I was mid-way travelling up the Basswood River when the wind/rain struck.  It was very hot and humid in the morning when I packed up camp and I remember wishing it would cloud up and rain a bit to cool off; also thought it was very unusual weather and "something" was going to blow up out of it.
As the weather was apparently getting worse I passed a group who had stopped on a campsite and put up their tarp for cover.  They warned me the weather was looking bad and I agreed but kept on paddling.  It started to rain, it had sprinkled off and on a bit prior, so I took refuge under some overhanging trees along a 20 foot cliff with its foot in the water, sitting in my kayak and thinking it would soon pass.
It began to rain hard and then pour.  I went from too hot to soaking wet and cold in a short while and then sat it out in the rain, finally having to bail my kayak while I sat in water, because I thought I would finally fill up and sink if I didn't.  It was windy but I had picked the lee side of the cliff and had a couple trees to hold on to so I didn't get blown out into the open so can't say it was much more than a thunderstorm where I was.  I think the group who had put up the tarp probably didn't stay dry under it.
When it passed I paddled to the nearest big rock on shore and unloaded my stuff and poured the excess water out of the kayak, then continued on soaking wet.  At the top of upper basswood falls I ran into a Boy Scout group who were setting up camp on one of the sites there, looking just as wet as I was.  I portaged past, saying "We're having fun now...".  They didn't look amused.  Thinking about it later I believe they may have been out in their canoes on the water at the time the wind was the worst.
I camped on the Canada island between the two falls and dried out before nightfall.  That night the second thunderstorm blew by in the distance and kept up the lightning and thunder for an hour or two.  I could just see the 4th of July fireworks flashes against the clouds, and hear the booms from them in the direction of Ely and then the storm followed and carried on the show for quite a while longer.
I still had no clue that the severe blow-down had happened until the next morning.  I headed out for Fall Lake and soon ran across an entire, fully grown Red Pine which had been torn off its ledge rock, roots and all, and was floating down Basswood Lake.  That was unusual.  Then passed a campsite, everything out on lines including the daily newspaper drying.  Two huge Red Pines had fallen in the center of the site, one on either side of the tent and not far away.  I asked the campers if those trees had fallen after they were set up and they said "yes".
Further on at the portage there were big Aspen fallen over the path, hung up on other trees, so you had to stoop or crawl under them with the gear to get by.  Someone had already been there with a chain saw and cut some, until their chain apparently got pinched in a tree and was left hanging in it, over the path.
When I got within cell phone range I called home and my husband just said "Thank God" when he heard my voice on the phone.
IC