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We had the privilege of spending three days in America’s favorite wilderness area this week, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. We traveled up to Basswood Lake, which is shared with Canada. Between the BWCAW and Quetico Provincial Park nearly 2 million acres of lakes and rivers are protected. Prairie Portage takes you around this beautiful little waterfalls to get into Basswood Lake.

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Our first day was calm and the lake was like glass reflecting the forest around it.

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We selected a campsite that gave us awesome views of the sunsets.

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There is a lot of history around Basswood Lake. This metal propeller shaft must have been from one of the early boats that cruised the lake.

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In the corner of a small protected bay we put the canoe on shore and stepped into the forest to find one of the oldest trees in Minnesota. This Northern White Cedar doesn’t stand any taller than its neighbors but it is over 15 feet around. I ask my friend to take a photo of me next to it to show its tremendous size. At over a thousand years old it has experienced many fires and windstorms and still stands firm.

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It was amazing to see it’s thick, gnarly bark. Cedars are one of my favorite trees of which the BWCAW has many.

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Two blue sky days gave us many beautiful scenes to photograph.

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Bald Eagle

Travelling close to shore we saw lots of wildlife. We encountered over a dozen eagles.

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Bald Eagle Nest

We came across this bald eagle nest which still had one young one in it. Any day now it will take flight.

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In Flight

One eagle passed by our campsite.

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Newborn

This loon family was just a short way from our campsite. The baby had to have only been a couple days old. It is going to have to grow fast to be able to fly south before freeze-up.

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Beaver Pond

On our way back, we drove by this beaver pond that looked so beautiful with the afternoon light.

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Loon Chick

I checked on the loon family that I photographed last week. The baby has doubled in size.

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Loon Family

I was glad to see that the eagles hadn’t got this one. We saw over three dozen loons on our BWCAW trip and only one still had babies.

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