Stuart River to Lower Basswood Falls - BWCA 2023

With the goal of seeing Lower Basswood Falls and permits unavailable for our three target entry points, we defaulted to a still available permit for the Stuart River entry point. This entry point starts with a 433 rod portage, plus five more mapped portages, as well as several additional unmapped beaver dams to climb over before arriving at the first campsites from Entry Point 19. Maybe this causes some unpopularity for this entry point, and perhaps it is this unpopularity that allowed us the permit.

Whitefish Lake Canoe Trip 2023

 

Welcome to our warmest ever Labor Day Weekend canoe trip in the Sylvania Wilderness. Typically our Labor Day trips feature cold nights. We gather around the campfire warming ourselves. This time we swam and paddled the standup paddle board around Whitefish Lake not really caring about warm campfires. In fact, at some points we could have used a cold breeze!

Wildflowers and Warm Weather on Memorial Weekend in the Sylvania Wilderness, Spring 2023

We packed up and headed north for our first canoe camping trip of 2023 with new canoeists along for the trip. Typically our May trips to the Sylvania Wildreness are cold, wet and buggy. Because guests new to the sport were traveling along, we hoped for good weather and mangeable bugs. We put in on Crooked Lake, paddled the length of Crooked and took the short portage to Mountan Lake to camp on Lynx 1 Campsite. After the second night, we paddled and portaged from Lynx 1 Campsite on Mountain Lake over to Coyote Campsite on West Bear Lake. This is what happened.

May 2021 Wildflower Canoe Trip in the Sylvania Wilderness

Setting off for four days in the Sylvania Wilderness, my husband looked forward to retesting our gear set, our daughter hoped for a cell signal, and I dreamed of spotting spring wildflowers after a long winter of bare trees and dull coloration. We drove to Michigan's Upper Peninsula and stopped view Burned Dam Falls before entering the wilderness. Burned Dam Falls proved to be home to several wildflower species and I grew excited thinking about what I might see in the wilderness.

2020 July Family Trip to Whitefish Lake in the Sylvania Wilderness

Capturing our precious family canoe tripping memories is one of my favorite things to do. As working parents know, finding the time to do the things we want to do isn't always easy. I feel rather anxious finding myself here in June 2021, recording the events of July 2020. But the memories are precious and few due to my having only a sparse allotment of vacation time. Although I come to the party late, I am glad I made it.

BWCA 2020

 

Those of you who have visited the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) know that summer trips include cold and rainy days. You come to expect inclement weather days with just enough nice days sprinkled in to inspire deep appreciation. With Covid19, the riots, and stories about how crowded the BWCA might be in mind, our family wasn't super focused on the weather when preparing for this trip. By luck we stumbled into atypical, beautiful warm days, with only a little rain. We've never had an August trip this beautiful before. 

Our Family's Last Canoe Trip of 2020

You waste weekends in the summer accomplishing obligatory chores. You think to yourself, "It's summer, I can camp and paddle anytime." Then suddenly, night begins to come earlier. The leaves shine brilliant gold, orange, red, and then poof - they're gone. It sneaks up on you, the last canoe trip of the season. Now you wish you had spent more days on the water, in camp, off the grid.

Teen Finds Joy Paddling in the Sylvania Wilderness, September 2020

Our daughter Ams is a teenager now. Everything is boring. On canoe trips it's always a fight. She wants to sit in the middle seat and fiddle with her phone. Canoes, being a part of "everything", eyeroll, are sooooo booooooring. To offer her a bit of independence, not to mention exercise and fun, my husband decided to pick up a kayak and start bringing it on our canoe trips, at least the ones that require a smaller amount of portaging. Let me tell you how it went.

Watching Goslings on our First Canoe Trip of 2020

With limited dispersed camping areas open in Wisconsin due to the Covid19 pandemic, we set off for a  closer-to-home destination. We went on a rainy spring day thinking the Turtle Flambeau Flowage would not be busy until Memorial Weekend. On the way, we saw other cars carrying canoes. As one sped by, I said to my husband, "Look they're racing you, they're trying to beat you to the campsite." We laughed, in a state with so much water, they could be headed anywhere. Imagine our surprise when we got to the landing and there they were, putting their boats. And yes, they did beat us to the first open campsite, although it wasn't a race and we were looking to go further in.

July 2019 Sylvania Wilderness Canoe Trip

Cold snowy days are great times for reminiscing about summer days gone by. Our 2019 four day canoe trip to celebrate the 4th of July seems so long ago.  It is funny how in hindsight the first things I remember are the warm sunny swim days, little fish jumping to eat mosquitoes, and the excitement of watching a porcupine visiting our campsite and climb trees. It is only after looking through the old videos and photographs that I recall the swarming mosquitoes, or the storm that came out of nowhere and turned out campsite into mud puddles.

Halloween Walk 2019

Despite the cold and wet weather, thousands of Leaf Peepers and Trick-or-Treaters flocked to High Cliff State Park for the 2019 Halloween Walk. Our daughter Ams brought a school friend along, and we arrived on Friday evening. We set up camp and enjoyed a nice campfire to take the chill off. Before we knew it he night was over. 

2019 10-Day Family Trip in the Boundary Waters Canoe Wilderness

Seeking solitude and a large dose of vitamin N, our family decided to enter the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) from a relatively unpopular entry point, #4 Crab Lake. There are no pictographs or big waterfalls to see from this entry point. The trip starts with a long paddle across Burntside Lake or the hiring of a tow. Once at the portage, the entry into the Boundary Waters kicks off with a once 370 rod portage, now 408 rod portage to Crab Lake.

Our First Canoe Trip of 2019 - 4 Days in the Sylvania Wilderness

There is nothing like a long, cold winter to make us ache for the warmer, carefree days of summer. Finally, the weather had become right for a canoe trip. With a song in our hearts we loaded up the car and headed north for a four day family trip to the Sylvania Wilderness in the Ottawa National Forest of Upper Michigan. As we drove it began to rain. We talked about the weather, the way people headed into the wilderness tend to do. Our goal for the day, to make it to camp without thunderstorms, and without our everything becoming entirely drenched.

An Eggscellent, Eggstraordinary, Egg Hunt in Camp

If you really want to know how gross and boring you are, ask your tween. You'll get an earful. Anyhow, being stuck with Mom and Dad in a place without WiFi - ugh! Right? Tweens one minute want to be babied, and the next minute want to be treated as adults. So I decided to do something just for fun to enjoy to the younger side of my tween Ams while there is still a little bit of it left - a surprise Easter egg hunt!

A Campy Halloween - 2018

Despite the cold and wet weather, thousands of Leaf Peepers and Trick-or-Treaters flocked to High Cliff State Park for the 2018 Halloween Walk. Our family arrived on Saturday morning. We set up camp and enjoyed a nice campfire to take the chill off while we waited for extended family to arrive. 

Three Spring Weekends

Spring's arrival sets our family off in celebration with a flurry of outdoor activities. Springtime in Wisconsin brings surprises. Blizzards bring deep snow, the sun warms the air from below freezing to beach-warm, sometimes within a 24 hour period. Don't like the weather? Wait 5 minutes!

Dehydrating Meats, Veggies, and Easy Entrees for Outdoor Adventures

Want to cut back on weight in your pack while increasing the nutrition and protein in your trail meals over that of store bought freeze dried foods? Dehydrating your own foods at home can be the solution you are looking for. In this post I'll provide you a list of tips for success and three videos on how to dehydrate meats, veggies, sauces and entrees for the trail. Once you understand the system, you can put together many of your own great meals for outdoor adventures!

Family Fun in Camp at the Long Lake Recreation Area in the Northern Unit of Wisconsin's Kettle Moraine State Forest

Our family had a glorious fall weekend camping at the Long Lake Recreation Area (LLRA) in the Northern Unit of the Kettle Moraine State Forest. We arrived to a warm, sunny afternoon which cooled quickly when night fell. Owls sung us to sleep and serenaded us again in the morning. 

Reflections on 2015

So much changes in a year, and so much stays the same. Jobs and people come and go out of our lives, but our wild places, our places of beauty and solitude, remain. With so many truly beautiful outdoor spaces to be thankful for, many of them close to home, I feel blessed. It is my hope that by sharing my love of these places, others will come to love them as well, leading to their preservation for future generations.