Although I was born in Minnesota, everything I know about the Boundary Waters I learned either from BeaV, or along the way in the 2015 and 2016 Minnesota challenges, so I am no expert.
Mzee and I never saw a bear on either trip. We think we saw bear prints once, but that may have been wishful thinking for a better story. We did see beavers, otters, swans, bald eagles, loons, ducks, and a small Lynx.
Our food plan was fairly simple. In the morning, we made coffee and had a quick bite of something, but never really cooked anything. Lunch was informal snacking along the way. For dinner, we tried to always stop for a nice break in the late afternoon. That gave us a rest and a morale boost that transferred into more energetic paddling the last couple of hours of the day. The bonus of that plan was that we rarely cooked anything at our campsite. We certainly snacked etc in the evening, but nothing that sent the smell of cooking food off into the woods. We did not hang our food or use a food barrel. Around camp we kept all of our food in CampSource Odor-Barrier bags (Amazon). We also put all trash in those bags. At night those bags were packed inside our closed portage packs which we left outside of our tents but not far away. We had no issues with mice, bears, or any other pests. I don’t know if all that was all a sound plan or we were just lucky.
I did bring bear spray. While I’m sure it’s unnecessary, for me the comfort outweighed the extra weight. I plan to bring the same old unused can again this year, along with a small 1.5oz marine air horn.
We also brought TheHammer (my nephew Ricky). He generally didn’t bother setting up his tent and slept on the ground, and he was not very meticulous about keeping his food stash tidy and packed away. Mzee and I figured any bear issues would start with him, and cause enough commotion that we would wake up and have a chance to run away.
