All of my pre-trip planning was based on renting a kayak in Crane Lake and doing a big loop through Crane, Sand Point and Namakan Lakes, with one portage at Grassy Bay. (If you're familiar with the park, this probably makes sense. If not, just ignore the details, nod your head and smile.) However, I didn't want to do a 2-nighter from Crane Lake for various reasons which escape me now but made sense at the time.
I also didn't want to rent a kayak from a resort on Kabetogama - that's some serious big water and the winds were 10-20 mph from the west, so the lake would be pretty tough for a newbie like me to deal with. That left Ash River as my one real option. And unfortunately the one place that rents in Ash River had cheap rental-type kayaks. The ones with no spray skirt or rudder, leaving me with an open cockpit and a boat that didn't track very well. I thought this would be OK as I was mostly going to be in water protected from the wind.
Setting out with the wind at my back, I cruised down the river to Sullivan Bay at a good clip, between 2-2.5 mph (according to my GPS) while barely paddling. That should've been a clue as to what I was in for. That and the hellacious boat wakes I had to contend with when I hit the end of the no-wake zone.
Anyway, Ash River makes almost a 180 bend to head into Sullivan Bay, and I got to experience the pleasure of paddling into the wind. And the pleasure of trying to keep the kayak from turning sideways in response to the wind while trying to avoid being swamped by the frequent boat wakes. Kayaking is fun! I also learned it's quite difficult to take photos while kayaking - by the time I could get my camera out of the dry bag, all forward momentum was gone, I was sideways to the wind and the photo op would be gone. I wound up taking most photos from the shore.
It wasn't all that bad (yet) and I kept close to shore to block the wind as much as possible. I made good progress and before I knew it I was at the narrow channel between Sullivan Bay and the Kabetogama Narrows. Almost literally before I knew it - I'm not used to large scale maps and the distance on the map seemed so much more than what I had just paddled.
The channel was really cool to paddle through - relatively quiet, and very narrow with rocks rising up on both sides. On the way through a boat slowed down and warned me the Narrows were pretty rough. I hit the end of the channel and made my way to the shore out of the wind to look things over. I'm not even going to describe what happens when a huge boat goes by and you're sitting on shore in your kayak. It does involve getting very wet though.
I tackled the Narrows and fought with it a bit, stopping part of the way through to plan my next line of attack. It was there that I pulled out my camera and took a few shots of a bald eagle on the opposite shore.
A bit wet and cold and with sunset just a couple hours away, I decided the nearest campsite was my smartest option. About 15 minutes later I was there, in dry clothes and not too much worse for the wear. I had made about 6 miles in 2.5 hours of paddling, not bad for my first time. I also decided paddling the Narrows in that kind of wind was pretty darn stupid, given my lack of experience and less than stellar kayak. The campsite was alright, not as far into the park as I had wanted but it would have to do. At least I had decent sunset views.
The wind died down right after sunset (perfect timing) and picked up the next morning right after sunrise. I had a much easier time of it this day though, as I had no major crossings and was able to stay out of the wind for the most part. I was still along a major boat channel so there was quite a bit of traffic. I meandered around a bit, then went back to camp and ate lunch before paddling a bit more. I checked out the nearest portage trail and walked over to Kohler Bay to see what that was like. The trail was a little wet but very short - kind of wish I had just portaged it in the morning and paddled around in Kohler as it was much quieter than the main lake. I'm not sure which shot of the bay I like better, so I'm putting both of them up.
I headed back to camp and packed up some, then ate my dinner. The winds had calmed down at this point and I thought about packing up everything and paddling across the Narrows to Sullivan Bay. I knew the forecast for the next day called for 10-20 mph winds and thunderstorms, and I did not want to get stuck crossing that stretch of water in bad weather. By now, I had maybe 1.5 hours of daylight left, so I decided to stay put and just get up early and try to beat the wind. Had a nice quiet sunset that night. 
A thunderstorm rolled through around 4am, then all was quiet. I was up by 6 and ready to go shortly after 7am. The water was perfectly calm and I was off. As I rounded the point and headed into the Narrows, I could see several miles of calm water in front of me stretching into Kabetogama Lake. It truly was a beautiful sight, probably one of the best views of the whole trip. And I have no pictures, because at that moment a thunderstorm was slowly moving across the lake in my direction, with flashes of lightning every couple of minutes. Not wanting to be on the water with lightning about, I stuck as close to shore as possible and paddled like a madman. In no time I was through the Narrows and into the channel leading to Sullivan Bay, with lighter skies dead ahead.
Unfortunately, the storm was faster than me and with the lightning strikes getting closer I had to get off the water. I pulled up on shore and tried to get as far from the tallest trees as I could., then spent the next 40 minutes huddled up hoping the storm would pass quickly and clear skies would roll in. Hail rolled in (quarter-sized) but no clear skies. As the rain let up, I contemplated a dash to the Visitor's Center, maybe a half mile away. With lightning still flashing I was reluctant to abandon the shore. And just then a houseboat appeared. A houseboat that was headed to the same place I was going. After some gesturing and a little bit of shouting, they stopped and just like that I was on the boat with my kayak on board, not quite believing how lucky I was to be out of the storm. (Yay for Dani and Kevin, my houseboat rescuers!) Not sure if I'll ever get that lucky again, so don't look for me to try to outrun any storms in the future. The rain finally stopped about 3 hours later.
Despite all that, there were some moments (even hours) of great paddling and I definitely want to make another kayaking trip up to Voyageurs. Experience is a great teacher, and I need some more of that before I take on a trip like this again, but I will be back.
More kayaking pics are here.
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