#3: [07-May-02]

#2: [04-May-02]

22-Aug-2001 -- This confluence is in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, a roadless wilderness area in northern Minnesota and southern Ontario. The nearest canoe route to the confluence is about 2.7 kilometers to the north. Canoe routes also run about 4 kilometers to the east and west. After a couple of days of canoing in, we camped at a campsite almost due north of the confluence. The next morning, we began hiking towards the confluence. A very strong storm on July 4, 1999 blew down nearly all of the trees in an area a couple of kilometers to the north, and unfortunately it also blew down a significant number in our path, nearly all of them lying in an east-west direction. See the pictures for examples. We climbed over some and skirted others, but only moved about 200 meters closer to the confluence in a half hour. We then reached a treeless marshy area running roughly south which made for much easier walking. We were hoping that we might be able to follow the marsh a consdiderable distance, or that there might be fewer downed trees further inland from the lake, but alas, such was not the case. After about 500 meters, we again reached the forest of fallen trees. We could see no further open areas, and had only traveled about 1/4 the way to the confluence in somewhat over an hour. We were also scratched and scraped from crawling over trees, so we decided that we were unlikely to reach the confluence that day.

I would suggest potential confluence seekers get some good topographic maps and plan a route which keeps them out of the trees as much as possible, possibly by coming in from the east or west. From the east or west, the downed trees also tend to be parallel to ones path, so they are somewhat less of a problem. Since there are also some lakes in the area which would need to be skirted (they can't be reached by canoe), it might be easier to get to this confluence in winter when they can be skied over. This would entail at least a couple of nights of winter camping, as the area is off-limits to all motorized travel.