Aug-13 ~ Aug 15-2004
Published on 5-May-2012 by Ray Fried
Voyagers NP was named for the fur traders that navigated this area in the 1800's. They used canoes and would portage as much as 250 lbs/person. They would often paddle 18 hours/day.
Voyagers National Park located in northern Minnesota. Voyagers is located next to the Boundary Waters Canoe Wilderness Area but differs in that the lakes are larger in Voyagers and power boats are allowed. One lake is 60 miles long.
Voyager contains many smaller islands providing nice scenery and shelter from open winds. We had excellent weather except for the morning of the last day in which we needed to cover a lot of water in what we would call a storm but real boaters would probably call a squall. The yellow waterproof bag shown in the photo above kept things dry. Actually we didn't take on water but was thankful for the significant bow on our little canoe. It was taking some huge blows from the oncoming waves.
We covered about 40 miles in 2 ½ days.
Campsites are only accessible by canoe/boat but are well furnished. Camp-sites were well marked - if you located the correct island!
Our canoe doubled for a dining room table the first evening/morning, as we did not camp in a designated camp site.
The sight at sunrise with moisture coming off the warm water on a cool morning.
Shorelines were striking and interesting.
We were able to find a fine camp site the 2nd evening – within a stones throw of the water. A nice place to settle down for a quiet evening.
The island in the background was inhabited by a black bear. He attempted to swim to our island as we were eating supper. When he saw us, he headed back for his island then went up shore about 300 feet and crossed again to our island. We were sure he was looking over our tent and canoe as we slept but since the waves were beating on the shore, we couldn't hear him. Our food supplies were safely stored in a steel bunker provided by the National Park.
One comes to really appreciate a good GPS or good maps as it is sometimes hard to locate a camp-site while sitting in the canoe.