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You are here: Home / Updates / December 05, 2015 at 05:32PM

December 05, 2015 at 05:32PM

December 5, 2015 By Dave Freeman

Yesterday morning we woke up early and quickly packed up camp. The temperature had dropped overnight and we decided to pull our canoe like a sled across Vera and Ensign Lakes. The sun’s glow cast a red light on the horizon as we loaded our canoe on Vera Lake’s frozen surface. Amy and I leaned into our harnesses to pull the canoe, loaded with several hundred pounds of food and equipment, across the ice. We stopped often to chop a hole in the ice with our axe to check the thickness of the ice.
There was just enough ice to safely hold us, so we cautiously moved along the shoreline. We were wearing our drysuits and PFDs (personal floatation devices). We also carried icepicks and safety ropes to minimize the risk of traveling over the thin ice.

We had never hauled a canoe over the ice before and had been wondering for several months what it would be like. It felt good to walk along, traveling in a new way. Once the canoe was moving, it slid over the ice relatively easily, but we both had to lunge into our harnesses to get the canoe moving. When we reached the west end of Vera, we hauled our loads across the portage to Ensign. We made 3 trips each. Ensign is a shallower lake, so we were happy to find thicker ice.
Around 2 o’clock we sat down on the ice, leaned up against the canoe, and had lunch. We laughed and joked about our lunch spot. It was a fun day, full of new things. As the sun began to set, we pulled up to a campsite on the west end of Ensign Lake. We were tired after hauling a heavy load all day, but were overjoyed to have traveled over the ice.

Wilderness is a wonderful teacher. Even after decades of exploring the Boundary Waters, there is still so much we can learn from this special place–7=\ about ourselves and the earth. That’s just one reason we need to @savetheBWCA.
#wildernessyear #BoundaryWaters #winter #ice #canoe #savetheBWCA @mti_life_jackets @granitegear

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