June 17-21, 2020
Welcome to Ely, MN!
I had 6 trips planned between March and June and this was the ONLY one that didn't get canceled! So happy to finally be able to go somewhere!
Most people use an Outfitter to rent at least some of their gear. We decided on Boundary Waters Outfitters. My son and I rented ALL of our gear from there (you can get a package where literally everything from your canoe to life vest to cooking equipment to food, etc is included) and my brother and his two sons got the "canoe and food package."
BW Outfitters also has several rooms filled with bunkbeds. You can stay here the night before or after your trip for $20/person/night.
And they have a campfire area there too.
Practicing their fire starting skills.
Checking out the canoes.
Strapping the gear on to my back.
Getting the canoe racks on the truck.
Loaded up and ready to go!
After driving away from the BW Outfitters, we drove about 30 minutes to Entry Point #30. You have to get a permit in advance of your trip and each permit is for a certain entry point on a certain day. You can have up to 9 people on a permit. We secured our permit through the BW Outfitters.
Ready to launch.
Exploring Lake One
Found a campsite!
And set up camp.
Our campsite was off a little cove, which we named Turtle Cove due to all the turtles we found there. The boys set off in the canoe regularly to get fresh water and to catch turtles.
Pulling up to our campsite.
Pulling the canoes on to our campsite from the water.
With map in hand, planning out our next adventure!
Going for a dip in Turtle Cove.
One of the many turtles we caught (and then released)!
Turtle love
To get to Lake Two, you have to portage.... twice in each direction. You portage for about 30 rods into a small lake, then paddle over to the next portage, which is about 40 rods and then you get to Lake Two.
Ryan is portaging his canoe with the boys helping with the backpacks and paddles.
And I portaged the other canoe. Portaging is no joke! It's hard work!
Made it into Lake Two.
After an epic adventure into Lake Three and back which involved four portages, lunch on an island, fishing, getting caught in a current and losing an oar, we finally made it back to camp and had some dinner.
And then enjoyed the world's best sunset!
Our final morning. One last turtle hunt!
Group selfie before sailing away for the final time.
My nephew wanted one last camp pic after taking everything down. Leave no trace.
Tanner as King of the World (or Boundary Waters as the case may be) on the way back to Entry Point 30 where we started and ended our adventure.
We made it!
Map of the BWCAW area.
An up close pic of the area in which we spent most of our time. I put an "X" next to where we started and circled the campsite where we stayed.
Verdict: Yes! Absolutely! It's a ton of hard work and best done in a group. Originally, I was planning on going with just my son. Now that I've done it, I can't imagine doing it that way! I absolutely needed my brother there for so many reasons. In addition to it being extremely physical, the bugs are TERRIBLE. We brought bug repellant but we all got eaten alive by the mosquitoes. Dozens and dozens of miserable bites. Having said all that, it was some of the most breathtaking scenery I've ever seen and so isolating (depending on how deep in you go, you can go for days at a time without seeing another human - we didn't go that deep in, but we definitely went for hours at a time without seeing anyone else and when we did, they were typically pretty far away) which was so soothing and peaceful. I remember thinking of everything going on the world - the pandemic, the riots, the unrest. And then just consciously putting it all out of my mind and almost feeling total zen as I looked around and the only thing you could see or hear was nature. Beautiful, beautiful nature in all it's glory.
Cost: The pricey part of this trip is 1) Getting there and 2) Renting equipment. You could do this trip for next to nothing if you lived close by and had your own equipment. It was ~$500 for my son and I to rent everything (tent, sleeping pads, sleeping bags, cooking equipment, food, canoe, etc) for three days. My brother got the "food and canoe package" which is $47/person/day for the kevlar canoe (which is what he got because they are lighter canoes and we knew we would be portaging) or cheaper if you do the aluminum canoe. So it came to about $420 or so for the three of them for three days. We got plane tickets into Minneapolis and rented a car. Duluth is closer, but also a lot more expensive (at least for us). Minneapolis was 4.5 hours away from Ely.
