If you are going to spend a week camping and canoeing in the Boundary Waters, your butt is going to get sore. This is especially true if you are going to be fishing for ten hours a day. Yeah, those Crazy Creek Canoe chairs will help but as we found out, there is more you can do.

It doesn’t take long for canoe butt to set in. It seems to that even by the second day, it was getting more difficult to sit. Even with those canoe seats. They helped more with back support but didn’t address a butt sore from sitting on that little aluminum seat all day.

I tried using one of my towels to try to add some cushion, but it just wasn’t enough. Near the end of the trip, we were taking frequent breaks from fishing just to try to get some relief from Canoe Butt. It was a strange frustration to get back to camp after a tiring day of paddling and fishing and have to decide between a rock or a log to sit on. It was painful and most of the time we’d stand or lean up against a tree.

I was wishing that I packed one of my camp chairs. It would have made a great difference. Every day, it would get worse. We were all suffering. There we were standing around camp on our last night when Gary, our resident veteran remembered that the last time he was there, they sat on their life jackets at camp. As soon as he said it, it seemed so obvious. We retrieved our life jackets, our soft, firm, foam filled life jackets and had our first comfortable seat in week.

We all gave Gary a hard time for forgetting about that crucial detail as we finally enjoyed sitting. So, there it is! When you are camping and canoeing all week, you can use that life jacket in camp as well as on the canoe. Sit on it and enjoy!