BWCA – Day One

The Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) is a destination for many outdoor enthusiasts. I love nature and being outdoors so I consider myself an enthusiast but I had never experienced a trip in the BWCA. It is something I have often thought of doing so I made a commitment to go on the annual Faribault Flyers BWCA trip this year.

Ten of us met up in Ely. We had dinner together and made everything ready for our departure the next morning. After a good night’s sleep we woke up early, went out for breakfast, and then took off to the Falls Lake boat landing to load our canoes and start our adventure. It was very foggy.

We loaded our gear into five canoes and the fog started to lift, thankfully. We took off paddling to the first portage. Our group split up;  six guys took off for five days and the other group of four, the one I was in, took off for three days.  By this time the sun was shining in a blue, cloudless sky and it was a glorious day to be in the wilderness!

We paddled across a second lake and portaged again to the third lake where we found our campsite. Since this was my first time in the Boundary Waters, and the others had been there before, they let me choose the campsite. I wanted to be on an island. We found a campsite on the west end of a small island with a slight, rocky incline. It was perfect. There is a fire pit with an iron grate, and a latrine at each official campsite in the BWCA. (The latrines are several yards back from the fire pit and are numbered for emergency location identification.)

We noticed this island on the map but it didn’t have a name. There was a larger island nearby named Gary’s Island so we named our island “Valerie’s Island.”

After setting up camp we had lots of time to sit and relax, read, gather firewood, make dinner, enjoy a beautiful sunset, and go to bed early.

We crawled into our tents and fell asleep but in the middle of the night we were awakened by voices…it was very disorienting at first, and then kind of scary, and then we learned it was a medical emergency. The campers across the lake, to the south of us, had paddled by the island earlier in the day  so they knew there was someone occupying the campsite on the island. One of the two men was having an asthma attack and forgot his inhaler back in his truck. His friend loaded him into the canoe, paddled out into the dark night and dark waters to our island and used the sounds of snoring to find our site. I don’t remember the words exactly but in essence he said “We need help. Do you have an inhaler?” His talking woke us up and he repeated what he said and added “I’m just a social worker and I don’t know what to do.”  After regaining our wits, a woman in our group, who is a nurse, got up and went out to talk with them. She suggested a breathing technique since we didn’t have an inhaler. The “patient” was talking and she said that was a good sign. The two men paddled back into the dark waters, to their campsite. They said they would return in the morning with a report. All this time the “token male” in our group slept through it all!

It wonderful to see the starry, starry sky but, of course, it was very hard to get back to sleep after all the excitement.

The next morning the two guys did come back. We recognized both of them, and their dog. We had  seen them at the boat launch the day we left Falls Lake boat launch. They let us know the patient was doing OK. Being away from the smoke of the fire, propping himself up against a tree for the night, and special breathing made it easier for him to breath. We were thankful!

BWCA trip….to be continued.