BWCA-Ensign Lake, October 17-22, 2017

The canoe/fishing group agreed to try a late season trip into the BWCA this October.  We didn't go in until October 17 and came out on the 22nd.  This is a full month later than we had ever gone before and we got very lucky with the weather.  Never got below around 40 over night with daytime highs in the upper 50's, 60's and even to 70 one day.  Strong wind and waves on the way out, but otherwise the weather gods smiled very favorably on us.  George had his usual good fishing trip and provided most of the fish for our three fish dinners.  He outfished the other four of us combined, but we were not bashful about eating his fish for dinner.  George had made a new cedar strip solo canoe, which performed very well.  We went in this late as Donna and I were together in the upper midwest visiting family and friends for 10 days prior and this is the earliest I could go.  I probably would never had heard the end of it, if the weather had been rotten, and indeed it snowed about two days after we paddled out.  Ensign Lake is a fairly large lake that is not real far into the BWCA, and has about 38 dispersed campsites.  We were the only ones on the lake.  In the summer all of the sites would have been occupied, so we pretty much had the BWCA all to ourselves.