BWCA

No posts for a couple days because I left civilization to go to my favorite place....the Boundary Waters. Brian, Foxy, and I left Saturday to put in at Sawbill Lake, paddled and portaged about 9 miles, and set up camp on Cherokee Lake. Now I do love going out into the BWCA (Boundary Waters Canoe Area) but there is always a little bit of trepidation over 1) the weather and 2) the bugs. The last trip we took (in June this year) had both rain and biting flies/mosquitoes, so I was really hoping we would have better luck this time. And we did! Oh man was it nice. There was no wind on our way in, the bugs were not bad at all (as long as you were in your tent by like 9:00 at which time they all came out in droves but you could hear them coming so at least we had a little warning), and we had a great site. We did get a good workout on the way out today because there was a decent wind that we paddled into the entire way back. But overall, it was a very relaxing and peaceful trip.

Being pregnant has some advantages to these kind of trips as well. Like, I didn't have to carry as much as I usually do on the portages, and I must say that Brian was a sport about carrying the extra weight in his bags. He didn't complain once and kept telling me to take it easy. The downside of being prego in the BWCA is that sitting in the canoe for that long is not as comfortable and I couldn't really wear the waist belt on my pack cause it felt weird. The highlight, prego or not, is putting up your hammock and reading a good book while watching the loons float by and listening to the water sloshing against the shore. Now that is awesome.

We saw loons, lots of ducks, and a pitcher plant, but sadly the most memorable piece of "nature" was not beautiful or exciting. We were on our day trip, just paddling around from lake to lake, checking out different campsites we might want to stay at in the future. We pulled in to one such site, which was awesome, and I was throwing the stick for Foxy into the water so she could swim a bit. I started to head to the canoe and I was trying to swish whatever was caught between my toes (I was wearing my water sandals) and as I kept swishing I knew it was bad. I lifted my foot and am embarrassed to say, said something like this, "OH MY F*ING GOD... GET IT OFF BRIAN... GET IT OFF RIGHT NOW..." as I am flailing my foot around in the air with this gigantic leech hanging off of my toes. I can't even look at it as he is pulling it off (which my hero did without hesitation), and when he does get it off (he then yelps a little bit as it starts sucking on him) he flings it. I found it back in the water and OH MY GOD, IT HAD TENTACLES. On closer inspection, it was not a mutant leech with tentacles, but a leech with LIKE 50 LITTLE BABY LEECHES ATTACHED TO IT. So then I look at my foot and see several of these little baby leeches attached to my toes as well. I may or may not have destroyed many of those little leeches still in my path at that point. Dear God. It was awful. I don't know what it is about leeches, but I simply cannot deal with them. Ticks, mosquitoes, snakes, spiders, whatever. I can handle those, but leeches.....no thanks. I am shuddering even as I type this, that's how gross it was. But really though.....the rest of the trip was beautiful. Gorgeous. I highly recommend it.