If solitude is of prime concern you should definitely consider Quetico. I don't know why you want to limit yourselves to entry from the U.S. side you may have a very good reason. But it limits you to some of the most heavily used Quetico entry points making it hard to find that solitude for a couple of days.
I have used the Quetico Lake entry point a couple of times and was very pleased with the solitude. Let me give you a proposed route. If you look at Quetico Lake you'll see that it is separated into a northern and southern arm by a large peninsula, contained in this peninsula are three unnamed lakes. You can paddle to the western end of the south arm paddle north through the bay and enter this chain of lakes. This route was suggested to us by Canoe Canada Outfitters in Atikokan. We didn't choose it but it would offer a high degree of solitude. The route we paddled instead was a loop through Quetico, Kasakokwog,and Cirrus. We had Kasakokwog and Cirrus to ourselves.

As far as a BWCA route goes I have been in the Sawbill area which was very nice. There are lots of small lakes and many options for getting off the beaten path. Sawbill Outfitters is excellent and can offer good advice on a route. Remember that large areas of central BWCA from Prairie Portage East along the Int'l border to the end of the gunflint trail sustained heavy damage from the July 4th storm. In the Ely area a couple of excellent outfitters are Cliff Wold and Canoe Country Outfitters.

Whatever you choose I hope you have a great trip.

Posted by Pops on September 18, 1999 at 12:58