Boundary Waters Catalog

About
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Piragis Northwoods Company has, since 1979, become a sort of home away from home for lots of people on the way to their Boundary Waters Canoe trips. Ely, Minnesota is proudly the Canoe Capital of the country and we at Piragis strive to be the paddlers' best friends up north. Having the "right stuff" in stock, displaying it attractively, and greeting everybody who walks through the door with a smile and a welcome is what we're all about. 

Of course the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness is our reason for existing as a business in this place. It's the indescribable magic of this wild land of lakes and streams that brings so many people here for adventure, solitude, and simple presence of mind. These qualities led Nancy and I to make Ely home after coming as young biologists in 1975 to work for the EPA. They are the main attraction of our 30 plus staff members also.  We all take time throughout the year to renew that love of the wilds with canoe trips and hikes and skis into our favorite wilderness.

When asked what is it about the Boundary Waters that you like best, I find so many possible answers, but the one quality of the wilderness I find most enticing is the way it makes me feel when I'm there.  It's the almost addictive presence of thought in wilderness, the focus on the now which brings me back so often. Paddling itself is peaceful and relaxing combined with the beauty that elevates the spirit almost always leaves those, open to the experience, feeling renewed.  It's a bit of a mystery, but if you ask Boundary Waters trippers to think deeply about the experience, whether they are birders or anglers, families, boomers, millennials or more recent generations they'll find something spiritual to talk about.  It's the sublime that makes wilderness a necessary part of our lives. I guess that's why we're here; to bring people that sense of the aesthetic that leads, almost always, to some sort of arousal of the spiritual in nature. Maybe it's like viewing profound art and feeling that similar type of awakening but in nature the renewal is renewed around every bend of the lake, every sunset or sunrise and and every tug on the line when dinner is at hand.     

Ultimately, we hope that all who walk through our doors and out into the wilderness will come back to join with others to act to protect the little wilderness we have left in this world.  

I hope this gives you a feeling for what we do "at the end of the road."

Steve Piragis