I took this opportunity to watch your videos. I admire your persistance and survival skills. With the Minnesota weather being so rainy in the fall in recent years, it takes guts to go into the BWCAW in a canoe and suffer the weather. I will admit though, that some of my best stories from my earlier days involve surviving storms and hail and rain and Northern Lights in the BWCAW.

I think I am getting lazy though. These days, my canoe spends most of it's time in the shed. I go 'truck camping' into the national forests instead. This year, I spent two separate rainy solo weeks in a tent. I cope with it in two ways: bringing a large tent with tarps, table, chair, and cot, and by moving around the forest on foot or in my truck.

Sometimes I get impatient with the weather and get a detailed report. If it is a slow moving system and I still have several days of vacation left, I will break camp and drive into and out the back of the storm and make a new camp in another part of the forest. A different kind of camping, I know, but it suits my impatient nature, and gets me into the woods in 3 out of 4 seasons.

I'm seriously considering adding a homemade long Baker to my kit on your recommendation. I can see a lot of advantages in poor weather. Kids are grown, and I hope to retire soon....probably three years before my slightly more youthful wife can. Lord willing and my health holds out, I will spend even more time in the woods and on the water, and maybe even sit tight in a Baker.