The Great Outdoors

I do the BWCA every other year roughly and my buddies and I go on a week long hiking trip every year. I'm also doing a pieced out hike of the superior hiking trail. My first leg was 4 days of rain but I still made about 70 miles.

My advice, when you look at anything for whatever you are doing look at the people who do it a lot and focus your money on the things they do. For example, I used to use a REI single person tent for my hikes. It was lightweight, easy to set up, and pretty bomber. No good hikers used it and I wondered why. After 4 days in the rain I understood. You can't set it up in the rain without everything getting soaked unless you use a tarp. Tarps are needless weight, they can be worth the weight however. I switched to a Tarptent double rainbow and rain is now manageable... Unless it is pouring, then you need the tarp. Super lightweight tarps are expensive and so are good tents. Worth the money.

They also spend money on shoes, those are subjective to some degree so I won't say what I use but most big hikers use trail runners instead of boots now.

I guess the lesson really is... Spend money on your hobby. It's always worth it.

A picture from my last BWCA trip with my son.

Ok, I have a nice bourbon next to me and screamfeeder asked for stories, so here's one.

When my son was young I made a concerted effort to get to the BWCA. We always brought friends and I always did all the planning. He was 11 at the time and a confident little guy. Quick to laugh and not a wuss when times got tough. He'd just look angry, tell you his opinion and move on. Great kid. We had my wife's sister, two of my friends and one of their kids along.

The trip started beautiful and rough as the BWCA is prone to doing. Gorgeous entry, a slow moving grassy steam with a couple of pull overs and short rocky portages to break up the sitting. I planned well. My buddy Bill (his real name) bought a new kevlar canoe for the trip (we rented) and custom wooden oars to go along with it. Todd and Kim's canoe was a brand new kevlar rental.

There are portents, in this case on one of the rocky portages. Bill set his custom beavertail paddle down and proceeded to fall off balance, step on it, and break it in half. $325 gone and used less than a day. Shortly thereafter it started to pour. We weren't that worried since we were one lake and one 60 rod portage away. Wet rocks are slippery. The other canoe my friend Todd was driving took a dive during a portage onto the sharp rocks. What was a shiny new rental kevlar now had a deep ding and several bad scrapes. We pushed on. After finally arriving at our destination lake we found both camping locations were full. Hindsight being what it is I should have known better. It's a perfect place for teenagers to screw and drink. That's who was there. So we moved on. We were now about 5 hours in, 2 of them in strong rain. The next portage and lake was promising. The first campsite was taken leaving one last shot. Lady luck seems to find me sometimes and she was with me that day. It was open and in good shape. There is a tradition in the BWCA of leaving a pile of chopped wood for the next group and a sprig of pine on the grill. This camp was no exception. The issue being, of course, we were soaked and so was all of the wood. No fires were had that night. We were decidedly cold but the kids were good about it. Truthfully I was worried, we were about one mild mistake from having to leave. One wet sleeping bag, one more broken paddle etc etc.

The next morning.

Anyone that camps knows how amazing sunshine feels after a wet night. It picks you up instantly. But we were in northern Minnesota at a campsite I hadn't scouted. Naturally it backed up to a swamp and with the sun came the mosquitoes. We aren't rookies to those but sometimes they seem particularly desperate. Even though he worked along with everyone, reading my child's mood on his face was easy, it was time to move. I suggested it and the adults agreed. We would take advantage of the sun, paddle along a huge lake (roughly 6 miles long about 1 mile wide) and camp on an island. Off we went, trying to find peace, and peace we found. 75, sunny in a huge lake and zero wind. You can only hope to remember it well enough. You could see fish swimming along the bottom of the lake clear as... Clear water? Lol

Along we went, in no hurry. Stopping once for fun and then back on our way. Without warning the wind came up. Strong wind. Within minutes we went from glass to 4 foot swells. I know that doesn't sound like much, but we were in heavily laden canoes. My son suggested sticking a little closer to the shoreline, so we stayed about 50 yards out. Along came a wave, a rogue wave about 5' high, it just carried us in towards shore. It set is down gently after about 20 yards on a huge flat sloped rock and we rolled into the drink.

At first you swim. Then you look for your kid. Then you look at the packs floating around you and lastly you try to stand. That's just how it goes. I found I could stand, my son was standing and the packs were floating. I had the canoe. But something was wrong, he was crying... Hard. Really hard. I hadn't heard that from him for probably 7 years at that point. Then your mind races before you can get the words out. He looks fine what could possibly be wrong? So I asked in a loud voice to be heard over the wind and waves. I think it shocked him. His response was simple and unexpected... Are we going to starve? Wtf. We didn't have the food, there other canoes did and they were fine. I could see them. So I asked, why would you think we are going to starve. "I dunno, the idea just scared me". Kids. I spent the next 15 minutes putting him to work getting loaded back up and getting us going to get his mind off of that idea. We made it to the island, barely. He fished for a day straight. I suppose to this day he doesn't remember that, probably a subconscious response to his fear.

I learned more lessons on that trip than any other. The tough trips, I don't want to call them bad because they aren't, are the ones that make you better. Sometimes they reveal unexpected problems and sometimes hidden fears.

Time for a plug. The canoe that was a brand new rental and came back looking like the one you won't buy used even if it was a bargain. We were ready to have to justifiably pay big money to the outfitters. We wouldn't have batted an eye if he said $600 in repair costs. At our outfitters, Bear Track in Grand Marais, the owner took one look at it and said he'd indeed have to charge us for it. How did $30 sound? We couldn't pay him fast enough. I use them to this day. Honesty at the end of a rough trip was refreshing and probably part of the reason my memories keep driving me back to enjoy that beautiful, dreadful, annoying, and relaxing place again and again.