Our Boundary Waters Kayaking Adventures '05


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For our 10th wedding anniversary we took a kayaking trip up to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area - over a million acres of protected wilderness in northern Minnesota.

We wanted to really get away from it all for a week, so we stayed in a rustic little cabin that was accessible only by water. No phone, no electricity, no running water. Probably one of the best get-away-from-it-all vacations we've ever taken.

It's hard to decribe how quiet and remote it was. We didn't see another person all week, and that was just fine with us. And at night it was so dark we would just sit out on the dock and stare at the sky in wonder - it was amazing!
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We rented this little cabin through the fine folks at Log Cabin Hideaways. It had been an old hunting camp and distillery that they rebuilt into a cozy cabin complete with wood-fired sauna.
BWCA Ely The view from our living room window was amazing. Some mornings the water was as smooth as glass.

These are Canadian Shield rocks that can be over 500 million years old.
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We paddled our Folbot Greenland II, Maggie, almost every day. Sometimes the wind made for some challenging paddling, but there were also lots of quite bays like this.
BWCA Ely Kayaking provides so much joy for us. It's hard to describe the sensation of gliding through a weed bed and it's so quiet you can hear them rub against the hull.
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Lilly pads - the water was clear, but stained dark like tea from all the plants.
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A beaver dam in one of the little bays. We saw otters, loons, and bald eagles, but no moose or wolves.
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One of the many rocky islands that dot the lake.
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Another little island.
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The rock cliffs at the end of our bay.
BWCA Ely The lake of full of these solitary boulders. Some of them have sprouted trees over the years.
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This is a campsite that part of the Superior National Forest system.
BWCA Ely We beached Maggie and took a little hike around the site.
BWCA Ely The campsite was on a solid sheet of rock that rose up out of the water in a gradual slope.
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The view from the cliff behind the campsite.
BWCA Ely Spooning rocks.
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Persistence.
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Ferns and moss fill in the cracks between the rocks. Life is everywhere.
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One of the many loons we saw while paddling. They liked to dive under the boat and pop up on the other side.
BWCA Ely A rock slide almost took out this tree, but it keeps hanging on.
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Gelina says she sees a guy wearing a tie in the cliff??? 
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The bay in front of our cabin taken in infrared. See Dave's Geek Stuff for details on how these were shot.
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The grove of tree outside the back of the cabin in infrared. See how almost black the sky is?
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The south end of the bay in front of our cabin. The IR makes it almost look like it was taker by moon light.
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Because they reflect IR, these pine needles glow like they're lit from within.
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Rain drops on the pine needles after our one day of bad weather.
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Mushrooms growing on a birch log.
BWCA Ely Maggie "parked" on the dock for the night. 
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In the evening light the dock showed such great grain and texture.
BWCA Ely Our outhouse with a view. Not a bad facility, as outhouses go. We had a mouse that liked to nibble the toilet paper. You would find little bits of it on the floor every morning.
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The cabin at night. They use propane lamps to light the place.
BWCA Ely The little wood stove did a great job keeping us warm the couple nights we needed it. Temps were in the 30s-40s at night and 60s-70s during the day.
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At night it was so dark you felt you could see every star in the sky. Here's the Milky Way over the bay outside the cabin.