Annual BWCA Trip - part 1

This past week was what has become a near annual camping trip into the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) Wilderness.

The usual foursome of Jenny, Julie, Brian and me drove up north on Tuesday. We spent the night in Jenny and Andrew's cabin on Gust Lake off the Grade (road). We paddled in on Sawbill Lake from Sawbill Outfitters.

There is a very long and, looking back, funny story on how we ended up where we did but I'll make the text of this post short and post the photos that I took. There will hopefully be more photos when the others get theirs off their cameras and phones.

Paddling in on Sawbll

Around the campfire grate

Fire grate and some of our cooking gear

A Jack Pine pinecone. The Nut Hatches really like these.

Dramatic sky while paddling. We did have storms during this trip.

A double water lily. We saw lots of these on our river paddle.

We love to swim in the lakes. We always where our life jackets.

A dramatic sunset. The reflection off the lake is always a winner.

One of our campsite sitting rocks.

We all happened to wear our Gust Lake t-shirts!

Annual Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness trip

Starting off from Sawbill Outfiitters on Sawbill Lake.  July 13.

Portaging over a beaver dam

Typical campsite activities...reading and fishing and relaxing

Female or juvenile merganser ducks.

Having fun in the lake...lots of swimming

Day trip to Frost Lake with a sandy beach

Day trip past "face rock"

Julie with all our eggs intact

Jenny on rock on rock

Sitting on the rock on the rock

The rock on rock...red circle is the little rock that is holding the bigger rock on the giant rock...the blue circle is the trunk of the tree somehow growing out of the giant rock

Day trip...fern rock

Julie in campsite

Getting ready to leave in the rain

Back at Sawbill.  July 16.

Part of our gear (tent, rain fly and tarps) spread out at Jenny and Andrew's cabin to dry.

The other part of our gear.

It was a fantastic trip.  Left from Sawbill Lake on Friday, July 13.  Our destination was Cherokee Lake, a beautiful lake with enormous boulders, rock walls and mature trees.

The weather was forecast to be sketchy with high probability of rain.  We lucked out for the most part.  No rain until Monday when we paddled back to civilization.

The pictures tell the visual story but what you can't experience are all the different birds we saw and heard.  Saw several loons, various types of ducks, seagulls, bald eagles doing aerial acrobats and an osprey.  Heard so many song birds it was magical.

• Had a fun encounter with a frog.
• The flies were irritating but manageable.
• The mosquitoes won out as we had to take shelter in the tent every evening.