I am a seasoned bwca explorer and am headed to lake pickerel in august and have purchased some McKenzie maps to aid in my trip planning. Does anyone have insight on better maps for quetico. I am used to navigating with the Fischer maps, maybe I am spoiled. Also If anyone has ideas on the routes offered from there ie... is the portage through the baptism area worth it. This site has always given me great feedback, thank you all

Well Mr. Wild Wild West---I personally like McKenzie for Quetico but that is just personal---if you like fisher they make Quetico maps as well. For portages I would get the Chrismar map which is pretty accurate but too small to navigate. You could cross reference your McKenzie or Fisher maps with the Chrismar.

http://www.quietjourney.com/tradenpost/map.html

Never been to pickeral so can't help ya there.

Tim

Maps are either Fisher or McKenzie. I usually either take both or mark up additions on one.
As for trips, where are you entering and how many days are you planning? There are several good trips from Pickerel.

I would second the Chrismar map comment to verify portage locations. Fisher maps seem to be a bit off.

See this map for the area I am traveling in Quetico coming up.

Boneli

Pickeral L is known for SW & W winds. You will want to hit it early if you are starting from French L. With an early start you should get accross it before the winds become too strong. If you're a fisherman, take a fishfinder and troll as you paddle. Pickeral has it all. Head over to Dore' for lakers. Continue down to Sturgeon. Many routes are possible from there depending on available time and interests. If you help us out here, we may have more.

Thank everybody, we are leaving in 10 days I can't wait. I am brining a camera and will post a trip report when we return. I plan on looping down to Kawnipi and back up to French

Wow, I don't think you mentioned before you are doing the infamous Cache Portages at the end of the trip! They are well-known as the biggest portage challenge in the Park. Definitely something I'd like to do in the next few years. After a wet June it's been dry lately, so the portages should be easier than they sometimes are, plus at the end of the trip your gear will be light. Have fun!

Have a great trip James....I'm going into Pickerel on Labor Day so I'll be very interested in seeing your trip report..especially the Baptism (under fire?) Creek comments. Keep the shiny side down...

I just got back and the trip went great. We had a detour from the map I posted. The deux rivers are dry (mud for 2 miles)and we ended up going into rand-olifont then around. I would like to say that we kicked the cache portages ass. Everyone we ran into had a comment to say about them. "OOOOWee, your going into Cache?" That's right we did, and it was not as hard as one would expect. The portage from McKenzie to cache north was much worse than the one from cache to trouser. It had a 100 yard swamp dead in the middle (chest high). The second one is listed at 4000 meters, but it's only about 2500. All together it was a very difficult trip, not for the faint hearted, but our group could not have done better. one more tip for those planning this route this summer. BAPTISM CREEK IS DRY. we walked about 4-5 miles upstream the last day and it was not easy.

If you do make it into cache, it is well worth it. The campsite on the east is on a beautiful beach. Fishing in baptism lake landed us alot of northern. I will post a trip report soon. I am headed back up next week so, more to follow.
Show me a pool and I'll teach you how to swim
Jameswest.

Here's a link that Tim gave me for checking out portages. More info the better.

http://www.quietjourney.com/pdb/queticopark.html