North and South
October 15, 2011
It’s been one week since I’ve returned from the North Country of the Quetico/BWCA territory. I spent six days in these stunning and expansive hinterlands with my son Max and his dog Zipper. We saw about 8 – 10 other humans total all week; we exchanged only a few words on the portages, and when passing another party of canoeist, a nod would often suffice, keeping the silence golden. The majorities of those who venture to these parts seek a true wilderness experience and probably would prefer not to see anybody. So mostly you are quiet when you meet, respecting each other’s desire for silence and solitude on the trail.
We traveled the Border country by canoe, much the same as the Natives and Voyagers did long ago in these same although probably unnamed waters of Agnes, Iron, Lac La Croix, Crooked and Basswood, including many small rivers and portages, changing camp and making miles everyday. Across a portage or around the bend a new landscape would reveal itself, changing from dramatic cliffs and narrow passageways to sweeping water or bog areas. We had a perfect week of weather, peak fall colors, starry nights, a waxing crescent moon, a hearty feel and pungent smell of fall in the air and a healthy dose of wind to make our big water crossings memorable.
We saw a variety of birds, eagles, some mink, otters and other small critters while canoeing the waterways or fishing the rocky shoreline from camp. Unforgettable was the extraordinary large, yet immature Bald Eagle we watched perched on a precarious dead branch, his head black, his beak still grey, with a beautiful variation of color and pattern of his feathers that were ruffling in the wind. He reminded me of a proud and beautiful Indian warrior. Shortly after we saw him, we came to a large cliff area where there are known pictographs. As we moved in under the massive rocks to more closely see the renderings…two Bald Eagles came in to circle the air above us, giving us a show that left us breathless. I couldn’t believe our luck at witnessing this scene directly above the pictographs. That evening right after sunset, two trumpeter swans made three passes across the salmon colored sky above our camp before retreating across the lake, and in finale, flew across the quarter moon reflecting off the water. I remember commenting to Max that it had been a five star day.
Pondering my own migration on the night of our last camp, I was fortunate to have been able to observe an Arctic Loon feeding in the bay, getting ready much like me, to make his way south. But surely to return again.
