The Boundary Waters

 As usual, zillions of photos. We were to spend 6 days canoeing the boundary waters, in the far northeast corner of Minnesota north of Lake Superior, two nights in a cabin and 2 nights in the Upper Peninsula coming and going. We cut the canoe trip a day early as we had to go to a car mechanic 

Our starting point, Gunflint Lodge on the Canadian border. They provided us with all the food and equipment needed to be in the wilderness for a week

These photos are out of order. Our last campsite where we stayed for 24 hours, on an island. I preferred islands because I thought they would be too small to have bears

In the town of Grand Marais MN on the north shore of Superior 60 miles south of our lodge. We stopped there to get the car fixed and eat breakfast coming home. Main motifs: beavers, bears, moose and pike. They had a hotel called the Mangy Moose

The final campsite. This was the best one

Our two canoes loaded up with 9 very heavy bags. There were 5 of us

Nice sunrise 

At the beginning of the trip. My orange hat had a net to cover my head from the bugs and a backflap to protect my neck from the sun. We ranged from 52 to 70

The lodge

Our bunkhouse before and after the trip 

The grill usually had a log to sit on. You can see my white hair 

We didn’t see any bears but food had to be protected from them.  Very hard getting those heavy bags high enough to protect them. Sometimes we didn’t have suitable trees so the food bags were put under the canoes. We figured we’d hear the bears trying to get the packs and then could scare them away

Pretty irises all around 

And this frog

Not clear but this is a beaver

The guys purifying water. They are putting it through a filter to get out microbes. For cooking, we boiled water filtering out sediment with a washcloth. I put propel in my drinking water to mask the water taste

There were several waterfalls we had to portage around 

Our route in purple, the first half along the Canadian border. Allegedly 28 river miles but we had to do detours and got lost several times backtracking so we probably did close to 40

Me studying the map. Not obvious where we were a lot of the time as there are no signs anywhere

How the Canadian border is marked. 6 inch tall aluminum stakes every few miles or so. This also was the site of our fist portage. Note ginormous granite boulders

Gooseberry falls on the way to the lodge along Lake Superior 

No bears or pine martens but we did have red squirrels someone dropped a cookie and this guy scrambled over instantly to grab it

Organizing lunch

Inside the lodge dining room  lots of Walleye this and that on the menu

The Big Mac 

In our breakfast place

So instead of taking a weeklong bike ride this summer, I decided to canoe the boundary waters with a work friend and three others. I have taken overnight canoe trips before but not like this. For instance on trip we left all our food,cooking and camping supplies in a car at the halfway point and although we were in Northern Michigan lots of people around to help us if we got into trouble. On the Boundary Waters, they really limit the number of people on the waters so we could go for hours and not see anyone  and for the first half, no boat could ever rescue us as there were numerous waterfalls and white water that required portages  No cell service, not even at the lodge though we had internet  so no contacting anyone   We had an emergency beacon if something was really dire and a gps device that took forever to load to get our position 

 The canoe part was easy as we usually had tailwinds. I could canoe for hours. What I can’t do is handle was the portages. I naively thought we’d carry the canoe along a broad flat path such as the ones along our local river

On the way back we stopped to eat in Munising, home of the Pictured Rocks, to eat at the Eh! burger featuring Canadian food and bison

Trying to get the canoe up the boulders. We formed an assembly line

A loon which you can barely see   Heard their mournful cries in the morning and in the evening 

Pie shop we stopped by. pie is the Minnesota snack food. I had raspberry rhubarb 

Lupine all over the place on the North Shore( vogageur highway)these are considered invasive weeds but are so pretty

huge dragonfly. This guy is more than 3 inches long, a darner dragonfly. Usually little sky blue ones landed in our canoes

Years ago I read ‘The Things They Carried’ by Tim O’Brien about his and his fellow soldiers’ experience in the Viet Nam war and what they carried both physically and mentally. He didn’t believe in the war and initially escaped to Canada through the boundary waters which I can see for myself how this is possible  Good luck building a wall here

What we carried: food for at least ten days in case we were unable to get back, 2 tents, 5 sleeping bags with heavy pads, 4 tanks of propane, lots of pots and pans, silverware .  We were to carry out all our trash so let’s say we cooked a half pound package of some noodle dish but only ate half of it, we are left with heavier hydrated garbage so these bags didn’t get much lighter. The unmarked camping spots, far and few between, had a fire ring, a log to sit on and a latrine 200 yards away usually up through brambles and always through bugs

So the 12 portages were an unbelievable ordeal always measured on our map in ‘rods’ sometimes hard to find, sometimes right on top of the waterfall so lots of desperate paddling. As strong and as fit as I am, I was pretty much useless on these portages. I have no balance. What little I had, chemo destroyed. I had to scramble on hands and knees while being bitten by horseflies. I fell down several times as did others. Fortunately no one was badly injured so I couldn’t carry those heavy bags while trying not to fall. I would help in the assembly line getting things over huge boulders and dropping bags to reload the boat but I hardly was doing my share.   one of these portages took 2 hours. For the first 2 days, much more time was spent portaging than canoeing. And it was unbelievably hot despite how far north we were Even the water was warm. I know the others were resentful especially the other woman who seemed to be part mountain goat. She was really friendly with me until the portages and then never talked to me again. And after all that we couldn’t find a campsite and it was getting dark despite the sun setting much later there. We finally found one on a lake not on our path  Despite all the Deet, the mosquitoes were ruthless. We scrambled to set the tents up in the failing light, get a fire started(fires and cooking were my job as was water procurement as it was the least I could do. Waterproof matches suck. They are covered in wax which you have to cut off without cutting off the stuff that makes fire. Fortunately someone brought regular matches   They packed steaks for us, some completely frozen, some bleeding all over everything so cooking these was tricky especially by flashlight. Eventually I got them done. Finally we could eat. After a few bites somehow a piece got lodged in my throat. This has never happened before to me but I knew I was dying. Someone said to help me but they though I was vomiting so I managed somehow to do the Heimlich maneuver on myself. I had brought wine but I dumped that out and went to bed.  I kept dehydrated for the first 2 days just so I wouldn’t ever have to leave the tent. It sounded like we were in the center of a beehive so many mosquitoes were out there. We were all grumpy but we couldn’t go back because of those portages though the group that left an hour before us came back the next day and said never again. Anyway I was quite miserable. And then a storm came through and we left stuff unprotected 

Fortunately things got better. We had a leisurely breakfast cooked again by me. It was obvious to me how to get out of the lake area but my canoe partners didn’t agreed and we went off in another direction. Meanwhile the other canoe went in the right direction and disappeared from our sight.  My partners assumed they had tipped over so we went to save them. It was a big lake full of islands and coves so lots of places to be invisible. after 2 hours we finally found them they being incredulous that we went off in such a stupid direction. More portages but then a miracle, some young dudes took pity on us and helped us through 2 of them so we could get to a campsite before dark. And on the third day , different young dudes helped us so we went to our deluxe island retreat by noon and relaxed and I finally could get clean in the lake. We were now in a zone that boats could go so I felt safer. And we set up camp by noon the next day confidant we could finish on time or even earlier 

Going there we stopped in Ironwood Michigan, as far north and west you can go. 600 miles from my house. I could get to DC or Manhattan in less miles We didn’t meet up until 1 as my friend still works and lives on the west side of the state and I am on the east Steve drove me to the drop off point north of Lansing with Maya in tow as her Dad now lives just south of Lansing. 

The UP is beautiful but as they say, 10 months of winter and 2 months of visitors. political signs would just show the outline of the UP missing a good chunk of the state. We Michiganders below the bridge are known to them as trolls. They talk about forming their own state, Superior, but they are very dependent on the trolls. So signs for smoked whitefish and pasties all over the place. We stopped for pasties. I could have had a bison pastie, must have bison farms up there now, but I opted for beef, very tasty 

Gas was a problem despite the weekend meaning lots of tourists. we drove along Lake Michigan for awhile before heading up the middle to Lake Superior and drove along the coast.  very beautiful but no time to stop. Years ago I biked this same path with my friend, a long way.  the sun was setting making it hard to see despite my very dark sunglasses. I think it was close to midnight est when we pulled into our tacky motel but that part of the UP is in the central time zone

The next morning we went across a few hours of Wisconsin before going through the big city of Duluth There we headed northeast along the shores of Lake Superior. very beautiful with all those lupines.  We stopped at Betty’s world famous pie shop and a state park that had the largest waterfalls in Minnesota.  The thimbleberries, all over the place weren’t quite ripe

When we almost got to the Canadian border at Grand Marais we turned  due north up a twisty hilly road for 60 miles to the lodge. no cell service but we had wifi as long as we were close to the lodge. We had to go to an orientation but settled down to a nice dinner with the other two on our trip. Unfortunately we got a flat in the parking lot. The lodge had a landline. AAA said they would come in 2 hours but were no shows after 4. They said they called 3 contractors none willing to do that drive. A donut was put on and we hoped it would last the 60 miles down to the Lake which it did

We cut short our trip by a day so we could get to the tire place when it was open. We were out there long enough. finding rooms on a Saturday night was impossible. Finally found some in Sault Ste Marie. The guys said we had no time to look at the locks the next morning.