Now that the "have-you-seen-bear?” thread seems to have exhausted itself, here’s another question: What’s the latest (in the season) canoe trip you’ve taken, either to Quetico, the Boundary Waters or other points north?

For me it was Oct. 17-24 out of Prairie Portage back in ’98. I don’t remember the original intended destination, but we entered the park late and therefore camped on Burke, headed north and ran into wind and sleet and decided to stop on North Bay, and the next day we changed direction and headed east through South, West and the stream to Jeff, which involved crossing an array of beaver dams, stepping in and out of the cold water to maneuver over rocks and around tight corners and finally running out of water. After staying on Jeff for three days or so we went to lower Agnes and came out on Sunday Lake, a trip of no distance whatsoever but it seemed more impressive at the time given the weather, the aluminum canoe and my canoe-mate being a first-timer. Our travel days seem like really short jaunts, but I remember we slept in every morning and it seemed to take forever to break camp, plus the cold just seemed to sap our energy. It was like everything was in slow-motion. The sun finally came out and it warmed up the last few days, which ended the trip on a high note.

Looking through my journal, I see references to:

-      Most wildlife ever, with four moose, two whitetail, several grouse and various small animals.
-      Hazy display of the Northern Lights from the Channel Island on Sunday Lake (our last-night campsite because of early tow-time the next morning.
-      Cutting a leech off my foot.
-      Forceful wind collapsing half the tent on us while we slept on Burke (I don’t remember the exact location, my notes say only “island”).   
-      Lots of sleet and snow flurries, and frost on the packs and ice in the canoe in the morning.
-      Terrible fishing, with four fish caught the whole week. (On the tow out, we asked the outfitter “How do people catch fish in October?” and he answered “People DON’T catch fish in October” and we said, “For the people who DO catch fish, how do they do it?” and he said “People DON’T catch fish in October" and we said something like "Seriously?" and him just giving us a "y'all are stupid" look.
-      Having to set my pen near the fire to warm up so the ink would flow so I could write.
-      Hiking trips, and bushwhacking to at least one unnamed lake off of Jeff to fish.
-      Cutting a lot of firewood.
-      Seeing just one other canoe the whole week, and that was pulled up on the bank on Agnes – so we never actually saw a person. The outfitter said he expected we were one of the last groups to come out before the lakes froze, and in fact he had predicted we’d hit some skim ice, tho we never did.

Word-for-word snippets: “very windy all night” … “wool socks, wool hat, wool vest, wool gloves” … “I’ve almost had frostbite on feet several times now” … “we paddled an amazing stream through thick marshland, often not more than a foot wider than the canoe” … "Can't get a bite -- where are you, Mr. Fish?" ... “snow flurried on and off but it’s mostly been light sleet” … “the silence is loud.”

-      kypaddler