While a quarter of a million people visit Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness every year, you’re not likely to get jostled by crowds here.

The region spreads over nearly 150 miles in northeastern Minnesota alongside Canada’s Quetico Provincial Park. Its size turns any kind of description of scale toward silliness – the area’s lakes and streams comprise some 190,000 acres, only 20 per cent of the wilderness area’s more than 1 million acres.

Long time ago, the landscape was scraped by glaciers, leaving behind thousands of lakes and icy cold streams. With 1,200 miles of canoe routes, the easiest way to explore is by water, carrying your gear over the land that connects many waterways. You should explore for a whole day or go for many weeks. There is no way to see everything, which is its own kind of invitation.