Lucky Finn Lake
Have not yet visited this Primitive Management Area lake. The information displayed on this page are notes used for planning a future trip to this area. Use the information on this page at your own risk.
Lucky Finn Lake is feed by water coming in from Range Line Creek which enters in the southwest corner of the lake. Lucky Finn Lake drains into the Hustler River through a small creek that drops 35 feet of elevation rather quickly. There are several ways to get to Lucky Finn Lake, but none of them is easy so pick your poison.
The west end of the lake mostly has peat bog along its shoreline. The remainder of the lake is enclosed by forest.
This area of the BWCA has escaped fire for a long time. The most recent fire was in 1755. That fire is known as the Big Moose, Oyster and Lac La Croix complex. Another fire affected the area in 1681.
Approach to Lucky Finn Lake
There are three legitimate ways to reach Lucky Finn Lake, but all are quite involved. From the north, Lucky Finn can be reached by a bushwhack from Nahimana Lake. Visit the Nahimana Lake page. From the east, a small but steep creek can be followed from its confluence with the Hustler River. Of course this means you had to of come a long ways up the Hustler River first. Check out the Hustler River page for this approach. Finally, a third approach is from the south coming down from Range Line Lake along Range Line Creek. Much of Range Line Creek is navigable, but getting to Range Line Lake, even though it is not a PMA designated lake, requires a bit of adventure. See Range Line Creek page for details on this trip.
Bushwhack to Lucky Finn Lake
From Nahimana Lake, there is a small channel/creek heading into the forest from the lakes southeast tip. When the navigable water ends (after maybe 10 rods or so), follow what appears to be a small valley through the forest to the southwest until you enter some scrub forest that is reclaiming an old peat bog. This jaunt is about 40 rods. Follow the left margin of this old peat bog for perhaps 30 rods to the shore of Lucky Finn Lake. The entire bushwhack is about 80 strenuous rods.
From Range Line Lake, follow Range Line Creek. For all the details on this bushwhack, just visit the Range Line Creek page on this website.
Beginning at the confluence of a small creek and the Hustler River, proceed west up the creek toward Lucky Finn Lake. You will gain about 35 feet of elevation along this trek. There appears to be a lot of fallen timber along the course of the creek so you may have to parallel its course a ways back into the forest from its bed. This bushwhack is about 40 rods and is probably not easy.
Exploring Lucky Finn Lake
There are several reports of how miserable it is to get into the Lucky Finn, but not a lot of information on the lake itself. Would imagine that most paddlers who make it to Lucky Finn Lake are too tired to explore it much. The west side of the lake has a lot of peat bog terrain, but the remainder of the lake is forested so there should be a place to pitch a tent. The lake is at least 13 feet deep according to Minnesota Department of Natural Resources information, so there should be some fish in here.
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