BWCA

Me and a buddy are thinking of planning a trip next summer with it kids. Any tips for first timers to the bwca

this isn’t the best forum for bwca info. Check out bwca dot com – everything you need to know is there.

First of all, familiarize yourself with the rules and regulations of the bwca. That is step one. And please, I hope you follow every one of those rules and respect the wilderness

Leave no trace.

Recreation.gov is where you go to book permits. Permits for next year go on sale Jan 23. The popular entry points are sold out in a matter of minutes. Make sure you have a list of several backup entry points and dates incase you don’t get your first choice.

What’s your gear situation like? Having good gear is incredibly important. You want to pack light, so a lot of times your standard camping gear isn’t what you want to bring into the bwca (example 2 burner Coleman stove and 5 person tent).

If you don’t have the best gear, it would be worth it to rent from an outfitter (like Piragis out of Ely) for your first trip. They will set you up with premium gear and you can give it a test run before you decide to invest serious coin into bwca gear. The ideal bwca gear is expensive (light and packs very small) and takes a few years to build up a full arsenal of gear.

You will also need to figure out meals. That is a big enough topic to warrant its own thread. The meal plan largely depends on what type of trip you’re doing. If you’re doing any portaging, you’re likely not bringing a cooler so you have to go the dehydrated route. We dehydrate all our own meals for our trips and they are really good. Bring frozen steaks for night 1

Bring an empty basketball net with rope to use as an anchor. Zip tie one end shut and fill it with rocks when you get to your destination and use that as your anchor rather than bringing in a real anchor (unnecessary weight to pack in)

If you shoot me your email in a PM, I can share my gear packing list that has been fine tuned over the last decade.

Do you have any specific questions? I could type pages and pages but I’m not sure what your experience level is. I’ve got over 50 bwca trips under my belt, including a 200 mile full border route trip I did this last spring, so have a lot of experience to share.

X2 on using Piragis

They’ll take care of all details, down to each meal.

Their gear is top notch as well.

Bring many Thermacells.

if you go in May, bugs are not bad at all. My last 3 May trips, I didn’t use bug spray once

also, I always treat my clothes in permethrin. Not sure how much that plays into it but bugs aren’t bad at all in May (generally speaking)

Are the kids big enough to portage their own gear?
Portages are where it gets kinda tough at times.
You can take the bladder out of a box of wine, tie it to a canoe and let it float along in the water to stay cool. I wouldn’t tie it to the kids canoe.

Yep kids are 16

Nitrodog wrote:

nough to portage their own gear?
Portages are where it gets kinda tough at times.
You can take the bladder out of a box of wine, tie it to a canoe and let it float along in the water to stay cool. I wouldn’t tie it to th

Kids that age are also known as “Sherpas”.

Make it a rule that life jackets must be worn at all times when in the boats. Don’t make this a kids rule, set an example for them. Almost every year someone capsizes and drowns in the BW, this summer an 18yo died when his boat capsized when fishing. I had an outfitter tell me that of the last 48 drownings, all but one were not wearing their life jacket.