515 Rods

Portages, love or hate them are a big part of the BWCA experience. You really cannot get anywhere without at least hiking some in-between lakes. Sure you can choose to stay on one lake your whole trip or simply go down a river, but such trips miss out on so much more that the BWCA has to offer. These days though people are increasingly doing shorter trips to only the periphery of the BWCA and not working their way into the interior as much (Forest Service latrine cleaning statistics back this fact up, specifically periphery lake campsites have a lot more you know what in their latrines!). Reason being is that doing so requires a lot more canoeing and a lot more portaging, people would rather set up camp a couple lakes in and relax as opposed to pushing themselves to see a larger portion of the wilderness.

While I have done some trips this summer that have been a bit more on the lazy side, my most recent solo was definitely not! While I did not cover as much mileage as some of my past trips my trip did take me through a route that is traveled by only a handful of daring souls each year. While my route was not exactly deep in the BWCA, people avoid it for a completely different reason.....a dreaded 515 Rod portage! Not only is this portage 1.60 miles long, but the elevation change is brutal as one is constantly going up and down over huge rolling hills.

My Route: Seagull Lake to Round Lake. I originally planned to just spend my entire day off on Seagull relaxing, but when morning came I decided I wanted something a bit more challenging (and perhaps insane). The Entire route is around 15 miles, the first marker (going North to South) is my starting point, the second my campsite, and the third was my final destination of Tuscarora Outfitters on Round Lake. The large portage is from Seagull Lake to JA Paulson Lake

Of course 515 rods and massive elevation change was not enough for me so I decided to do this portage solo (meaning I got to carry all my gear and my boat) and I did it on one of the hottest days of the summer (90+ degrees, sunny, and very high humidity). Needless to say by the time I finished it I was exhausted (although I did find a bit more strength to filter some more water to drink!). Unfortunately the long 515 rod portage was only my first portage of the day and I still had 10 more to go in order to make my way back to Round Lake and Tuscarora Outfitters.

So after a quick rest I was on my way cutting across more lakes and portages. Surprisingly by the end of the day the dreaded 515 Rod portage was not my least favorite of the day. Upon arriving on Fay Lake I was unable to locate the portage to Flying Lake. I searched several deer trails and other potential paths and was completely exasperated. Finally after about 45 mins of searching I went back to where I thought it should be (according to the map at least) and bushwhacked around in the woods a bunch. Finally I discovered what appeared to be a small path heading off in the right direction. I had not found it earlier because there were tons of trees down by the lake so it did not look like a portage from the water. While I had finally found the portage my trials and tribulations were far from over. As hardly anyone does this route the portage was extremely poorly kept up. Trees had overgrown the portage everywhere and there was barely any room to walk. The result of this was that I got to spend 100 rods literally ramming my canoe through brush and trees the entire way. There were many times during the portage where I wondered if I was actually on a portage at all or if I had just followed some deer path into the woods and would never reach a lake on the other side! Needless to say when I finally arrived at Flying Lake I was greatly relived (and tired).

The rest of my trip was mostly uneventful as I worked my way through a handful more lakes and portages, all of which I had done before on previous trips, before finally arriving back at Tuscarora mid-afternoon.

The trip from Seagull Lake to Round Lake, via JA Paulson Lake (also called Jap Lake), is not one I would generally recommend. I loved the challenge and the remoteness of it, but it is not for the feint of heart. Campsites are few and far between and portages are frequent and long. Still if you are up to the task and want to take on a fun challenging route, go for it, just do not say you were not warned!

Granite River

Last Monday and Tuesday I went on another trip during my day off. Myself and another staffer, Rachel, decided that we would go down the granite river route which goes from Gunflint Lake to Saganaga Lake. While the area is still quite burned from the 2007 Ham Lake fire it still is a great route that offers a lot of cool things including good fishing, river rapids, fairly easy portages, and scenic views.

Rachel actually already blogged about this trip for the Tuscarora Blog, so instead of writing my own blog post about it I am simply posting the route we did (below) and the link to Rachel's Blog Post. Enjoy!

Gunflint Lake to Saganaga Lake (21 Miles) via the Granite River. We camped Monday night on Larch Lake

Seagull Rendezvous

After a bunch of trips in which I spent a lot of my time paddling and portaging long distances to see large sections of the BWCA I decided it was time for something a little different (and more relaxing!). Lucky for me a lot of other people had the same idea. Staffers from three different Outfitters (Tuscarora, Seagull, & Voyager) all had last Thursday off and decided that we would do a short group trip on Seagull Lake. The great thing about Seagull is that it is a large entry lake in the BWCA and thus requires absolutely no portaging and only some paddling but still allows one to get into the wilderness.

Our trip was full of good weather (minus a few isolated thunder storms), good food, fun people, an amazing stary night, beautiful wilderness, and while the fishing was not great we still enjoyed ourselves and did not get skunked completely! Below are some pictures from the trip, enjoy.

Seagull Lake and our brief (and easy!) route

Maggie and I Canoeing on Seagull Lake

Dylan and I soaking up the sun after an afternoon swim

Sunset on Seagull Lake

The Palisade on Seagull (if you look closely you can see people climbing it)

Part of the View from the top of the Palisade, we took the hiking trail up (as opposed to scaling the 50-80 ft cliff faces)

Picture of Maggie, Dylan, Alyssa, and I on top of the Palisade

Watching a storm approach from across the Lake

Into the Wild with a Friend

Things have been really busy here at Tuscarora in recent weeks between having a group of 50 middle schoolers come through and the 4th of July festivities. The result of all this has been that I am a bit behind on blogging about my trips (I have actually done two since I last blogged now!). So now I am trying to rectify that by blogging about a trip I did last week with Randon Ruggles (a college buddy from Wartburg).

Way earlier this year (back in January) I told Randon that I would be working up in the BWCA over the summer. He told me that he in that case might just have to come up for a trip. So throughout the spring and early summer we talked and eventually were able to find a time that would work for both of us. We settled on Monday June 27th to head out and our trip lasted through July 1st. Normally I only get one day off a week but I had already banked two days off so far this year so between using those extra days and agreeing to work a late shift on the day we came back we were able to take a trip that spanned over parts of 5 days and 4 nights!

Our Route (Click to Expand): American Point on Lake Saganaga to Tuscarora Outfitters on Round Lake (35 Miles). The first and last markers are the start and finish points and the four in-between mark our campsites on Hansen, Ogishkemuncie, Little Saganaga, and Tuscarora Lakes respectively.

So at 3:00 pm right after work on the 27th Randon and I quick finished up our packing and then headed for our entry point. We actually cheated a bit as we took a Tow Boat across Lake Saganaga to American Point. This allowed us to get a head start on our route and explore some different areas within the BWCA. Our overall route was a one way trip from American Point on Lake Saganaga to Tuscarora on Round Lake. That first evening it was raining a decent amount so a lot of the campsites were already taken (people trying to stay dry!) so we ended up canoeing a lake further then we originally planned and camped on Hansen Lake. Our site was not much to write about but none the less it served its purpose and our trip was officially underway.

Randon and I about to head out on our Tow to American Point

On the 28th we got up, cleaned up our camp, and hit the water early in the morning. Our route that day took us through Knife Lake (which is gorgeous). There in addition to enjoying the large channels, old growth, and rolling hills around the lake we found a large waterfall pouring into Knife right by our exit portage. While it would of been fun to stay longer on Knife we pressed onward to our final destination that day of Ogishkemuncie Lake. There we found an awesome campsite that sat on a high rock peninsula that overlooked the main part of the lake. In camp that day we spent the afternoon enjoying some sun, our first campfire, steak & potatoes, and a beautiful sunset.

Randon Canoeing on Knife Lake

Waterfall into Knife Lake

Looking out over Knife Lake

View of Ogishkemuncie Lake from our Campsite

Sunset over Ogishkemuncie Lake

June 29th took us from Ogishkemuncie to Little Saganaga Lake. The highlight of this day was that throughout the entire day we saw absolutely no one. This made for a peaceful paddle and an enjoyable relaxing camp experience on Little Saganaga. To boot the entire day was perfectly sunny with almost no clouds in the sky. Similar to the previous day we spent the morning paddling to get to our campsite (an amazing Island site overlooking the main portion of the lake) and the afternoon relaxing in camp reading, sunning, swimming, and eating.

Our trusty stead, a 15 foot Aluminum canoe

Sunset over Little Saganaga

The 30th was our final full day of our trip so our goal was to get near to Tuscarora Outfitters so our final morning would not be too difficult or long a paddle. So we headed out from our Little Sag campsite and made for Tuscarora Lake. There we grabbed the famous Island campsite (a common place for Tuscarora employees to go on their days off). While the weather was not quite as nice as the previous two days we stilled enjoyed hanging out and relaxing in camp.

Sunset over Tuscarora

July 1st we decided to get up early and paddle out with the sunrise. While we did get up around 5:00 am, it was a cloudy morning so we missed seeing the sun come up. Still our effort was not in vein as it proved to be an extremely hot day and very humid so by getting up early we missed the worst of the heat. While we were only two lakes away from Round Lake we still had to transverse the Tuscarora (425 Rods) and the Missing Link Portages (a steep 140 Rods), so needless to say we worked hard that final morning. None the less we managed to finish up our canoe by 8:00 am that morning leaving me time to recover before work and Randon plenty of time to make the long drive back to the Twin Cities.

Randon double packing on a portage

Overall we had an amazing trip. Yes our trip like all others had lots of problems such as a rainy first day, a seriously slooooooow water filter, ineffective propane burner, and sometimes less then appetizing dehydrated foods but the upside of good companionship, remote and pristine wilderness, peaceful solitude, beautiful sunsets, and much more easily overcame any hiccups our trip encountered.