Day 1 – I finished packing the morning of my trip. Piling into my car at 10 am, I took off towards my entry point, North Fowl. North Fowl is located at the farthest east point in the BWCA. To get there I have to drive up Hwy 61 past Grand Marais to Hovland. Turning away from Lake Superior up County Road 16, I drive another 15 to 20 miles to McFarland Lake public access. I am on the water by 12:30 pm, the sun is high above me and the wind is calm. This isn’t my first solo trip, but it is the furthest away from Sawbill I’ve gone for a solo. As usual, my anxiety is rearing its ugly head. I do my best to ignore it and paddle on. My first portage is unmarked on the map. I imagine on a lower water year, the rapids are easier to pass through, but I wasn’t willing to find out if I could run it. Unfortunately, I sliced the side of my foot on this portage right at the end of it. Fortunately, it wasn’t bad. Carrying on into John Lake, I paddle for 5 minutes to the next portage. This one is 60 rods. The downside to soloing is I get to carry everything on the portages. I do my best to single portage when I can. As I walk with a canoe on my shoulders, my equipment pack on my back, and my day/food pack on my front, I fall into comfortable silence. Birds call. Slowly the pain in my shoulders grows and I remind myself that it’s just like I’m walking up and back on the portage to Alton from Sawbill. That’s all, keep walking, it’ll end soon.
Stepping out into the Royal River, I set my gear down and loaded up the canoe. It seems like this area would be great to travel in late July and early August because there are a lot of thimbleberry bushes along the portages. Royal River winds south east for a mile before opening up into Royal Lake. About 700 ft before I got into Royal Lake, a strange thing occurred. As I mentioned before, the wind was calm at this point in the day. A slight rustling of the tree leaves above but nothing more. Suddenly I heard a buzzing or whistling sound mixed with the sound of strong wind. A small, twister-like form appeared in front of me about 100 ft out. It lifted water off the surface and moved across the width of the river and up through the jack pines, red cedar, and black spruce that lined the shore around me. From what I’ve been told, these are called water spouts when they happen on Lake Superior. As quickly as it started it ended. By this point my nerves were electrified. I wanted to turn around and leave right then. But, not wanting to let myself down, I paddled on. Royal Lake is mostly reeds. I rose up from my kneeling position to navigate myself through the grass. To the south of me, the surface of the lake cleared up, allowing a pair of trumpeter swans to scrounge around for food.
As lake transitioned back to river, the current picked up. Luckily, the portage landing was very visible and happened to be right before a beaver dam. 90 rods of mud. Again, there were a large number of thimbleberry bushes. Thimbleberries are one of my favorite fruits. The portage ended where the river was still moving fast. I thought, at first, that the portage maybe went further along the bank, so I put my stuff down and slowly looked around in the woods beyond. Did I really have to try to paddle these rapids? Yes, I decided. Turning back, I carefully put the canoe into the water, and loaded up my pack. Slowly I sat in the canoe. Turns out, it was pretty straightforward to paddle with the current. Hopefully I won’t have to come back this way. I can’t imagine trying to paddle against the current. After the current dies down, I enter North Fowl Lake. There are a few islands ahead and to the right of me blocking most of my view. All I can see is that the lake will open up once I get around the point 100 yds ahead of me. To my surprise, as I round the bend, three small docks come into view. Up from each of the docks, there are a few small, rustic cabins nestled in the woods. Around the next small point, there are some more docks. Two of the cabins have a motor boat tied to their respective docks. I could tell that at least one of the cabins was being actively used because I could hear music coming from inside. I had expected to be alone on this trip for the most part except the occasional other group of BWCA travelers.
The way my anxiety shows itself is by giving me a sense of foreboding. I feel as though something terrible will happen to me and I’ll die alone without being able to help myself or get help. As much as I wanted to be alone on this trip, the knowledge that there was someone else around that could potentially save me lessened my anxiety. I feel silly admitting all of this, but I know it’s out of my control. I will eventually learn how to handle these feelings. It’ll take time and practice.
The wind was picking up a little bit by this point. It was 2:30 pm. The wind was coming out of the East/Southeast. I was able to move quickly with the waves. There were patches of aquatic grass that I paddled through. Soon, there were multiple dozens of blue damselflies flying alongside me. It was magical. The deal with North Fowl as an entry point is the only way you are considered in the wilderness area is if you either move on to Moose Lake, or camp at the northernmost site on North Fowl. I was looking for the site when I spotted a hole in the tree line that I was currently paddling quickly past. Oops, there it was! I quickly turned around and paddle hard against the wind and waves that I was now moving into. The landing to the site was sandy with smaller rocks and mud lining the shore. It was about 3:30 pm by the time I finally got all of my gear up into the campsite.
As far as campsites go, this one was average. I don’t really like rating sites, it seems to inflate people’s expectations of what campsite they can get and when all those “5 star sites” are taken they get disappointed. Nevertheless, I will say that the site on North Fowl doesn’t have much of a level spot to put a tent. Rating sites will also funnel groups to a smaller percentage of sites, causing more concentrated areas of impact instead of spreading out more (Don’t worry though, I too, still like to grab the best looking one when I can, just food for thought). Truthfully, the only real flat spot is the fire grate. It’s grown in a bit as well and would make for a great protected site for the fall. I spent my afternoon bouncing back and forth from trying to start a fire and swimming. I feel lucky in hindsight that it was not as warm and humid as it is now, but it certainly felt hot at the time. During one of my wades, I noticed that there was a boat launch across the lake from my site. Based on the map I had, I had no idea how people were meant to get there. As far as I knew, it was just forest over there. However after zooming in on google maps, it appears there is a dirt road that ends at the landing there. On occasion a motor boat would troll past. I found that all the boaters acted very respectful of the area and never sped past the site I was at. For dinner I had a white bean and kale soup from some freeze-dried camp food company. Had I elected to bring salt and pepper, I probably would have enjoyed it a bit more, but I was hungry and it was food, so good enough for me!
I tried once again to get a fire going before I went to bed, but all of the wood was pretty wet, so I constantly had to feed more kindling into the flame. At a certain point it no longer is worth the time. I crawled into my tent, carefully attempting to keep the mosquitoes out. I settled down and read until the light disappeared. As I closed my eyes for the night the loons and swans started calling. Unfortunately, the swans decided the best place to talk was right outside my site. Eventually I slept.
Day 2 – I never sleep through the night when I go on trips into the wilderness. This time was no different. As the sun rose, I found it more and more difficult to keep my eyes closed. Around 8 am, I rolled out of the tent and started packing up. Normally on solo trips, I can eventually calm myself enough to continue on. This time I was nervous from the moment I woke up. I decided to head back to the entry point. I was paddling back south by the time it was 9. Once again paddling past the surprise cabins, back up the rapids, which weren’t as terrible as I expected, back across muddy portages. I’ve never felt so disappointed in myself on a solo trip. Why couldn’t I just deal with the anxiety and push on? Maybe I should start taking my own advice to people going on their first solos. Start small. Do an overnight at a lake that is familiar. Build up your comfort and understand your limits. Push yourself when you know you can. I’m still glad I went out for a night at least; it was nice to get away from the hustle and bustle of Sawbill sometimes. Doing this trip still helps me work closer to my goal of being able to do longer solo trips in the future. It’s been a few weeks since I got back, and I no longer believe I let myself down. There are always setbacks as we try to learn a new skill. Hills to climb. I’ll just have to try again next year.
