Compiled by Louis Levin
Perhaps the greatest lesson learned on a Nebagamon wilderness trip is the benefit of stepping out of your comfort zone. Now, having gone on my fair share of wilderness trips, I am very comfortable out in the woods, but my most recent adventure with my wife Maggie pushed me in ways I wasn’t expecting.
As you can imagine, I like to plan. I plan for camp, of course. I have next summer’s programming schedule already made – down to when each Special Interest and Wannado falls – months upon months in advance. And I like to plan my free time as well – there’s a big whiteboard in our kitchen outlining the following week and how we’ll spend each evening… including what we’re going to watch on TV each night. It’s a little much! So when it comes to my personal camping trips, the planning is half the fun. I enjoy pouring over maps of the Boundary Waters to decide a route. I sketch out a menu many times over to ensure we’ll eat all our favorites. And laying out all the gear we’ll need has become a bit of a ritual.
Illustration by Sally Stein
Now, in all this planning, sometimes I end up trying to maximize each and every minute. When it comes to the Boundary Waters, or really any vacation, high level planning helps me satisfy my itch to see and do as much as humanly possible. This doesn’t make for the most relaxing vacation (see last year’s article about Maggie and my trip down the Grand Portage). So this year, when planning a BWCA trip at the end of the camp season, Maggie decided it was time for me to step out of my comfort zone and… not plan.
She planned our camping trip, from the menu and the route, to the gear we’d need, to where we’d stay and what we’d do. And unsurprisingly, our trip this fall looked quite a bit different than what I’d usually plan. Maggie’s itinerary consisted of canoeing up to beautiful Cherokee Lake, finding a prime campsite, and spending three consecutive nights in that one spot, maximizing time for reading in a hammock.
I bit my tongue while my internal monologue went haywire. Three nights at one campsite?!? What a wasted opportunity! Heck, with tailwinds, in three nights we could paddle half the lakes in the Tofte ranger district. I can read a book at home! It took some effort to keep these intrusive thoughts to myself – I’ve put Maggie through the ringer on more than a few backcountry trips; it only made sense that she should plan a camping trip for once.
Camp Family, I am as always happy to report that I was wrong. You know what’s great? Waking up in a tent and not having to pack it up. Leaving your wet hiking boots in the sun all day to dry. Reading in a hammock with your wife! In my maximization habit, a basecamp day never really crossed my mind in planning, let alone two consecutive. But Maggie showed me there’s more to camping than planning the perfect trip. There was so much to appreciate at our lovely site, like the biggest birch tree I’d ever seen, one that I surely would’ve missed if I’d hurried out of camp after a single night. I usually rush breakfast on trail – I have a historic penchant for cold overnight oats, both on and off trail – but base camping showed me the benefits of warm pancakes on a chilly September morning.
And the wilderness still provided some healthy challenges. Our first drizzly night, the low dipped into the mid-30s for the coldest night I’d ever spent in a tent, testing the limits of our gear. Our third afternoon, an unrelenting rain blew through our campsite and lasted into early the next morning. We had to hold our tarp down to the ground to ensure we could cook dinner without getting thoroughly soaked.
The trip was amazing and memorable for many reasons that I wasn’t expecting. These kinds of rewarding, stretching experiences happen for each and every one of our campers with every single paddle, hike, and portage. I am pleasantly surprised when it happens for me as well. Thinking differently about my own trip, even if it’s the umpteenth trip to the Boundary Waters, helped me appreciate a new perspective on the woods, and taught me to let up on the reins a little bit. In the end, it was a reminder that the woods always has something new to teach us. Whether you’re a first-year camper learning to stern a canoe or a lifelong paddler learning to slow down, the wilderness has a funny way of teaching us exactly what we need—often when we least expect it.
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IT MAY INTEREST YOU TO KNOW… On the East Coast, Zach Brotchner, Ben Brotchner, and Jack Chait went on a backpacking trip in the Catskills with their folks (including Jack’s dad and alum, Dan Chait, 1985-’88, ’90, ’95), hiking, fishing, and cooking over a fire, just like they learned at CNOC! In Cleveland, Maxwell Block plays running back for his middle school football team, and Lu Apffel runs cross country for his school and is in his community golf club. In Cincinnati, Nathan Eiserman has been focusing on school, playing golf, and spending time with friends all while teaching Sunday School and working at Great Wolf Lodge. In Detroit, Will Temkin plays wide receiver for his high school’s freshman team. In Minneapolis, Grayson Sweet has brought his love of rubber ducks back to school, founding an independent country called the Duck Republic. He has recruited 12 citizens. Sam Schwartz is the goalkeeper for his soccer team, Cole Moscoe is playing Tennis and shortstop for his baseball team, and Rex Frank is playing midfield for his soccer team. Mika Halloran is putting his sailing skills that he learned at camp to good use, racing 420s for his sailing team. Maz Miotke is a point guard for his basketball team and plays right wing in soccer, and Silas Schonwald is playing travel soccer for the Minnesota Thunder Academy. Parker Lund is deep into football season, as well as working on his painting — pictured below is Parker’s interpretation of the Camp Nebagamon fishing dock!
WHERE ARE THEY NOW… At the end of summer after campers left, former Camp Director Sally Stein (come on, I’m not going to list the years) sketched a few illustrations at camp to be used in the Arrowhead layout. Line-drawn clipart, like the example Sally drew above, was an instrumental part of print editions of the Arrowhead that camp published on paper for decades before the Arrowhead went online in 2019. We’ll include others in future Arrowhead editions! After a successful visit to camp this summer to teach his new camp song, Reed Maidenberg (Santa Rosa, CA, 1959-’64, ’67) has released a remastered version of his camp song, O Nebagamon. You can listen on all major streaming platforms!
