This year over 250,000 folks will travel to the Northwoods of Minnesota commune with nature and the outdoors. For the young adults and teens this oppertunity comes in the form of an Minnesota Adventure Camp.

When one thinks of the BWCA, they are reminded of a picturesque area in the northern third of the Superior National Forest in northeastern Minnesota. between The International Boundary between Canada and the United States and extends nearly 150 miles while consuming nearly 1.3 million acres. The Canadians protected areas are Canada’s Quetico Provincial Park and Voyageurs National Park. The main means of transport in the BWCA is mainly canoing with over 1200 miles of canoe routes, 11 hiking trails and approximately 2000 designated campsites plus loads of Portages.

Something special happens, in this Minnesota natural area. Its the challenge and personal integration with nature that seems to offer freedom to those who wish to pursue an experience of expansive solitude. This Natural Wildlife area in Minnesota is a treasure. One realizes they are alone. Thsi is what it must have been like hundreds of years before the first strip shopping center. Trips to this area require all participants to be independent and self-sufficient. As you paddle days pass before you see any signs of civilization.

This joint sanctuary is the largest international area set aside for wilderness recreational purposes in the world. This area has served as a travel corridor for native peoples and, more recently, as one of the main routes to the west for European explorers and fur traders. The Voyageurs’ Highway rwas a heavily traveled route between an Canada and Minnesota. Modern-day living is nothing but a far off memory when one paddles along the magestic lakes.

So how did this come to be? Here is the short form.

July 10, 1930, the Shipstead-Newton-Nolan Act, the first statute in which Congress expressly orders land be protected as “wilderness,” is signed into law by President Herbert Hoover

September 3 1964, the Wilderness Act, U.S. is signed by President Lyndon Baines Johnson, establishing the U.S. wilderness preservation system and prohibiting the use of motorboats and snowmobiles within wilderness areas except for areas where use is well established within the Boundary Waters, defining wilderness as an area “where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man . . . an area of undeveloped . . . land retaining its primeval character and influence without permanent improvements.” This date is considered by many to be the birth of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area.

Find the Bestt Summer Camps in Minnesota.

Swift Nature Camp is a Minnesota Summer Camp for boys and girls ages 6-15. Our focus is to blend traditional summer camp with a Animal Summer Camp increasing a child’s appreciation for nature, science and the environment.