Alone through the Wilderness

The United States has 800 designated wilderness areas, of which the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness is the most visited and one of the largest. It was the first wilderness I ever visited, and it was a revelation: At the age of 14, I found a stone and water dreamland that sparked an obsession with wild places, which peaked several years later when I walked 7,000 miles over three cross-country treks.

Yet now, decades and dozens of canoe trips later, I haven’t hiked across the Boundary Waters, where during high season only 2 percent of campers are backpackers. I want new perspective on my formative wilderness, gleaned through sweat and solitude along the state’s toughest footpaths. So I’m leaving the boat at home and traveling by land. I backpack 140 miles through canoe country, more than half of the 230 miles of rugged hiking trails that cross the BWCA, on its three longest trails: the Kekekabic, the Border Route, and the Powwow.

Along the way I learn firsthand that these routes, notorious for difficult conditions, are a far cry from the well-trod lake-to-lake portages many of us know as the footpaths of this wilderness—and that they offer an alternative, literally off-the-beaten-path route to experiencing it. During my summertime hikes, and in conversations with the people who look after these trails, I also learn that it takes a virtual army of volunteers to keep them passable. Motor restrictions, geographical isolation, and climate-change-driven extreme weather ensure they remain wild and woolly, just like they’re supposed to be.

Neck-Deep in the Kek. The 39-mile Kekekabic Trail, the second longest in the BWCA, stretches from Snowbank Lake near Ely to the Gunflint Trail near Grand Marais. My first day on the Kek, near Snowbank, walking into herbage so thick feels nuts. I can’t see my feet beneath the bracken ferns that after buckets of early summer rain are face-tickling behemoths. The path ahead is engulfed entirely by riotous alder growth, though a corridor of shorter shrubbery implies passage. I press my palms together into a wedge and plunge into the wall of branches and leaves. Shrub diving quickly becomes routine as I forge eastward.

“If a trail is maintained, people will hike it,” Martin Kubik had told me before my trip. Despite the vigorous undergrowth I encounter, the Kek has, generally speaking, been maintained for decades. It was built in the 1930s for fire tower access, but before then its proximate route had been surveyed in the 1890s for a railroad and considered in the 1920s as the route of the never-to-be Ely-Gunflint Highway (see “Paddling into the Past,” March–April 2023).

Kubik first trekked the Kek in 1974, four years before the motor-free wilderness was established, when the trail was a chainsaw-manicured thoroughfare with muck-spanning boardwalks. Since then he has become an advocate and champion for this and other BWCA trails through his work with the Kekekabic Trail Club and Boundary Waters Heritage Trails, both volunteer-run organizations that help keep these paths hikeable.

For determined travelers, that is.

On a July afternoon, 10 miles into my solo eastward hike, I’m dripping sweat under a bulging food sack and an effective but claustrophobia-inducing hooded bug shirt. Spring and fall are better, when bare branches reveal the scanty path, but a free week is precious, so I’ve set out despite summer extremes of mosquitoes and foliage.

Where the trail isn’t rocky, it’s muddy. Rarely a faded boot print lingers in the mire, but these are outnumbered by freshly stamped moose and wolf tracks. The forest is silent other than the drone of mosquitoes as I scramble past pink granite boulders and orange chanterelle mushrooms to a hilltop over Kekekabic Lake.

I nose around for relics of the fire lookout tower that stood here, but little remains of what was, at 110 feet, the tallest such tower in the Superior National Forest. In 1939, the lookout man, Bill Rom, went all of July without seeing another person. These days, I reckon, I wouldn’t have to wait much more than a week.

After two days walking with wet feet, I reach the prettiest spot on the Kek, Agamok Falls, a foaming cataract in a black rock gorge. My trail runners finally dry, but shortly after leaving the gorge, I slip into a mudhole that slurps off my left shoe. I grope around in the sludge with my hand until I find it, then slog on. At a campsite on Lake Gabimichigami, I fall into an exhausted sleep listening to mosquito whine and loon tremolo.

On my third day walking, I near the Kek’s eastern trailhead. The trail traverses an open hillside over stream-linked ponds before popping out of the trees onto the paved Gunflint Trail roadway. It’s been a deep dive through the roadless heart of the wilderness, and I’m pleased to have experienced it, though I’m hoping the way ahead will leave the green tunnel for more lakes and vistas.

Trail Builders, Trail Keepers. The week after my trip, I check in with some folks who know the Kek best, seeking more insight into the lore behind the route and the effort it takes to keep it viable.

Ely conservationist Becky Rom wrote The Historic Kekekabic Trail, a booklet that describes how the Kek shaped the life of her father, Bill Rom. As a young man during the Great Depression, he earned paychecks from northland New Deal projects, helping to build the Kek and to man the now-vanished fire tower—work that provided a foundation for him to become an iconic Ely outfitter. In 1982, when he was 64 years old, Rom hiked the Kek for the first time in decades and found a mess of fallen timber. Alarmed by the trail’s decline, Rom enticed Martin Kubik to found the Kekekabic Trail Club; in 1990, Kubik kicked off the club’s work by recruiting 110 volunteers to remove more than 3,000 toppled trees.

Becky Rom sees the trail as a monument to government lifelines that helped Americans survive the Great Depression, though its merit transcends history. “Walking through the forest provides an intimate way to experience the natural world,” she tells me. 

Derrick Passe is one of the legions of volunteers who keep the Kek in shape, having led 34 maintenance trips with the Kekekabic Trail Club.

“I feel offended when someone says that the trail is poorly maintained,” says Passe, who explains that users themselves play an essential role in its upkeep. The trail is clearer than it was a decade ago, when Passe cut wrist-diameter trees growing from its tread. With dozens of volunteers putting in 1,500 hours a year, the club clears some sections annually and most of it every other year.

Depending on rainfall and other conditions, regrowth can occur shockingly fast. Club president Eric Campbell recalls once clearing a section in May, then hiking in September and finding plants 5 feet tall.

Along the Border. After 39 tough miles on the Kek, my food bag is lighter and I’m primed for my next BWCA trail, the 65-mile Border Route, which I reach by walking just 300 yards up the Gunflint from the Kek terminus.

The 1978 congressional act creating the Boundary Waters wilderness authorized construction of “a system of new hiking, backpacking and cross-country ski trails.” An outdoor club, the Minnesota Rovers, had already begun building the Border Route in 1972. The legislation allowed them to complete the trail across the eastern Boundary Waters in 1993, assisted by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Forest Service. The Border Route Trail Association spun off from the Rovers and now maintains the trail.

The Border Route immediately ascends the ridge system it traces eastward. Bugs are scarcer up here, freeing me to shed my mosquito gear and walk in a T-shirt. The trail passes a towering magnetite-rich stone pillar named Magnetic Rock, then joins ski trails for several miles to the top of the Gunflint High Cliffs, which soar 400 feet above Gunflint Lake. Early the next morning, I lose the trail on a ridgetop covered in 10-foot-tall hazel. I have paper maps in my pack and digital ones downloaded to the phone in my pocket, but I leave them be, using the rising sun as a compass bearing, then homing in on the sound of rushing water, which takes me to a stone trough of whitewater called Bridal Veil Falls. Nearby is a sturdy trail bridge, and I’m back on track.

The path becomes easier to follow under old-growth pine and descends to Topper Lake, where I’m startled to see a human stringing a hammock between pines at a campsite. “Hello,” I say, and the man jumps. Steve Braun is 71 years old and training to climb a mountain in Asia. He’s been 11 days on the Kek and Border Route, and I’m the only other backpacker he’s met. I’ll see no other during my six days on the two trails. Excited for company, we talk nonstop for an hour.

Moving along, the temperature shoots up to 85 degrees, and I follow the trail up a ridge with vertiginous northern exposure. I finally reach a campsite on Rose Lake. The evening refuses to cool, so I float on my back away from shore, staring at the cliffy ridge honeyed in sundown glow and listening to the distant whoosh of Curtain Falls.

“Glutton for continuous movement through country I want to see,” I journal the next day. The plentiful lakes, virgin pines, gorgeous vistas, and peaceful seclusion of the Border Route have made for stellar hiking. Now, though, hundreds of windthrown trees slow my pace. I walk for 13 hours with barely a break and cover 21 miles. The storm damage finally ends near West Pike Lake.

There, on a smooth stone propped against the base of a pine, someone has scratched “NCT to VT,” a tantalizing though illicit reminder that both the Border Route and the Kek are part of the 4,800-mile North Country National Scenic Trail. The gargantuan route stretches to the Appalachian Trail in Vermont. Looking at the inscription, I marvel at what adventures such a trek would create.

I hike just another day to where the Border Route merges into the Superior Hiking Trail and where my ride home is waiting. With more than a hundred miles of BWCA trails under my belt, I’m getting the allure of foot-powered travel in this land of lakes.

Powwow Weekend. In years past, the Powwow Trail was infamous for lost hikers. Thanks to volunteer grit, however, its surviving 31-mile loop is currently reputed to be in the best shape ever. Hiked by only 126 groups in 2023, the Powwow is a perfect length to catch on as a weekend backpack outing, a wilder alternative to the often-crowded Superior Hiking Trail.

The Youth Conservation Corps built the trail in the late 1970s from the south shore of Lake Isabella, forging three loops totaling 55 miles through recently logged terrain. The 2011 Pagami Creek Fire scorched everything. The following summer, Martin Kubik counted 4,648 trees across the path. The Forest Service flirted with abandoning the trail, which Kubik contested vociferously, and when it gave volunteers permission to maintain the western loop, Kubik was so eager, “I about fell off my chair,” he says.

Over Memorial Day weekend, I start the Powwow with two friends, having arranged to meet a trail crew from the Boundary Waters Advisory Committee, an organization Kubik founded and recently left to start a similar group called Boundary Waters Heritage Trails. With Forest Service backing and sweat equity, these organizations, plus others like the Northwoods Volunteer Connection, have restored many BWCA trails.

Calm and sunny weather is a welcome surprise after a windy, rainy month that has flooded parts of the trail. We wade a shin-deep pool where a baby snapping turtle the width of a golf ball swims. Budding balm of Gilead trees lend the air a savory smell. After a few miles on a former logging road, we meet the trail crew, led by Mel Yackley.

“This is maybe the busiest the Powwow’s been since the Pagami Fire,” she gushes, telling us that five groups of backpackers, including ours, are presently spread—quite thinly, I think—along the loop. Yackley’s crew is a mix of veterans and first-timers.

“The best part is when you hike back to camp and see how clear the trail is,” says Aaron Nosan, on his 11th trip.

Fourteen-year-old Adam Povarchuk, on his first outing, takes a break from arguing with his father, Valentin, about the best way to saw a log to tell me he’s enjoying himself. Clearing trail, he says, “is more fun than hiking.” I bite my tongue.

Fresh Perspective. We part from the trail crew and camp on a scenic stone knuckle above glassy South Wilder Lake. In the morning we take on the loop’s northwest corner, where Yackley warned dozens of blowdowns obscure the trail. Long dead, the bare trunks are easier obstacles than ones felled live with twigs intact. Our only dilemma is whether to wriggle under or clamber over. Along its western edge, the trail hugs four rugged lakes, fetching and inaccessible to canoes. This is one of the busiest camping weekends of the year, and all day we are alone in the wilderness.

Our last night near quaggy Campfire Lake is not a place I’d ordinarily camp. No water views or ancient pines, just thickets ringing bedrock meadows. The trail, though, has led us to this homely landscape that through evening alchemy becomes resplendent with wildlife song. I set out in search of the wooing dance of a peenting woodcock, my head attracting a cloud of still-scarce insects. From the bugs a pair of nighthawks anchor their hunt, swooping repeatedly on scythe-shaped wings.

As I retreat to camp from thickening dark, a nighthawk appears from the gloaming gulf between the pale trunks of spindly aspens, the bird winging silently on a collision course with my face. I clench for impact and feel breeze off its feathers, but the nighthawk rips skyward, and, before vanishing, its white striped underwings lift my eyes to a blackened dome of burning suns. A flashing thrill of vicarious flight, I’m surprised to find my feet on the ground and that this familiar wilderness is anything but. I take a breath and stumble toward the glow of the fire back in camp. 

Before you hit the trail

The hiking trails of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness provide adventure for day hikers and overnight backpackers of many skill and ability levels. However, not every trail is for everyone. Choose a route wisely according to your physical ability, your proficiency in backcountry navigation, and your hiking experience.

• Permits are required for both day and overnight use of the portions of the trails in the wilderness, including all of the Kekekabic and Powwow and most of the Border Route. During the spring-to-fall quota season, Powwow permits are unlimited. Border Route and Kek permits are limited but usually available.

• Volunteering on a trail maintenance trip is a great introduction to wilderness hiking. Check in with the North Country Trail Association, the Kekekabic Trail Club, the Border Route Trail Association, the Boundary Waters Advisory Committee, or Northwoods Volunteer Connection.
  The trails have designated campsites with a fire grate and privy, though dispersed camping is permitted when backpacking in the wilderness. Check specific rules when you pick up your permit.

• The trails have trailheads with parking and signage. Along the trails, however, signage is minimal to nonexistent. Be prepared to navigate unsigned junctions where spurs and portages intersect.

• Cellular service is intermittent and shouldn’t be relied on. Digital trail maps downloaded in advance to a GPS device or smartphone with location services work well. However, electronic devices can run out of batteries or break. Every hiker should carry an analog compass and accurate topographical maps.

• Some hikers may carry a satellite communication device, but nonemergency rescue calls should be avoided. Rescues strain the resources of local emergency responders and the Forest Service and put others at risk. If you hike into the wilderness, aim to hike out on your own power.

• If you get lost, stay calm and use your tools to navigate back to the trail.

• On the Kek, a vehicle shuttle between trailheads requires a 170-mile drive. To avoid this, the Kek’s western end offers several loop hikes—the Snowbank Lake, Benezie Lake, Old Pines, Disappointment Lake, and Disappointment Mountain trails. On the Border Route, some Gunflint Trail outfitters may, for a fee, shuttle hikers between trailheads. Inquire locally.

• The Kek and Border Route have printed guidebooks available for purchase, and the Powwow has a free, printable online guide. To learn more:

Backpacking the BWCA:
tinyurl.com/backpackingBWCA

Wilderness permits: 
www.recreation.gov/permits/233396

Border Route Trail: 
www.borderroutetrail.org

Kekekabic Trail: 
northcountrytrail.org/trail/minnesota/kek

Powwow Trail: 
www.boundarywaterstrails.org/powwow-trail-guide