On the way, we spent 2 nights in the creepy Superior National Forest. Creepy because our campsite was littered with bullet cases, had a beaver skeleton which someone had bashed the skull of pre- or post-mortem and we found a smashed up nesting box.
The Wooden Frog State Park was a welcome relief, quiet and peaceful, we saw a bald eagle and white tailed deer, neither of which fled from us.
In the spirit of the pioneers we elected to canoe to back country campsites and stay out for 2 nights. This meant we had to carry food, make water, have a camp stove, tent, sleeping Bags and so on. Just to make sure we have a challenge we have zero canoeing experience and a lot of the first lake is open to the winds: they have a lot of wind in Minnesota and North Dakota.
So we packed up and set off across the Kabetogama lake. A lady in a power boat had left the area we were going through in our open canoe because of the waves and worsening conditions. We had winds up to 20knots, so elected to do an inland traverse to avoid the worst of the open lake. We left the visitor centre and travelled into the lost lake. Our portage was just a quarter of a mile, but with all our outdoor gear and a heavy 2 person aluminium canoe it seemed a lot longer.
We then had to paddle up the long slough, where Caroline gave directions to another paddler and then we slogged up the lost bay (this also seemed a lot longer!) Lifting the canoe out of the water we then walked to our campsite on one of the ‘inland’ lakes, beautiful and tranquil.
Our first night in the tent the thunder and lightning storm was unbelievable. The whole tent lit up time and time again, thunder claps were deafening, torrential rain fell and winds shook the whole tent. Thankfully after 90 minutes the storm ended and we could leave the tent.
Loons must be the noisiest birds in the world. The first night out we slept for 9 hours, Caroline briefly waking because something was munching noisily on the flora around the tent.
All to ourselves, a whole lake; wonderful, we really enjoyed our canoeing and camping out.

 Bear pole

As Florence Page Jaques of Canoe County said, “This is the moment I think I’ve really given my heart to our canoe country, though I have been entranced with it from the first. But here its special quality of wild innocence touches me sharply and deeply.”

What is this bug?

Creepy!