May 11, 2025

I committed to a whitewater paddling trip in August. This has been in the works for almost a year now. It’s still 3 months away, but only three weeks until my departure from here to MN. I’m vacillating between finding and packing the myriad and necessities for four months of building a house and preparing for a 14-day paddle on the Hayes River in the wilderness of Manitoba. Both enterprises are foreign to my bailiwick.  

But all the details of shutting this house down and getting ready to resume our house building project are daunting. At least we’ve worked on this for the past two years and I have some knowledge of place and duties. Whereas the Hayes and whitewater canoeing is new to me.

I’ve read a couple dozen books, and watched many more You tubes on paddling Wilderness Canada. I run with canoe adventure audiobooks being read to me through earbuds. I love all this stuff: canoeing, camping, wilderness, the Arctic. So I’m absolutely thrilled to have an opportunity to paddle here.

A couple days ago, the book Riverman ended just as my run did. What to listen to next? And Deliverance came to mind. When I read it, I’m thinking in the 80s, I loved the writing, and it takes place on a river. Now I’m past the middle of the book, and it’s a terrific read, but I’m wondering if Deliverance might not have been my best idea.

May 3, 2025

I’m emerging from a long hibernation of sorts. I was set to abandon this blog and just use Facebook to do some photo journaling. But more and more, I have a hard time wading through all the reels and advertising to follow my friends. I believe others must have the same experience.

The impetus to blog now is that I feel I’m entering unknown territory, unsure of how to navigate. I’m labelling this Terry-tory. You probably know we’re building a house. The we is composed of Terry. Mostly, I’m of no help. Terry always says “we.” But that’s far from the truth.

Last year we left MN in early October to beat the cold by returning to our house in CA. Terry had our crawlspace/foundation (the culmination of months of work,) covered in multiple tarps impervious to every possible condition and varmint. Hopefully that is.

This year, he’s leaving on May 18th two weeks ahead of me. Then he will face the consequences of the winter.

Then he’ll continue where he left off. Proceeding will be a test and a testament to every decision HE makes. it’s a nail biter.

Hopefully by the end of September, we’ll have a warm envelope—walls up, doors and windows in, heat and plumbing functioning. Then we can continue with the interior.

I would love to share this process and progress with you.

Below Zero

Terry sacrificed his puffy for me because I had all the clothes I brought on already and was snug in my sleeping bag yet still shivering. I felt vindicated when I exited the tent in the morning to a frosty world.

We headed into the Moose River. So narrow now it was barely a stream. I’ve been listening to the audiobook, Beaver Land by Leila Philip. I feel more amazement for these animals and their work. Yet I’ve never seen one at work. We saw a number of them swimming with their V wake trailing them. But all of their dams and lodges were abandoned leaving us many opportunities to negotiate rounding and plowing through their work. We were just here seven days ago but didn’t recall all the these obstacles. Sometimes we could rush a small break in the sticks as we pushed off with our paddles.

Other times we needed to evacuate the canoe standing atop the dam or in the knee deep water pulling the canoe as it raked and rasped the gnawed boards of these bridge builders and then caught and released our boat.

We were in and out of the small 25 rod portages and then it was the last 160 rod portage to reach the hole in the forest that dumped us into the parking lot.

Back in the car we don’t need the heat on. Maybe we never did.

We were back on the Echo Trail with wilderness in the rear view mirror.

Time to warm up

It’s time to reverse our directions to return to Ely. I rose to the “rosy fingers of dawn” and once again recited the adage, red skies at morn sailors take warn. Instead of the rosy cheeks of morning we left behind, we were shrouded in ominous clouds.

Terry proclaimed it was hard to beat Minnesota for her clouds. So much comfort in those words. If needed the clouds could be the highlight of the day. The reflection of these dark clouds in the water made the lakes more angry than the clouds. And the clouds came in many shapes and arch-chromatic shades.

We head back to Agnes Lake. We were lucky to find the obscure entrance to the portage. Our plan was to camp on Agnes. But we slipped by camps that were taken. Soon we were at the opening to Nina Moose river. Nina Moose lake was calling us. Putting us home a day early is welcome when you have been bloody cold for days.

I started to envision getting into Terry’s car and blasting the heat. We found a campsite with a lawn. It was a if they rolled out sod. There was even a dandelion. Crazy. As soon as we finished Mushroom Stroganoff it was getting dark and wouldn’t you know it? Red skies at night sailor’s delight.

Swim coach, Jim Booth’s moto is a ‘little progress everyday’.

I know he was referring to swimming and I am referring to building a house, but whatever it is for me if there’s growth it’s slow. Speaking of slow, has anyone been in a race and you’re so far back that there’s a cop car behind you with their lights flashing. AKA last place. It’s hard to concentrate on the house project when I’m staring down LP this Saturday in the Ely marathon.

It was a beautiful day in Ely MN. I was sorry to be inside this morning. I had to complete the application for our St. Louis County Land Use Permit. They don’t require anything too fancy. Nevertheless it was time consuming. I had to complete it on my phone because we have no internet. I’m not complaining because I completed it with the help of my good friend Skyler in Duluth who works in the planning and development department for the county. I had to call her for help this morning. It was the first item on my To Do List. Luckily, she has a lot of patience and kindness. Picture a youngish women with a MN accent saying, “Sure, I understand why you would see it that way.”

We were on the phone together for some time, and it was mighty successful. The computer accepted our application. You may think this is kind of late in the game to, after several months of knowing we’re going to build a house, to just now be applying for a building permit. Well I’ve had several calls into the number for Ely’s inspector, he left a message to let me know I was calling the wrong person. I told him it was his name and number online.

“Well, that may be, but it’s wrong.” He said.

He asked me some questions and determined that we are not in the city of Ely and we were under the jurisdiction of the county.

Terry and I have adopted the role of newcomer bumpkins.

Next step, agreeing on our building site. We have progressed on that too. With the sheds gone we learned our site was a bit small. I poke around the ledge rock stymied by too many rocks and trees. I’ve been clearing and poking now that the bugs have abated. When Terry came home today I had moved the building site stakes to extend the property to meet our needs. This will take hauling in more roadbed gravel, building up, grading. Time to get the man with his heavy equipment back. And I want all the trees in front of our property gone. Right now we have no view. And Terry agreed on all of that. Progress.

An ominous date and morning sky

I rise at 7:10 to an early morning without a visible sun and check the camp to make sure things are secure. At tentside I capture a bit more heat from Terry. A glance eastward, surprises me with a ribbon of pink below a cloud. As I ready my phone to take a photo, the pink is gone. The last evidence of sun for this day. In early afternoon we decide to cross the open choppy water. The breeze turns stiff as we brave the headwind. We make it to the high cliffs in Canada. We paddle slowly, hugging the cliff in the lee of the wind. We are looking for pictographs on these walls. Terry spots the first one and I the other two.

Our friend Diana provided us with this information (from someone-else’s blog) answering a number of our questions about the pictographs.

With the majority of painting done at the water level and the Ojibwe being skilled canoe makers, it makes sense that painters were likely in canoes when creating the pictographs. That makes sense for most of what we saw. But, it doesn’t satisfy all the imagery we encountered. A few paintings were high above the waterline in areas that seemed impossible to climb. While one could logically come to the conclusion that climbing, some sort of scaffolding, or rappelling was involved in making the pictographs, the truth is that no one really knows. Whether the paintings were made a couple or several hundred years ago, it’s incredible how well preserved they are. Considering the relentless conditions they are under—sun, waves, rain, wind, snow, water freezing to ice and later thawing—it’s impressive they’ve survived centuries. The paint the Ojibwe used is the key. The exact ingredients aren’t known, but enough is known to explain the paint’s durability. The paint was a mixture of red ochre and a binder of sturgeon oil, bear fat, or both. The result was a paint that has bonded with the rock face it was painted upon at a molecular level that draws modern backpackers, campers and other visitors from around the world.

We were thankful we braved the waters which turned out to be fun not dangerous. The adage “you can’t be too careful” doesn’t fit me at all.

We reached our campsite as the wind and rain drove us into action. We felt quarantined and incarcerated in our less that small closet-space for at least 15 hours. Terry said that he enjoyed the howling wind and driving rain. And he was proud of our little tent.

I’ve been singing this all morning, to the tune of “Just Call Me Angel of the Morning.”

🎶 Loon and trumpeters of the morning, baby. They touch my heart before we leave them.🎶 it’s become an ear worm.

Our previous campsite had a huge sloping granite rock, most do, it was out in the open and perfect for drying and staging our gear. Now again, our gear is hanging Halloweenish from tree branches, or strung on the line to flap like flags of camping. As the sun slowly creeps through the trees, we turn our gear, flipping it quickly as flapping a jack.

Oh, did I mention we have sunshine. Nevertheless, we are still tied to the little chores and little successes until 11. When all was loaded and I was standing in the water, lifting my leg, high to board the vessel. Then the captain said, “Where is the map, Skipper?”

“ The map that’s in the bottom of my backpack? You’re asking for it now?”

“I’ll help you get it.” He says sheepishly. As he sits in the stern.

“Never mind. I’ll get it.” I wade in the water. I grab the pack, which is in a big 55 gallon black garbage bag. This is our alternative to the big blue barrel that we have not needed to lug over the portages. I don’t have good leverage, and I twist this weight at an angle that is still talking to me a day later in the form of a back injury. I am in misery.

But with the map out, we successfully leads us through to Portage Lakes. Then we are in the big lake, Lac la Croix. We share this lake with our fun-loving neighbors to the north, the Canadians.

The line separating the two countries wends its way right down the middle of the lake for several miles. The features of the lake are boulders and islands. We don’t see one other canoe. The calm, blue water of the smaller lakes is replaced by a black chop. We don’t see any other paddlers in the near or the far distance.

The sun was shining and seem to be holding tight. Exact location via map and compass wasn’t true to what we were seeing. I used Gaia to get a position. After 3 miles just passed, never failed me, we felt a time for setting up camp. We passed a smaller island with a white marker. Last year we discovered that the white marker meant we were in Canada. Nevertheless, we paddled to the island where our campsite was located. I got out and looked at the grate for cooking, and it said US forest service. This was one of the nicest campsites we’ve ever stayed at. It had the grate with surrounding rocks for cooking, and it actually had a table and chairs made from granite. We were surrounded by water on three sides as this spit of land jutted out. We were in luck just waiting for red skies at night that never show themselves.

And the rains came

It started to drizzle about 2 AM. The temperature had risen, and all seemed good in our safe little tent. But it turned to rain and we had to climb in and out of the tent to pee. Soon wetness was inside too, along with mud. The sun rose before seven, maybe. We didn’t see it, but noticed it was lighter and we were growing stiff. It was back to an occasional drizzle. I made coffee and hot granola actually it was crapola, a local favorite, then I sat under a couple branches of a small cedar tree on the rock and journaled. Terry joined me for a while, but it was chilly, damp, clammy, and uncomfortable. If we were hiking, we’d roll up everything wet and leave. Once you’re backpack is on and you’re moving, it’s warm. But paddling takes a lot of gear. We’re doing paddling light. We are carrying freeze dried dinner and lunch and breakfast granola. We have a jet boil stove and one cup, a collapsible bowl, and three spoons. But add to this to this our life jacket, paddles, fishing rod, tackle box—well you get it. It’s a long day sitting under a branch.

Then the trumpeter swans came to life and stretched their impossible necks and greeted us headlong, bugling overhead. It brought us to the shore to sit on large granite ledgerock and observe. The small birds in no way noticed us. They walk near and around us close, pecking, pecking and then up to a tree branch warbling or calling chick a dee, dee, dee sometimes those little birds wearing blackcaps repeated the dees 23 times determined to make their point. Aren’t we all?

Around 2:00 pm, it seemed the rain had finished. Still no sun, but a good time to dry out everything.We strung rope I had rescued from my many days on trails. They were just discard pieces of detritus left without a second thought, now strung together their life was extended to hold more items and help them dry. Functionality. Important stuff. By sunset everything was put back together. Albeit a little damp, all was functional.

We paddled around Lake Agnes in the waning light. We went across the river to where the ten trumpeters lived. It gave us a lot of pleasure to be so close to them. To hear the Whoomp Whoomp of the wings so heavy, just beating on the water to take off. To hear the echoes of the trumpeters bugling so loud it stirred everything in your musical soul. Another night maybe closer to our resident bear. Maybe sniffing the breeze to catch our sent. Terry says bears don’t want our vegetarian food but it seems they want berries and peanut butter.

Day 2 of Boundary Waters paddle

We wake at the crack of dawn, the early pull of the curtain allowing a ribbon of light to portend the next day at sometime after 6:00 am. The chilly night had both of us up four times to pee. We are close enough to the neighboring campsite (about half mile across the water) that in the dead of night they might hear us unzip our bags and declare we don’t want to get up again. We’re trying hard to be cognizant of every word and bodily noise. Maybe I took the rules too seriously. But I do agree that if you’re visiting a wilderness site you don’t want to think you may be sharing it with other humans.

Quiet spaces are as rare as dark skies. Several years ago I read a book called one square inch of silence in which the author traveled the USA looking for just one square inch of quietude. I do not want to break the silence, but sometimes its like being at the Met trying to quell a cough during everyone’s favorite aria. You can’t. Soon from a row of different hands arrives a cough drop in a wrapper that has its separate consequences.

At 7:00 am, we see the silhouette of a canoe passing close to the opposite shore. It sat low in the water and between the two paddlers loomed a pile of stuff. So much and so heavy that freeboard was almost nonexistent. Think the Beverly Hillbillies arriving by canoe.

It appeared the person in front had a portly stature. Maybe he was wearing a coat with some beaver fur on the lapel. Perhaps he was Russian. He was paddling, but he needn’t. You could tell the guy in back was serving him at the pleasure of some Russian oligarch. With all this gear, they were clearly headed for the Arctic.

Terry and I speculated about them while packing to leave Nina Moose Lake for the larger Lake Agnes, the one that just yesterday experienced a bear stealing a backpack from a camp. So we were off to snag that same campsite.

We didn’t reach the Nina Moose River, some would call it a ditch, until 10:30. There at the first portage were two guys making several passes back and forth owing to an abundance of gear. These Russians had totally transformed into two American guys. The larger one was wearing shorts and T-shirt and only speaking when he had to which was seldom because the other guy said it was portly dude’s birthday and he was being treated , hence all the luggage. Oh, excuse me, gear. The other guy, tall and slim, seemed ordinary enough even with the hint of an accent until he returned looking like he was nude and covered in tattoos from the waist down. He was wearing camo tights. He dropped a bunch of MN references. Naming towns and cities and some landmarks. But we know spies when we see them.

At Agnes,the camp of the bear, was a super site, large with many good spots and even a granite slab and granite seats under a tree. We found no trace of a bear, no diggings, prints or scat.

We had time to fish. Terry fishes and I paddle following his every directions. Paddling slowly under the shadow of the trees, close to shore. It wasn’t long before he caught a Walleye. The one fish we really wanted because he had never caught one before. This would augment his dinner. He ate with glee even though he found it rather bland, especially with no seasoning of any kind. We took a celebratory swig of Fireball.

The Day of our Start on the Boundary Waters

At the time I am typing this, we have returned to Ely a day early that story is coming. I could not blog while in the wilderness, but I journaled daily using paper and pencil. So now I’m typing my entries one at a time. I’m hoping that the only suspense lost is that the wilderness did not take our lives.

It is 4:00 PM as I write this. Terry is asleep in the tent. The water on Nina Moose Lake is dead calm. A strip of glass is traveling through the middle of the water. In front of me a Norway pine tree branch dips over the water. They look as though they are part of long grass standing tall in the water and rimming the ledgerock that dominates the shoreline.

I only hear an occasional fly. No hum of anything mechanical. No low murmurs of distant words, laughter or music. Periodically a blue jay squawks.

The glass strip in the lake is bigger. If I paddle out to it now, it would feel like floating on a mirror not knowing if the clouds are above or below. And then that strip in the lake is broken by the slightest of ripple caused by the slightest of breeze.

Terry’s snoring is lost and now his sleeping is silence.

We dove into my half baked plan without the trepidation it desired. It seems everyone who does these canoe trips in the Boundary Waters carries a huge blue barrel and a large dry bag. They all seem fine or maybe resigned to carry this heavy, awkward gear over one portage several times. I figured we could do each portage one and a half times, we’d use our backpacks. Just put them in the big black garbage bags for waterproofing.

Because we didn’t have time to rehearse this, I didn’t consider that I could barely lift my pack, and my hands are loaded up with life jackets, paddles, shoes, and tackle box. But I never did more than one trip. And things really don’t need to be dry.

We left our garage at 7:00 am and started off at 8:30 with a 160 rod portage to the Moose River. A few paddles away was another short portage followed by a few strokes was yet another short portage.

The river was narrow and quite dry owing to the drought. But it’s nestled between rich green grasses and tall forests just beyond. It was peaceful and lovely and relaxing except for the 20 beaver dams we had to stop wade knee deep in the water to pull our canoe over the piles of branches.

Nina Moose lake was a welcome sight. The water feels warm when you wade through the dams,but by mid afternoon we were wet and cold. Our campsite was so welcoming.