Crane Lake

Crane Lake covers about 2,920 acres in the La Croix Ranger District, at the far western edge of the Boundary Waters where the wilderness gives way to Voyageurs National Park's chain of big lakes. It's one of the wilderness's motorized lakes, and most people reach it by boat from the community of Crane Lake rather than by paddling and portaging in.

The shoreline runs rocky and irregular for more than 30 miles, broken into bays and points that make the lake feel bigger than its acreage suggests. It drops to 80 feet in its deepest holes. The Vermilion River feeds in from the south after dropping out of Lake Vermilion, and Crane Lake drains north through Sand Point Lake into the Namakan chain and Voyageurs National Park.

Walleye and smallmouth bass are the two fish most people come here for, both holding on the rock structure that makes up most of the shoreline. Northern pike have a track record of running large in this lake, and sauger and yellow perch fill out the rest of the catch. A protected slot on walleye keeps anything between 18 and 26 inches out of the box, with one longer fish allowed among a combined limit of six walleye and sauger, no more than four of them walleye.

Motors are allowed on Crane Lake, and fishing boats share the water with canoes, which makes it feel less remote than a true wilderness lake despite sitting inside the boundary. The main route in by canoe is a difficult 383-rod portage from Little Vermilion Lake, well over a mile long, and it's a big reason most paddlers heading this way choose a motor instead. Only three campsites sit on the lake, so it's not a place to count on finding one open if you're passing through, and its open stretches build real chop when the wind picks up.

Crane Lake was part of the voyageurs' canoe highway between Grand Portage and Lake Winnipeg more than two centuries ago, following nearly the same water still traveled today. It works the other direction now too, serving as the main southern gateway into Voyageurs National Park just downstream.

With motor traffic, a handful of campsites, and a hard portage guarding the only canoe-only approach, Crane Lake suits anglers and boat travelers moving between the Boundary Waters and Voyageurs more than paddlers looking to camp and stay.