I was able to get up north for a quick overnight trip recently and had a blast!

This was my first backpacking trip since an SHT thru hike back in August of 2015, and wow did it feel amazing to be back on the trail! Instead of heading back to the SHT for this one, I headed up into the BWCA out of Ely.

It was nice to have weather on my side for this one. It stopped raining/misting about 20 mins before arriving at the trailhead and wouldn’t again for the remainder of the trip – perfect 🙂

As current trail conditions in the BWCA are hard to come by (seemingly non-existent, which is actually fine by me, it ups the adventure factor) I was interested to see what I was in for.

While there will always be the shock and awe factor of Lake Superior and the seemingly unlimited views our “inland ocean,” backpacking in the BWCA was simply magical and may be my go-to place to backpack around here for a while. Also, it’s hard to beat the comparatively low-used, spacious, lakeside campsites with loons serenading you throughout the night.

Trail conditions were pretty fantastic and the epic beaver dam crossings were rather interesting/fun (trekking poles helped A TON)!

Plenty of wildlife as well: I lost track of how many grouse I saw, there were a bunch of HUGE moose tracks (including actually hearing one crash through the woods just in front of me, no visual though), several beavers slapping their tails, a turtle, and of course my favorite of them all…plenty of loons!

I also saw potentially one of the best sunsets of my life, although as always, pictures don’t even come close to capturing the beauty!

A couple things to note:

• Bring the proper sleeping bag!! I failed miserably at this. As I mentioned above, my last backpacking trip was an August thru hike of the SHT back in 2015, which had overnight temps in the mid-40’s to low-50’s – no problem for me as I sleep warm and had a high quality 40 degree quilt. Well, fast forward and I’m now 6 years older, coupled with overnight temps around 30 degrees…in the same 40 degree quilt. Woops! By far the worst night of sleep ever while camping after I woke up around 12:45 AM. It’s nearly impossible to fall back asleep while your body is cold. I can’t tell you how many times I thought about how warm and cozy I would have been in my 15 degree down sleeping bag. I ended up getting another hour or so of sleep before just getting out of the tent around 5 AM to start my day (and a needed fire).
• Avenza app – Oh. My. Gosh. This app was incredible! You simply download the map you need within the app, and when you get your destination (with or without service), open the app and you will see a little blue dot representing WHERE YOU ARE ON THE MAP! No more guessing if you missed a turn or where you are in relation to campsites. Especially on trails that are not as well maintained/marked as the SHT, this was invaluable. I can’t wait to use this on future canoe trips as well, especially lakes with lots of islands where it can get tricky to navigate. Also: YOU STILL NEED TO BRING AN ACTUAL MAP (OR MAPS) THAT COVERS YOUR ENTIRE ROUTE. You do not want to rely solely on your phone for navigation purposes as it could run out of battery, get lost, drop into a lake never to be seen again, or break. Always carry the actual map(s) with you.

I can’t begin to explain how amazing it was to be backpacking again after such a long hiatus. I certainly don’t want to wait another 6 years before going again 🙂