Hey all! I'm taking my longest trip ever, 10 days, at the end of September with a few buddies. We're planning on doing the LLC interior tour, clockwise through Slim, Gun, Gebe, Hustler, and Shell. I have not been through this area but have been saving it for a fall trip to enjoy the beautiful colors I've seen many photos of.

Are there any specific spots that might slow us down? We're short on daylight so I'd like to be even more confident on time estimates than usual. I'm mostly concerned with water levels, mud, not being able to float an underwater section of a portage... stuff like that. I know there is a portage in the Paunesses that people recommend avoiding in the spring.

We're hoping to hit Slim on day 1 in about 8-9 hours, double carrying, with an early lunch at Devil's Cascade. Getting on the water around 7am (at sunrise!) should put us there at a reasonable time as long as we don't get majorly held up by anything. After that, the goal is to spend 2 nights at each site, until our final night on Shell. The day from Gun to Gebe will be on the longer side, hopefully not lengthened too much by low water around Pocket/Gebe Creek. Everything after that should be fine for travel days as long as we're on the water around 9am.

I'm open to any other recommendations, whether it's for campsites, productive fishing lures, sights to see, all of it! I've got some healthy anxiety about the weather/temps and will be overpacking clothing as a result, but I'm really excited to finally check out this area. Also let me know if you'll be in the area around the same time, would love to say hi!

The Gebe Creek will probably slow you down quite a bit. I went through there at the end of June and the water level was quite low. Be sure to check out the “ “Chairs” on Gebe.

egknuti: "The Gebe Creek will probably slow you down quite a bit. I went through there at the end of June and the water level was quite low. Be sure to check out the “ “Chairs” on Gebe. "

Thanks EK! I was hoping the local LISN guru would chime in. Would you expect more beaver dam pullovers, or mucky/bog areas? Pullovers I don't have too much of a problem with pullovers, even a couple extra hopefully short unmarked portages are "fine"... but deep muck can ruin your day...

We went through the second week in August. I will say coming from that direction you can expect steep portages through pocket/gebe. Gebe creek had 1 beaver pull over but several areas were weed choked and filled with beaver debris. We did ep-slim before 1pm so that is very doable, even double portaging. It will be a long day going from gun-gebe. That portage into thumb is no joke. I just posted a trip report with a lot of info on these lakes the other day so check it out if you haven't already.

Deeznuts: "We went through the second week in August. I will say coming from that direction you can expect steep portages through pocket/gebe. Gebe creek had 1 beaver pull over but several areas were weed choked and filled with beaver debris. We did ep-slim before 1pm so that is very doable, even double portaging. It will be a long day going from gun-gebe. That portage into thumb is no joke. I just posted a trip report with a lot of info on these lakes the other day so check it out if you haven't already. "

Thanks Dee! I did see your trip report. Some good intel there! Just wish it had a few paragraph breaks; it's a bit tough to read as-is. I have actually done that rough climb into Gebe, on a LLC trip from 2019. Definitely a tough one especially at the end of the day! Reading about how much you struggled with thick vegetation slowing your canoes on Pocket/Gebe creek, I'm not looking forward to it... though I do recall that being a pretty area at least. When I paddled it, we had sunshowers with thunder way off in the distance; it made for quite the mood.

I know the lack of paragraph breaks made the read very tedious. I'm still trying to figure this site out and that was my first trip report. May try to repost with better formatting over the weekend when I have time to fix it
My buddy fished with a chartreuse grub on a jig and was nailing them as well. My other buddy used a jighead and a green worm looking thing that seemed to be pretty successful. I think he was calling it a yoshimoto. I used a black and orange mepps that slayed the bass. Looking forward to reading your report!

Also will say that ep-fat is feasible in 1 day and that was our favorite site. The unmarked portage is initially steep but levels off quite nicely and was a beautiful hike. I wanted to make it up to gun but glad we made it to the stone chairs instead. GEBE was the best fishing we had that entire week. Don't overlook pocket for the small mouth, the dcnr has it reported they didn't catch bass there but there as some absolute monster bass along the shorelines.

Started at LIS and made it to Fat that same day.

ISRO: "Started at LIS and made it to Fat that same day."

Well, surely it could be done in a single day even if it took 16 hours! How long did it take you, and were you single or double carrying?

I went through the same lakes in early August, only I traveled in the counterclockwise direction. I felt like that the portages were MUCH easier! Near Steep lake there were some significant elevation changes at the start of some portages, but not nearly as long as my downhill trips to the put-in lake!

I camped on Little Shell, Oyster, Finger, Gun, and Loon. I double portaged 95% of the route, the rest was single. And I usually had a one day layover at each campsite. Oyster to Finger and Gun to Loon were about 8 hour days, but the others were more like 4 to 6. This was my first “long” travel route in years and I’m 60, but in decent enough shape to finish each portage without having to rest much to catch my breath. I do carry a relatively light pack and my canoe is ultralight.

I used my GPS to measure travel time and distance. For some reason, on the long days, my stopped time was around 3 hours each day. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what I was doing during that time. I never stop for lunch. I carried only one item with my pack and that was my paddle as a walking stick. My travel speed was consistent though. My moving average was just over 2 mph, and overall average was exactly 1.3 mph every day. I do know my little landing net is not coming with next time. Unless I can rig it so I can remove the handle.

Like Deeznuts mentioned, there were significant stretches of the creeks that were wall to wall lily pads(almost all were the small football shaped ones). But, for much of the time l could get a good stroke in because of fairly frequent “holes” between pads. There was only one small area where the depth didn’t allow me to take a normal stroke. Going that direction, I had one 3-4’ drop over a dam, and I think there was another time when I was able get halfway across one by speeding at it with my canoe-I didn’t have to get out.

The area on both sides of Pocket lake looked like fantastic moose habitat, and I could see a number of places where one was feeding. In the future, I would probably camp on Pocket so I could sneak along the creeks at dawn and dusk.

I thought the area was beautiful and having creeks interspersed made for a great variety of scenery. I thought Little Beartrack was the most beautiful, with fairly clear water and a towering cliff on the east side. There were a number of beautiful cliffs on the last half of my route.

The portage to Gun from there was really neat. More cliffs on the right, and it ran through a predominantly birch stand. I saw the biggest birches of my life! I even picked up a flat piece of birch bark as big or bigger than a cookie sheet! The campsite at the neck of Gun was very nice and pretty unique. I would avoid the one on Little Shell though.

Of course, it is random, but there was virtually no traffic except for my day going out. The rest of the 11 days, I saw only 5 occupied campsites and 6 groups traveling-all with 2 canoes or less. I went 3 days without seeing anyone, and only once saw another canoe on my lake! One caveat-I don’t spend much time on the water during my layover days, and when I’m not traveling, I’m often not an early riser.

If you do go that direction, one navigation tip. Finding the main channel through the last stretch of the LIS river took me awhile. I started on the right (going south), but ended up paddling through about hundred yards of tall reeds until I found it along the left shore. It was pretty cool and unique though, with a few 3’ “hallways” running east to west. Of course a good memory would have helped a lot:)

Fritty

Getting to Slim on day one isn't bad....long day, but not horrible. The kicker is the portage from Little Loon up to Slim. Its an underrated portage for difficulty...especially if wet. 2 sites on Slim are just ok. Next day the South to Steep portage is a thumper....like 90% up hill. The Beartrack to Thumb portage feels longer than indicated. Mostly decent path, beautiful, gets uglier on Thumb side.
Did most of your route in 2018 but stayed on Finger 2nd night...not Gun. Went from Finger to Hustler then. Did first part again last fall all the way to Pocket/Gebe creek split. We headed for LLC then. Gebe is pretty lake, always wanted to stay but just paddled through (3x).

I did that route in 4 nights, double portaging, and it was a haul. You’ll enjoy having a longer time span. We did ep 14 to the north site on Little Loon in 6-7 hours. Slim and Section 3 campsites are pretty scraggly. You might consider staying on the top side of Loon.
Steep and the Beartracks are gems. Enjoy your trip.
Make sure to see the Pictos on Rocky.

We did that route 3 years ago. Night one was northern most site on Little Loon. Has a sandy beach to the west of the site. 2nd night was the island site on Finger. Great site and such seclusion. Stayed here two nights.
3rd camp on day 4 was on the peninsula on Oyster. The southern side site. Another great site.
Day 5 was the site on Lynx across from Little shell portage. Stayed here 2 nights as well.
Day 7 was back to #14.
Was a great trip and I want to do it again. Next time I would like 10 days. I like a couple layover days and in order to do that we had to put in a couple long days. I don't like long days. I like to paddle and fish for a couple hours between camps thoroughly enjoying the paddle and the scenery. I despise hurrying.

The trip from Little Loon to Finger was a tough day. We still use that when describing a bad day. "Oh man have I ever had a day 2 today!" LOL

Heyfritty: "I went through the same lakes in early August, only I traveled in the counterclockwise direction. I felt like that the portages were MUCH easier! Near Steep lake there were some significant elevation changes at the start of some portages, but not nearly as long as my downhill trips to the put-in lake!


I camped on Little Shell, Oyster, Finger, Gun, and Loon. I double portaged 95% of the route, the rest was single. And I usually had a one day layover at each campsite. Oyster to Finger and Gun to Loon were about 8 hour days, but the others were more like 4 to 6. This was my first “long” travel route in years and I’m 60, but in decent enough shape to finish each portage without having to rest much to catch my breath. I do carry a relatively light pack and my canoe is ultralight.


I used my GPS to measure travel time and distance. For some reason, on the long days, my stopped time was around 3 hours each day. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what I was doing during that time. I never stop for lunch. I carried only one item with my pack and that was my paddle as a walking stick. My travel speed was consistent though. My moving average was just over 2 mph, and overall average was exactly 1.3 mph every day. I do know my little landing net is not coming with next time. Unless I can rig it so I can remove the handle.


Like Deeznuts mentioned, there were significant stretches of the creeks that were wall to wall lily pads(almost all were the small football shaped ones). But, for much of the time l could get a good stroke in because of fairly frequent “holes” between pads. There was only one small area where the depth didn’t allow me to take a normal stroke. Going that direction, I had one 3-4’ drop over a dam, and I think there was another time when I was able get halfway across one by speeding at it with my canoe-I didn’t have to get out.


The area on both sides of Pocket lake looked like fantastic moose habitat, and I could see a number of places where one was feeding. In the future, I would probably camp on Pocket so I could sneak along the creeks at dawn and dusk.


I thought the area was beautiful and having creeks interspersed made for a great variety of scenery. I thought Little Beartrack was the most beautiful, with fairly clear water and a towering cliff on the east side. There were a number of beautiful cliffs on the last half of my route.


The portage to Gun from there was really neat. More cliffs on the right, and it ran through a predominantly birch stand. I saw the biggest birches of my life! I even picked up a flat piece of birch bark as big or bigger than a cookie sheet! The campsite at the neck of Gun was very nice and pretty unique. I would avoid the one on Little Shell though.


Of course, it is random, but there was virtually no traffic except for my day going out. The rest of the 11 days, I saw only 5 occupied campsites and 6 groups traveling-all with 2 canoes or less. I went 3 days without seeing anyone, and only once saw another canoe on my lake! One caveat-I don’t spend much time on the water during my layover days, and when I’m not traveling, I’m often not an early riser.


If you do go that direction, one navigation tip. Finding the main channel through the last stretch of the LIS river took me awhile. I started on the right (going south), but ended up paddling through about hundred yards of tall reeds until I found it along the left shore. It was pretty cool and unique though, with a few 3’ “hallways” running east to west. Of course a good memory would have helped a lot:)


Fritty
"

Hey Fritty, thanks for the excellent intel! We considered doing it counter-clockwise, but one of the goal lakes/sites is on Hustler, and getting there on day 1 isn't gonna happen, so we'd have to shift which lakes we stay on, to make the travel days manageable. We're expecting the long days to be 8.5-9 hours, with the shorter days around 6-7 hours. Our travel speeds largely match yours, using data from my Garmin GPS to verify.

I would love to spend more time around Pocket, but we'll just be traveling through. Same for Finger; the south island campsite looks gorgeous and I hope to stop and check it out if it's open, but the plan is to push on to Gebe. I've heard of higher than normal moose sightings on Gebe, so I'll have my telephoto lens ready to hopefully capture a big bull munching away at daybreak - a guy can dream!

I'm hoping the GPS track sets us on the right course when heading back south on the LIS on our exit day, but I have definitely seen some river areas with no obvious path through so I appreciate the heads up. Will do our best to remember how we got up there!

cowdoc: "Getting to Slim on day one isn't bad....long day, but not horrible. The kicker is the portage from Little Loon up to Slim. Its an underrated portage for difficulty...especially if wet. 2 sites on Slim are just ok. Next day the South to Steep portage is a thumper....like 90% up hill. The Beartrack to Thumb portage feels longer than indicated. Mostly decent path, beautiful, gets uglier on Thumb side.
Did most of your route in 2018 but stayed on Finger 2nd night...not Gun. Went from Finger to Hustler then. Did first part again last fall all the way to Pocket/Gebe creek split. We headed for LLC then. Gebe is pretty lake, always wanted to stay but just paddled through (3x)."

That Slim portage will be up in the air depending mostly on weather. I've read numerous reports similar to yours. It seems some of the sites around Little Loon are nicer, but we're just passing through, and want to give ourselves an easier day 2 to Gun if we can. The cliff site on Slim looks to have a nice view, even though the climb up to it sounds like an annoyance (that I'm willing to put up with for a night), so that's the goal site.

When I was last on Gebe, I remember it being a somewhat picturesque lake with its arms and bays. Maybe not as dramatic as the eastern BWCA with its elevation, but charming in a backcountry way. I'm looking forward to having a layover day there to explore and fish it a little bit. Gun seems like it might be the sleeper hit though and I'll be holding my breath as we check if the nice campsite at the pinch is available.

CabinAfter: "I did that route in 4 nights, double portaging, and it was a haul. You’ll enjoy having a longer time span. We did ep 14 to the north site on Little Loon in 6-7 hours. Slim and Section 3 campsites are pretty scraggly. You might consider staying on the top side of Loon.
Steep and the Beartracks are gems. Enjoy your trip.
Make sure to see the Pictos on Rocky.
"

I can't imagine trying to push through this area in only 4 nights! I'm used to a fair bit of travel, but not without a break every 2-3 days. I suppose I would find a way if I only had 4 nights available and wanted to do this area.

When did you go? I'm wondering if your travel time might be on the shorter side if you didn't have any issues with pullovers or low water mucky areas which we might have.

I passed through Rocky back in 2019 and forgot it had pictos, but most of the reading I've done says they're a little unimpressive. We will probably cruise by them just to see. I remember Rocky being a pretty cool looking lake so I'm looking forward to paddling through again.

Thanks for the intel!

Bushman: "We did that route 3 years ago. Night one was northern most site on Little Loon. Has a sandy beach to the west of the site. 2nd night was the island site on Finger. Great site and such seclusion. Stayed here two nights.
3rd camp on day 4 was on the peninsula on Oyster. The southern side site. Another great site.
Day 5 was the site on Lynx across from Little shell portage. Stayed here 2 nights as well.
Day 7 was back to #14.
Was a great trip and I want to do it again. Next time I would like 10 days. I like a couple layover days and in order to do that we had to put in a couple long days. I don't like long days. I like to paddle and fish for a couple hours between camps thoroughly enjoying the paddle and the scenery. I despise hurrying.


The trip from Little Loon to Finger was a tough day. We still use that when describing a bad day. "Oh man have I ever had a day 2 today!" LOL"

I can imagine pushing from Little Loon to Finger to be a bear of a day, even if beautiful. That island site is something I'd love to check out, but our route will only have us passing through. Gotta leave something for the future I s'pose! I think I stayed at the Oyster site you're referring to, which isn't the one everyone wants, but we found it optimally placed for fishing and it has a pretty great view as well with a nice kitchen area. If we end up adjusting our route to stay on Lynx, the site you stayed at is #1 on my list! If there's anything I've taken away from planning a trip through this area, it's that almost every lake would be a fantastic place to camp, so it's been hard to choose.

I also love to take the time to appreciate a place (and photograph it), yet I am also the trip coordinator and have a hard time detaching myself from "the route", so a little "hurrying" is inevitable. When you plan a longer route, you do have to stick to it for the most part. My first solo back in June (Lil Gabbro/S.Kawishiwi) was wonderfully laid back, with plenty of meandering, fishing, and floating, and an open ended exit strategy. My group trips are the time to go deep and see some real backcountry, though, so we'll have a firmer agenda to stick to.

My longest day was EP16 to Lady Boot Bay on LLC, just shy of 12 hours, around 22 miles of travel. We knew it would be a long day, but we had a little more wind in our face than we hoped for, and it felt like Fish Stake Narrows/Lady Boot Bay took foreeeever to paddle through. My buddy's now-wife was pretty spent at that point, physically and emotionally, lol. Her mood brightened up when we finally found an open site and whipped up a delicious first night meal of spaghetti. We still refer back to that day on LLC though.

To Hustler in 1 day is a long day but very doable, especially because youll be doing almost the same mileage if you go up to slim (maybe a little more portaging). I WISH I had 10 days. We are lucky to get a week out there at a time!

I would go counter clockwise, those portages between gebe and finger are a b*tch coming from that direction. You'll be much happier if you start with those lower lakes. Those portages are long and I wouldn't save them for the end of the trip. If you plan on taking the unmarked portage between fat and slim it is also much easier from that direction.

In 2021 we did ep-hustler, layover on hustler, hustler-gebe, gebe-taku via LLC, taku- eugene, Eugene-Loon, layover day on Loon, then loon-ep. The toughest part was the portage between lynx and ruby. NEVER ENDING.

Deeznuts: "To Hustler in 1 day is a long day but very doable, especially because youll be doing almost the same mileage if you go up to slim (maybe a little more portaging). I WISH I had 10 days. We are lucky to get a week out there at a time!


I would go counter clockwise, those portages between gebe and finger are a b*tch coming from that direction. You'll be much happier if you start with those lower lakes. Those portages are long and I wouldn't save them for the end of the trip. If you plan on taking the unmarked portage between fat and slim it is also much easier from that direction.


In 2021 we did ep-hustler, layover on hustler, hustler-gebe, gebe-taku via LLC, taku- eugene, Eugene-Loon, layover day on Loon, then loon-ep. The toughest part was the portage between lynx and ruby. NEVER ENDING.
"

Based on my PP estimates, before my padded time, it's 7h15m to Slim, and 8h15m to Hustler. Pushing to Slim will already be a stretch for daylight, and we're bringing a newbie (who is in the military so he can "embrace the suck"), so I'm not looking to stretch it even further. The route to Slim seems pretty easy at face value, save for the portage from Little Loon... there is a lot more portaging involved with going to Hustler. I understand that the Steep portage is steep, but we're double carrying, so no matter what, we have to walk every portage in both directions. There are reviews for several portages on the route that say "I wouldn't want to be coming from the other direction". Also, saving the tough portages for the end of the trip means lighter food barrels, and beefier muscles... I think that's actually the winning strat! Throwing a miler at the end of the first day with weak bodies and full barrels? Nawww...

Does anyone know the best weather sites and stations to get accurate expectations for this LLC interior area?

More rain and storms seem to be moving in right as we're supposed to start our trip, but it's showing more storms for Lac La Croix First Nation and Crane Lake compared to Ely. I'm crossing my fingers that it goes back to a milder forecast, but I'd still like to make sure I'm using the most accurate weather station to keep my expectations in check. It is looking like the entire trip could be rain...

Well, Crane Lake/LLC/Ely are all showing pretty much the same thing across Weather.com, Natl Weather Svc, and WUnderground. We're gonna get rain, possibly storms on our entry day tomorrow. As long as we don't see ground strikes, storms aren't too concerning... we'll have a tailwind so hopefully we get missed by most of the heavy rain and can just fly up the river. The rest of the week is mixed between decent partly cloudy days, and a quarter to half inch of rain per day. Yikes. At least the first half of the trip will be relatively warm.

I also think we'll actually skip Slim/Sec3Pond, and instead paddle up into Snow Bay. This lets us avoid the tough portage into Slim at the end of what is sure to be a wet day, and the muddy portage into North/South from Sec3Pond as well. This should also save us some time for day 2 to hopefully get to Gun in under 4 hours, even with rain. That Steep portage is gonna suck in the rain though. If the nice site on Gun is taken, we'll still have plenty of time to get to Beartrack, again as long as storms don't force us on land for hours.

This will almost certainly be the wettest trip I've ever been on. Not exactly looking forward to it, but I'm just hoping there's enough good to go with the bad. We'll find out soon enough.

It'll be a hell of a trip either way! Have fun! It's an amazing area.

I used crane lake info, though it didn't seem to matter much. Initially at entry it called for 6/7 days to be rainy and we only saw rain 2 of those days. I think heading up to snow bay is a great idea. You'll have paddle fatigue but it will save you valuable energy for portaging later. Gun is beautiful but may I suggest that if the weather permits you go out LLC and come down through takucmich? Definitely one of those lake worth the view, and it would save you some portaging. Also the fishing in all of the little bays of LLC is definitely worth it too. I think I saw some info on an unmarked shortcut through the bay at snow bay into LLC to cut some time if that's a big concern of yours.
Happy travels and excited to read your trip report!

JD, how was the trip?

I just forced myself to sit down and write the report over the last 3 hours or so. Nearly 8000 words, a straight brain dump with hopefully some interesting bits or entertainment. I gotta get to bed, but I'll proofread it tomorrow and get it posted as a proper trip report. Hope you got some snacks because you'll be in for a long read (if you are so inclined)!

Cool cool. Thanks for the heads up.

Alright, it's up! Thanks to everyone for their advice and for following along! I hope y'all enjoy.

https://bwca.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=trip.report_view&sel_trp_id=7523