Every member of your group should participate in at least four canoeing days the Spring of the trip, and one overnight canoeing trip is advisable. You have skills, muscles and instincts to build. Everyone should be taught basic river canoeing skills, because that includes all the basic strokes, and you will probably need to paddle several connecting rivers. At least one of those canoeing days should be on a large lake. You need to learn to paddle in wind, waves and currents. Practice paddling back and forth across the widest part of the lake so everyone becomes comfortable on open water far from land. If you have an inexperienced group, or want a more leisurely trip, you can spend the entire week or 10 days on Burntside Lake, its tributaries and connecting lakes. In this case, the heavy aluminum canoes supplied by Van Vac or Burntside are perfectly adequate. Their weight makes them more stable in wind and waves, and their thick hulls make them impervious if you scrape a rock in the shallows. You won't need to portage so their 85 pound weight is irrelevant.

Secondly, do not try to take your canoes to Ely if you plan to actually enter the wilderness. They're the wrong kind of canoes for portaging. The Ely outfitters use Wenonah and Bell models with built in yokes and pads. These are 35 pound, 16 foot canoes with sharper bows for cutting waves, winds and currents. Each canoe already meets Minnesota canoe licensing laws, saving you the registration hassle. We go through Perogis for our canoes. They have 19 ft. 54 pound three person canoes if your group has an odd number.

Leave your other packs at home. You need two specialized packs. One is called a Duluth Pack. Buy them from Pirogis. They're rubberized nylon so totally waterproof. Their soft bottoms adjust to canoe hull contours. The second is your food pack, basically a plastic barrel with straps and waist belt attached. With the top screwed in, the barrel pack is totally impervious to bears and other animals.

Overnight canoeing is not backpacking. You have more room and can tolerate more weight. So you are not limited to freeze dried food. Shown at left is Zup's, the main Ely grocery. You can carry real meat and vegetables, at least for the first two days. If you are basecamping at a cabin, you have a refrigerator so you can stock up on even more fresh produce. You could bring a Dutch Oven or iron skillet.

Bring a small insulated cold pack, available through many mail order catalogues. You can seal it and carry iced food items like meat or vegetables for an extra two days.