BWCA Portage 928

It's legendary for a reason. We started at about 8:30 pm and portaged well into the night. The NPS has done an incredible amount of infrastructure building here from frequent boardwalks along the way, a couple of larger bridges over marshes or rivers, and one big staircase. Take your time, pay attention to your footing, and enjoy the triumph of reaching Superior.

I have portaged a canoe longer distances and I have portaged harder trails, by the Grand Portage is the longest hardest portage I have undertaken. The trail was downright soupy. Deeper water and very mucky pits made footing difficult. I went early Spring and it was apparent the trail hadn't been cleared yet. The blow downs were marked, but not addressed. There were numerous (20 ) blow downs that required fancy footwork, fancy tactics to get the canoe over or under, or both. The boardwalks were all in really excellent condition. Some slippery spots, but everything was level and felt stable underfoot. The topography itself isn't tricky. There are a number of things a long the trail to distract you. Thinking about the history of the portage really makes the time fly. The wet conditions and blow down slowed my pace quite a lot. I was able to touch Superior in 3 hours 15 mins, but during a dry time with a clear trail, I could easily see just over 2 hours being doable. 5/5

8.5 miles - bring your game face! A couple random details before reviewing the portage: 1. We did the Pigeon River when it was flowing at 83.6 CFS. This is low. We were in and out of our canoe for a 2 mile stretch at the English Rapids (there is no portage there anymore). It was doable, but any lower and the boat might not have floated even with us walking alongside it. The rest of the river is an easy, lazy paddle down the beautiful river. 2. Fort Charlotte has 2 campsites that share 1 outhouse. The sites have tent platforms. Make sure you have some rope so you can tie down your tent. Don't rely on stakes. The river-side site offers easy access to the river for filtering water, and the sound of rapids to lull you to sleep. The main event: We hit this portage during extremely dry times, so mud was almost a non-factor. With that in mind, the grand portage surprised me with how approachable it is. Going from Fort Charlotte to Superior, there are multiple checkpoints you can verify against your map (highest point, old Hwy 61, some hills to match to contours, etc). This kind of motivates you along the way as you realize you are making progress. The length is real, but the trees are cut back and the portage is well maintained. You aren't battling the surrounding woods as you push forward. Also, numerous boggy areas have board walks so you can just cruise along. Attack the portage, take a posé whenever you need one, and revel in the accomplishment of putting your canoe in Lake Superior! You can do this!

Can't say this is the easiest portage. The distance is well, above average to say the least. The trail has a lot of different amounts of bugginess mud and elevation, but overall the terrain is pretty manageable. It gets easier as you get toward lake superior, but only because you realize that you are finally starting to make some progress. I will say this, it sure is satisfying when you reach the end and realized that you conquered an eight and a half mile long portage. (we did it in about 7.5 hours) This portage is certainly not for the faint of heart.