Our canoe made a soft scraping sound against the sand as we arrived on the shore of our next portage. Quickly, we jumped out and lifted the canoe slightly, to drag it further onto shore. We attached our paddles to the inside, and then began to unload. Tony helped me lift my first pack onto my back. His brother, Mike, and our sister-in-law, Wendy, had arrived a few minutes before us. We could see Wendy was already loaded up, and heading down the trail. I grabbed a bucket and a folding table, and followed her.

We were in the Boundary Waters in northern Minnesota for an eight day canoe trip. The previous day, we had spent the whole afternoon fishing out on Lake Polly. It had been sunny yet cool, and I had forgotten to reapply sunscreen. My arms, shoulders, and the tips of my ears turned a lovely shade of pink—but it didn’t deter the bugs.

As soon as I entered the woods, mosquitoes swarmed me like honey. I walked at the fastest pace possible, swatting bugs as they dug deep into my arms, all the way. As if the straps of my pack rubbing against my sunburned shoulders wasn’t enough, the mosquitos found my ears through my headband. They stuck the thin, scorched skin surrounding my cartilage as if to give me another piercing.

I just have to make it to the other side of this portage. I told myself. The path went straight for a little while and then curved. Though I couldn’t see Wendy, I could hear her just up ahead. And as I finally began to move my focus away from the bugs, she called out:

“Uh-oh.”

“What’s up?” I asked.

“Well, we have some trees down here and it’s pretty bad. You might want to go back and tell the guys before they start bringing the canoes through.” There were four canoes in our entire group. If they were to try to bring them all through at once, there would be a traffic jam in the wilderness.

“Ok,” I responded, dropping my bucket and the folding table. I backtracked until I saw Mike, balancing his canoe on his shoulders, and told him what was going on. Then, after retrieving my stuff, I continued down the path until I came to three pine trees fallen across the trail. All of the trunks were leaning at my waist level, and with the top of one of the trees hanging underneath, there was no option but to climb over.

I threw the bucket and table over the first tree. Then, trying to keep my balance with a pack on my back, I jumped over. Just as I was about to think, “How did I get here?”, I landed on a heap of pine boughs, releasing the most wonderful smell, reminiscent of Christmas. At once I was reminded of the beauty of the place I was in.

Over two more trees, I threw my bucket and the table, and then climbed over. But our adventure wasn’t over. A little further down the path were two more trees fallen at waist level. In other places, brush covered the path completely. Then a very large tree—about two feet in diameter—fell down the path, which meant climbing what was left of its trunk, and then (pack and all) balancing your way down the length of the tree until the trail was visible again.

Oh, and each of us had to do this twice.

Once, we reached the next shore, we had to drop our stuff, turn around, climb our way back through the woods, pick up more stuff from our canoes, and do it all over again. And this was only one of four portages we had to do that day.

This was not the type of trip I would have ever imagined I’d be a part of. Not raised to be an outdoorsy person, spending eight days in the wilderness where you have to paddle whole lakes and trek your stuff through the woods, to a campsite with no running water or bathrooms—would never have crossed my mind as something I’d do. Let alone, something I’d call a vacation.

But last July, that is what we did—and it was epic. This trip reminded me that doing new and hard things is so good for us. After this portage, we didn’t feel annoyed or defeated—we felt Hard Core. And after the entire trip, I felt strong and more confident in what I am capable of. Sometimes new and challenging things seem really scary, yet doing them helps us discover who we really are and all that God has enabled us to do in this world.

Paddling in at the end of our trip!

What scary things are you doing this summer?

How are you being stretched and in turn, inspired?

 

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