ive never solo tripped and ive always been in a group of 3 or more, so that kinda helps with the margin of error portion. the past few years my canoe (we usually have 2 or 3 canoes) has done the portages in one trip. we have 2 taller guys that like taking the canoes and the two shorter guys take the 2 community packs. we have a self imposed rule of one personal pack only. there are 2 'community' packs, one for the food stuffs and the other for the tents. that leaves one person per item 2 canoes, 2 packs, 4 people. we trade off when necessary as well. ive done quite a bit of work on my canoe to streamline the portage process, so the paddles/rods easily store up inside.

from landfall to everybody walking the portage with gear its about a 3 minute process. we all enjoy the fishing aspect the most, so the longer we spend on land, the less we get to fish. if there was a way to troll a line behind us on the portage and catch fish im sure my group could find it.

with that said, half of the people in our group are a tiny bit OCD about being early to everything so we try to get to our destination ASAP! the other half is pretty laid back so sometimes we have issues on portage days.