BWCAW 2020
Ely, MN
After having so much fun on our first trip to the BWCAW last year, we decided to make it an annual thing. There’s just something awesome about relaxing in the backcountry and spending your days fishing, paddling a canoe, and lounging around camp. This year looked a little different than last year - we decided to start at an entry point in the Ely area instead of Grand Marais, we brought our furbaby along, and we went with some friends new to canoeing. We also opted for a more laid back trip and base camped for two nights rather than changing campsites every night, which was great!
Since it’s been a little while since we wrote about the BWCAW, let’s start with some logistical info. The BWCAW is over one MILLION acres of wilderness area in the Superior National Forest of MN, bordered to the north by Quetico Provincial Park in Canada. It has over one thousand lakes, two thousand campsites, and 1200 miles of canoe routes. A trip to the BWCAW can be as complicated or simple, strenuous or laid back, and remote or close to civilization as you want. There are big and small lakes, long and short portages (trails between lakes), and endless experiences to be had there, and it’s amazing! Well what do you think, have we sold you on a trip to the BWCAW yet?
We drove up to Ely on Thursday night and arrived at our outfitters around 9pm. We checked into our bunkhouse, took Crimson for a walk around downtown Ely, and relaxed. We used Voyage North Outfitters - they open early, close late, have amazing bunkhouses (complete with private bathroom, a fridge, and a microwave), and are located about 20 minutes from the entry point that we chose. Lindsey and Al got in around 11, and then we hit the hay to get some sleep!
Day 1: Burntside Lake to Cummings Lake
We got up early and hit the road by 6am, snagged the last two parking spots at the canoe launch, and were on the water by 6:45! When you book a trip to the BWCAW, you reserve an entry point - this is where you are supposed to start your trip. Then once you’re in, you can choose any route and stay at any designated campsite. In our case, our entry point was #4, Crab/Cummings Lake - unique because there isn’t a road to these lakes, the way to get there is a one mile portage from Burntside Lake. So that is where we began our adventure - Burntside Lake. It was a beautiful lake, clear and calm, and studded with tons of islands! As we were paddling it was hard to tell the difference between the shoreline of Burntside and the many islands, which was problematic for us because we were supposed to be following the shoreline toward our first portage. Some of these islands were massive, large enough for cabins to be built on them! Luckily we still had cell reception, and we checked Google Maps just in time to see we almost passed the portage, and were able to find it pretty quickly after that. We really need to invest in a GPS…
Next came our 360 rod portage, the toughest of the trip (except for our final day, when we had to do it again to get back to our cars!) - as a reminder, one rod is about 16.5 feet, so 360 rods is roughly a mile of portaging. We decided to do it all in one trip - packs, canoes, paddles, fishing poles and all! Lindsey and Al took turns carrying their canoe, and Joe proudly carried ours the whole portage and wouldn’t let Ashley take a turn so that he could say he portaged the entire mile, haha. It felt really long, even for a certain someone who didn’t even carry a canoe! Finally we made it to the other side, and we were greeted by a nice sandy beach onto Crab Lake. We took a rest and loaded everything back into our canoes, then started paddling. Crab Lake was beautiful, loaded with pines and a jagged, rocky shoreline. It was a quick paddle and we arrived at our second portage, this time only 20 rods, onto Little Crab Lake - another pretty lake with huge boulders along the shore.
We turned onto the Korb River which led us to small Korb Lake, opted out of a 70 rod portage and instead continued on the Korb River to take a “shortcut”. This section was so beautiful - kind of marshy with a narrow winding river jam packed with lily pads and lotus flowers. Some lily pads were huge, and others were much smaller with different colors including green, yellow, brown, and bluish-purple, and they all seemed to fit together like a mosaic. We were expecting a tiny (if any) portage onto Cummings Lake but were surprised to see the river blocked off by a beaver dam. We found a narrow, rocky portage trail that was a lot tougher than we thought. It was also tough to put the canoes back in the water after that portage, the shoreline was really rocky and slippery! (Joe may or may not have slipped in up to his waist).
We paddled to our first choice campsite, an island on the east side of the lake, and crossed our fingers - and it was open! We were exhausted and relieved to be able to stop for the day, especially at such a cool spot. The site was amazing - it had a firepit up on a hill overlooking the lake, great views of more rocky islands around us, and a huge slab of rock sloping down into the water - and we had the whole island all to ourselves! We pitched our tents at the bottom of the hill out of the wind, had some lunch, and set up some tarps to be ready for the rain we feared was coming. We relaxed in our hammocks for a while, then went fishing around our island for a bit.
We came back to camp for dinner and built a fire, which had an absolutely epic backdrop with the lake down below! There were a bunch of toads hiding in the rocks around our firepit, because as soon as it heated up all the toads came jumping out - Crimmy had a good time chasing them down. We relaxed around the fire for a while, then went to bed! It stormed a little bit overnight, and we woke up to thunder and lightning a few times. Our tent held up great though, we stayed warm and dry and Crimson slept right through it!
Day 2: Day Trip from Cummings Lake
Crimson had us up around 6:30 Saturday morning, eager to wreak havoc on the rodent population of the island. The rain had stopped but it was pretty foggy, which had an eerie effect on the landscape around us. We had some breakfast and coffee, then packed some bags for a day trip to explore the west side of Cummings Lake. We trolled while we paddled, and Lindsey found a hot spot in a bay and caught 4 bass (including our lunch!) Joe and Ashley explored a bay with some neat rocky slopes on both sides, but no fish, and Ashley may or may not have snagged Joe’s new silver rattletrap and lost it…We all came back to camp for lunch, fried up Lindsey’s catch, then swam a bit and relaxed. While the big slab of rock at the entrance to our camp was picturesque, it was also very slippery and quite difficult to climb, which led to some difficulties getting out of the water after swimming and canoeing!
We went out fishing again before dinner - Joe caught a nice 30” northern which we threw back, and Ashley caught a decent smallmouth bass that we fried up to supplement our dehydrated meals for dinner. We made a fire and enjoyed the most beautiful sunset over the lake. We sat on the big flat rock at the top of the hill and watched the sky turn yellow, orange, and pink. We ooh-ed and aah-ed at the gorgeous mix of colors, listened to the loon calls, and went to bed for the night!
Day 3: Cummings Lake to Crab Lake
It was very humid and still overnight, and the morning was overcast with a good chance of rain. Since our last trip we invested in some walkie-talkies which not only helped with communication between our two canoes (that is, until the batteries died), but they also had weather scanners which really came in handy since we had no cell service out there. We packed up camp and got back in our canoes, heading for Crab Lake. We just about made it to the portage onto Korb Lake when it started sprinkling. During the portage it turned into a heavier rain, and we changed into rain gear, sucked it up, and kept going. We paddled as fast as we could through the twisty Korb River onto Little Crab Lake, and the rain poured down on us as the thunder and lightning rolled in. We decided we needed to get off the water ASAP, and checked every campsite we passed. The only campsite on Little Crab was taken, so we pressed on through the 20-rod portage onto Crab Lake, and were crushed to see the first campsite there was also taken. We finally found an unoccupied site, unloaded our gear, and set up some tarps for cover.
The four of us worked together to set up a shelter out of the rain, attempted to dry off, and waited. Crimson was soaked to the bone, and we wiped her down with some towels and wrapped her in Ashley’s jacket. We had some hot food, played part of a cribbage game, and then the rain stopped. The campsite we found was less than ideal - no good tent pads, on a huge slope, and we really wanted to be closer to the portage back onto Burntside. So we hopped back in the canoes, and got half way across Crab Lake when, once again, it poured rain, thundered, and we saw lightning flash across the sky. We turned around and went back to camp, and Lindsey and Al had to stop at another campsite because they couldn’t see through the rain! Crimson was wet and cold again, and clearly unamused. We warmed her up and she fell asleep on Ashley’s lap, and we all gave up on switching campsites for the night.
We used the next break in the rain to set up our tents, and it actually cleared up long enough for us to get a fire going. We relaxed around the fire, drank up our booze, and enjoyed not sitting under a tarp! Eventually it started raining again, and this sent us heading back for cover. We sat under the tarp and smoked a cigar, then retired to our tent, read our books, and fell asleep to more thunder.
Day 4: Heading Home
We woke up to sunny skies Monday morning, and were on our way out of camp by 7am on the dot. We had an uneventful paddle back across Crab Lake, suffered through the mile long portage (again), and navigated through the many islands of Burntside Lake. The paddle back to the boat launch was nice - sunny with just a little bit of a breeze. It was a bittersweet feeling pulling the canoe out of the water for the last time - we were tired, hungry, sore, and stinky, but boy was it worth it!
What an awesome trip! Major props to Al and Lindsey who did AMAZING - no one would ever know it was their first time in the BWCAW. We also really liked the Ely area - closer to home and tons of outfitters to choose from. We had an amazing campsite on Cummings Lake, arguably one of the coolest campsites we’ve ever had, and it’s hard to beat the gorgeous sunset we had on Saturday night. The rain on Sunday was unfortunate, but at least we were prepared, and we were blessed with beautiful weather on Friday and Saturday. You just can’t beat a trip in the BWCAW.
Hope you enjoyed our post! Check out the rest of our pictures in our gallery.