Back into the BWCA: Canoeing campers return to the wilderness after wildfire closure
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After a closure that has stretched for more than two weeks due to several major wildfires that continue to burn in northeast Minnesota, canoes are once again gliding across lakes and rivers in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.
The U.S. Forest Service reopened a portion of the BWCA to day use access on Monday. On Thursday, the agency began allowing overnight access for 41 entry points in the central and eastern areas of the wilderness, covering about 40 percent of the one million acres in the Boundary Waters.
"My dream has been to always go out on a northern Minnesota lake and catch a walleye,” said Jeff Zortman this week, while he was launching a canoe on Sawbill Lake, about 25 miles north of Tofte on the North Shore. Zortman and his family drove all the way from Kansas to visit the Boundary Waters.
Pat Moline of Maple Grove had planned to depart Tuesday on a multi-day trip into the Boundary Waters. Instead, after the Forest Service opened part of the wilderness to day visitors on Monday, he and four of his friends and extended family members packed up for a day trip to Alton Lake.
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"There's a campsite that's rated as five stars, just on the other side of the short portage, and we're going to have lunch, put our camp chairs up, put up a tarp, and just relax,” said Moline. “It is gorgeous.”
The sound of canoe paddles dipping into the still waters was music to the ears of Clare Shirley, who along with her husband, Dan, owns Sawbill Canoe Outfitters.
"Now that day trips are an option, I'd say we went from canceling 100 percent of our reservations coming up for the week to canceling about 50 of those,” Shirley said.
And now that overnight trips are once again leaving from Sawbill Lake, business is beginning to return to normal.
"It feels really good to see people around,” said Shirley, who grew up at the end of the Sawbill Trail and is the third generation in her family to run the outfitter. She said it feels good to be able to focus again on the “normal” work of helping prepare customers for canoe trips.
“We really love what we do. So we're excited to get back to work."
The Boundary Waters closure has been a huge blow to the many resorts and outfitters surrounding the wilderness that cater to the 150,000 people who visit the BWCA every year. Shirley estimates they lost 80 percent of their business over the past two weeks, during the busiest time of the year. She and other outfitters make a big chunk of their money between mid-July and mid-August.
The closure was put in place on July 14, the day after scorching temperatures and driving winds pushed wildfires several miles across the Boundary Waters, forcing thousands of canoeists to leave the wilderness.
Since then, more than 1,000 firefighters have arrived in northeast Minnesota from other parts of the country to fight the fires. Over the past couple of weeks, aided by frequent rains and cooler temperatures, they’ve slowly begun to gain the upper hand. The wildfires are now more than 50 percent contained.
But the fires are still burning in some areas on the forest floor, and officials caution that hotter weather and strong winds could still reignite the flames.
The areas of the Boundary Waters that have reopened are far away from the fires, which are mostly burning west and north of Ely. A large fire has also burned across the border from Canada west of the end of the Gunflint Trail.
But the partial reopening doesn't offer much help to the outfitters who serve canoeists in those parts of the wilderness that remain closed.
"The amount of files we're looking at, sitting here for cancellations, makes you a little sick, to be honest,” said Matt Ritter, who along with his wife, Cassidy, runs Voyageur Canoe Outfitters at the end of the Gunflint Trail.
Over the past two weeks, the business has gotten creative to bring in some income. For the first time, they set up an online store to sell items from their retail shop. Ritter said four staff members have processed and shipped about 300 orders so far.
The business is also housing and feeding firefighters in what otherwise would be vacant cabins. They even outfit elite firefighting hotshot crews from as far away as Arizona who have been paddling out to battle the Little Knife Fire. Ritter said his staff gave about 65 firefighters a crash course in paddling and portaging.
“You have to adapt,” he said. “Like, how are we going to have some income? And how are we going to take care of these firefighters?”
The government contracts have been a huge help, Ritter said. But it won’t cover what he’s losing from outfitting campers.
It’s a similar story outside Ely, where Nicole and Frank Udovich own the historic Kawishiwi Lodge and Outfitters on Lake One, on the edge of the Boundary Waters, at the end of the Fernberg Road.
The Udoviches were just able to return to the resort on Sunday evening when the Lake County evacuation order was lifted. But even though the lodge is open, guests aren’t allowed to canoe on the lake.
“I’m having a hard time selling anybody on coming to our resort without day use,” said Nicole Udovich. She said guests are also wary with the area still in the “Set” status of the Ready-Set-Go evacuation protocol
“They see ‘Set,’ and they don't necessarily want to venture up here, having to keep their cars packed, ready to go at a moment's notice. So that's a really tricky situation.”
Udovich said their lodge is nearly 20 miles from the nearest fire. And she feels protected by all the work firefighters did clearing brush and thinning the forest along the Fernberg Road. So it’s painful not to be able to access the Boundary Waters, which are right out their back door.
“We’ve got 20 docks situated in that bay, and it's really hard to look out at the blue skies, clear air, and not be ready to go just yet.”
The Forest Service says it's monitoring conditions daily to look for opportunities to open up more of the Boundary Waters.
The agency recently moved to allow campfires at developed sites outside the Boundary Waters. It also reopened the campground at the end of the Gunflint Trail.
But outfitters are pushing the agency to allow more day use permits for paddling into the Boundary Waters in areas still closed. Ritter also is hoping for additional overnight trips soon. He wants officials to think creatively, perhaps limiting how far canoeists could paddle, or creating check-in stations.
If two popular entry points into Seagull and Saganaga Lakes at the end of the Gunflint Trail aren’t reopened, Ritter said, “the rest of our summer would be shot."
