The Speakers

Emily Ford
Saturday Keynote Speaker

Emily Ford is an aspiring winter adventurer and thru-hiker based in Duluth, Minnesota. She has completed many thru-hikes in the midwest including the 1,200 mile Ice age trail, which crosses Wisconsin east to west from Potawatomi State Park to St. Croix State Park on the Minnesota border. Also, in the winter of 2022 she completed a solo 180-mile ski route across the Boundary Waters Canoe Area and Wilderness with her Alaskan Husky, Diggins. With an understanding and drive to show that anyone can adventure and everyone deserves to discover the outdoors, regardless of race, gender identity, or upbringing, she continues to seek adventure and represent the underrepresented in outdoor spaces.

Ken Hupila
Friday Keynote Speaker

Ken was born and raised in Northern Minnesota. The local climate was included in his genetics, and he learned to live in and enjoy the cold from a young age. Living fourteen miles from the nearest town meant that winter recreation revolved around ice-fishing, snowshoeing, cross-country skiing and building snow forts and igloos.

Ken moved to Ely to teach at Ely Memorial High School in 1978. Outdoor activities during all seasons remained important to him. His summer job soon became guiding in the BWCA, spending up to forty days a summer on the water guiding for his own “Red Pine Guiding” company as well as many of the Ely outfitters. When not guiding, personal trips put him into the backcountry of the Boundary Waters and Quetico many more days a year. Winter recreation took a serious turn during that first winter of 1978-79 when Tom Deering skied across his yard on a Saturday morning in December. A friendship developed and it wasn’t long before similar interests took them on adventures up to and including winter camping. Early efforts were primitive, and honestly, have remained so over the years.

Tom is a low-tech winter camper with roughly 50 years of winter trips under his belt. Winter trips into the canoe country of northern Minnesota and Ontario have always been one of the highlights of his outdoor year. He is excited to have the chance to share a few memories from a life well spent at the upcoming winter camping symposium.

Besides numerous winter trips, open water canoe trips for the two became a staple once or twice a summer and included a 500-mile paddle down the Albany River to James Bay in 2006 that lasted 27 days. Nearing our middle 70’s, we still get out every year during open water and on the snow and ice.

Besides teaching, Ken is also a professional photographer – Snotty Moose Studio – and has also authored three books about his experiences in the outdoors.

Bear Paulsen

Bear started winter camping as a high school senior. In 36 years of winter camping, he has spent over 800 nights exploring a wide variety of snow-covered landscapes including: the Yukon, Alberta, Manitoba, Ontario, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, and of course throughout the Midwest. His favorite place to hide from the real world is the BWCA where he’s spent more 650 of those nights. Bear has hosted an annual BWCA New Year’s Trip for 24 years and counting. Also, somewhat unique among winter travellers is that Bear actively enjoys both cold camping and hot tenting.

Bear has also canoed extensively throughout North America from Nunavut to the Northwest Territories, from Alaska to the Yukon, from Montana to Florida. He is committed to introducing his young son to the outdoors too. Before Dashwa entered kindergarten this fall he was already experienced in the wilderness. He’s travelled 3500 miles and spent over 200 nights camping on canoe trips. By canoe Dashwa has spent a month above the Arctic Circle, paddled to Hudson Bay, and traced all of Minnesota’s North Shore of Lake Superior. Bear is the General Manager at Northstar Canoes.

Kevin Estela

Kevin Estela is a lifelong outdoorsman who grew up in New England. Born into a great family, he was inspired by his father who survived in the jungle of the Philippines during WW2. Kevin developed a passion for the great outdoors at a young age and carried it through life. In his early teens, he began kayaking and canoeing and spending more time on the river before becoming a guide and instructor.

Kevin taught high school history for 14 years at Bristol Central High School and split his time working as a professional survival instructor at the Wilderness Learning Center when the school calendar allowed. As a professional teacher, Kevin learned to address the needs of students and built a reputation of trust, respect, and dedication to his craft.

A student for life, Kevin continues to train with the best, travels internationally to numerous countries seeking adventure, and field-tests equipment in every environment. He has partnered with premier manufacturers in the outdoor space and continues to bring products to market driven by the real needs of those in the field.

In 2018, Kevin wrote a best-selling survival skills book after hundreds of published bushcraft articles in dozens of magazines. He continues to write for multiple publications and blogs and has added spoken media to his resume in the form of podcasts of which he has been the guest of and hosted hundreds of episodes.

Today, Kevin is a highly sought-after trainer, speaker, and author in the outdoor community, interacting with and educating thousands each year while sharing his passion. His goal is to inspire people to overcome adversity and hardship in their lives and live well with purpose.

Pam Wright

As a child of camp directors, Pam Wright’s early life was steeped in the outdoors of eastern Montana and woodlands of northern Minnesota. For the past 20 years she’s been adventuring and leading others into the BWCAW and other backcountry locations throughout the US and Canada. When she’s not dipping a paddle, she enjoys ultra-running, winter camping and backpacking. She takes joy in introducing everyone to the beauty of the north country, hoping that they too will be caught in the wonder of the wild. She currently works as a guide for Women’s Wilderness Discovery in Ely, MN as well as a volunteer leader for Thrive Women’s Outdoor Adventures, Hudson, WI.
Soka Outdoors

Curt Isaacson

Curt is an avid craftsman, winter trekker and photographer from Omaha, Nebraska. He’s been exploring the outdoors since childhood and developed an early knack for making and modifying his own gear. He enjoys promoting the intersection of the oft-forgotten tools of traditional craft and outdoor travel, especially as they relate to winter. Curt has fond memories of growing up working alongside his father in the woodshop while learning to tend the wood stove at the heart of it. His grandfather Karl Isakson immigrated from Kisa, Östergötland County, Sweden, giving Curt a deep appreciation for the culture, tools and lifestyle of Scandinavian peoples. He serves as an ambassador for Hults Bruk Axes of Sweden (also in Östergötland County). He's also an affiliate maker with RMP Finishes. You can find them all on Instagram - @4esttrekker @hultsbruk1697 @rmpfinishes

Pete Brautigam

Pete Brautigam has been a winter camping symposium board member since 2020. He is an avid winter camper in the back country pulling his toboggan solo or with a crew. Owner of Brautigam Expedition Works LLC. He will be sharing information that get into the science of our gear and his solo travels.

www.brautigamexpeditionworks.com

Ryan Fox

Ryan has been on the Winter Camping Symposium Board for the past 10 years. He is a husband, father, and an avid outdoorsman. In the Winter he can usually be found on trail pulling a toboggan, or in a canvas tent, having a staring contest with a wood stove. Ryan has been teaching the Hot Tent 101 course for the past several years as well as a first time toboggan travel class. If you're new to Winter Camping, you don't want to miss these classes.

Greg Wilcox

Greg Wilcox is the co-founder of Country Ways and for the past twenty-five years has brought us the very best in showshoe kits and finished outdoor equipment. Greg will be teaching a seminar on snowshoe lacing and repair.

Ben Piersma

Ben’s full time job is testing, researching, and selling tools and outdoor goods for life in the north woods. He uses hand tools like axes, hand-saws, and knives daily for fishing, hunting, foraging, self reliance, and primitive bushcraft. His goods can be found at Bensbackwoods.com

Jason Gustafson

Jason Gustafson, founder and owner of Lester River Bushcraft (LBR), born and raised in Minnesota; living in Duluth since 1997. While LRB is primarily now known for the 100% wool Boreal shirt, it started with a different intent. I am fascinated with primitive skills and adapting to modern day bushcraft. I’ve trained with Mors Kohanski in the states and on location via Karamat in Edmonton, Canada. I continue to work on expanding my skill base and put those skills to use while camping and hiking year round.

Sydney Tanner and Jim Nosker

Sydney Tanner and Jim Nosker are Azen Lodge Outfitters and Winter Camping Symposium board members. They’re parents of 10 children, have been cooking together, for groups, for decades. They’ve camped from coast to coast, from the rain forests of Central America to the Arctic Circle, in all seasons. They’ve hiked, backpacked, run dog teams, skied, showshoed, canoed, kayaked, hunted, fished and trapped at one time or another throughout their lives and have been long term Boy Scout leaders.

They will be hosting the kids program this year.

Don Kevilus

Don is the proprietor and owner of the Four Dog Stove Company. He has been designing and building portable wood stoves for the past 23 years. From a 2¼oz titanium back-packing stove to a large steel stoves that can heat a 14’ x 20’ wall tent at -30 below. He is known as the leading innovator in trail stove design and construction. All stoves are hand crafted with his wife, Roxanne on their back 40 acre Minnesota-based workshop/farm, where they enjoy family, friends, raising a large garden, chickens and working their mules. Don’s passion for creating time tested and proven items for use in the harshest wilderness conditions is evident by the testimonials of hunters, trappers, outfitters, guides and adventures throughout the globe.

Four Dog Stoves

Brian Rice

Bushcrafter and survival instructor, is dedicated to teaching the love of the outdoors and how to coexist in harmony with nature. Brian has been operating Three Ravens Bushcraft for 6 years and is part of the volunteer leadership team that coordinates Frostbite! on an annual basis. www.threeravensbushcraft.com

Brian will be teaching two classes: Friction Fire and a Knot Class.

James Bishop

Jim Bishop lives in Spooner, WI. is a long time winter camper whose excursions focuses on lakes with fish. He has ice fished in Canada, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Montana and Lake Superior. A board member of FISH - Friends Into Spooner Hatchery - a friends group of the state hatchery, where they put on fishing programs for youth and elderly. He is retired Public Affairs Manager with the WI- Department of Natural Resources.

Roger Pilsner

Although father time is catching up with me, my bushcraft, trekking, and winter

camping skills are on par with many of you. Instead of trying to offer a workshop

that many have already beat to death, I prefer to offer skills you should refine

before ever attempting to head out. My knowledge of tools, metallurgy,

manufacturing technology and how to apply all of that into simple but practical

tasks and items for use in the outdoors is something I hope to pass on. Let me

share my understanding of “sharp”, and why it changes with each application or

tool. K.I.S.S. and right tool for the task. I enjoy manufacturing very high-end

woodworking tools as my income. Simple tools but practical to create: a hand

carved wooden spoon, a wooden mug, a walking stick, a canoe paddle, birch

shrink pots, camp stools, wooden boxes, and all the other little things that make

life not just about surviving but thriving out there. I believe too many people have

the assumption that it is more about survival and needing the most expensive

latest technology and I seriously want to dispel that. I have trained with Alaskans

and Finish Sammi that live that life 24-7-365 and have figured out how to be

comfortable in some pretty harsh conditions. They did not have a PhD or wrote 20

books, but simple practical skills made all the difference.

Jon Maruska

"Jon Maruska is an Engineering Technician in Duluth, MN. He is addicted to making gear, skiing lakes and hot-tent camping in northern Minnesota."

Mark Morgen

Mark Morgen moved to Grand Marais, MN 6 years ago to be closer to the Superior National Forest and the BWCAW. Utilizing this amazing resource year round, he canoes, camps, snowshoes, fishes, skis, and also takes many pictures. He is a wilderness guide in the summer, bringing the joy of canoe camping to many newcomers, and a boat builder and a sailor. When not in the woods, he can be found in his workshop finishing his latest canoe, or out sailing Lake Superior on his sailboat.

Andy Wright

Andy Wright calls himself an “outrovert”; one who’s energized by and most at home in the outdoors. As a lifetime wilderness camper, he’s written extensively about the Boundary Waters (including how to eat really, really well there). Recent years have seen Andy teaching about foraging wild edibles, inspiring others through foraging hikes, classes and online content.

Kevin Kinney

Empire Wool and Canvas Company

https://empirecanvasworks.com/

Kevin Kinney is the owner of Empire Wool and Canvas Company. He's a pathologically creative outdoor industry veteran who's equally at home

in the mountains, on trail, or on the water. Kevin works from his cottage home in Duluth, MN.

Earl Swenson

Earl Swenson is an outdoor enthusiast and BWCA devotee. He’s been enjoying the BWCA since 1986 with 80+ trips during the soft and hard water seasons tripping solo and with groups. He has a passion for Bushcraft and all things outdoors. He’s been Winter Camping since 2008 and coming to symposium for nearly as long giving seminars on Staying Warm, Food/cooking and Bannock/quick Bread making.

Sparky Stensaas

Sparky Stensaas actually started the Winter Camping Symposium waaaay back in 1999 when he was Buyer/Marketing Director at Duluth Pack. He is the founder and executive director of Friends of Sax-Zim Bog (www.SaxZim.org) which has purchased & preserved over 25,000 acres of bog creating a Forever Home for future generations of birds and birders. A birder since age 14, Sparky is also a naturalist, publisher of field guides, wildlife photographer and now YouTuber (really?). He is the author of 6 books on the natural history of the North Woods. Sparky, his wife, Bridget, and two sons, Birk and Bjorn, make their home under the big pines in the Nemadji Valley in northern Minnesota. You can see more of Sparky's images at www.sparkyphotos.com and his bird/wildlife videos on YouTube “Sparky Stensaas”

Jonah Lottig

Jonah Lottig is the Operations Manager at Snowtrekker Tents. Jonah oversees the business operations ensuring each canvas tent is a testament to quality and durability. Committed to innovation and sustainability, I lead Snowtrekker in delivering the best canvas tent solutions for your outdoor adventures. Growing up with Snowtrekker from it’s inception by his dad Duane Lottig and now helping customers choose the right tent to fit their camping needs. Drawing on his knowledge of winter camping from a young child to now along with his backcountry adventures in the western mountains. Lets elevate your camping experience together by learning what to look for and not look for when choosing a hot tent.

Snowtrekker Tents

Josh Borchardt

I currently teach science and college physics at Denfeld High School in Duluth, MN, and am a former research scientist in academia, NASA-ARC, and private research labs in environmental and space sciences and astronautics.

I began my career exploring the planet as a professional SCUBA diver in the early 2000s, completing hundreds of dives on Lake Superior shipwrecks and the Cuyunna Mines. Since then I have developed a keen interest in mountaineering around the United States, Canada, and Argentina, as well as dogsledding trips and countless winter excursions into the BWCA.

Since 2020 I have switched my focus to pulk trips across the biggest lakes in Minnesota and am beginning to venture into the Canadian north. I’ve done all manner of winter trips and expeditions to temperatures up to -50F and have plenty to share and teach about my successes and failures in the hard and soft water world of outdoor exploration.

Irene Henderson

Irene Henderson, English teacher at Virginia High School in Virginia, Minnesota. I have always had a deep love for nature and the outdoors.

I have walked on winter traplines. I fish, hunt, hike and snowshoe. The sight, sound and smell of a wood fire is one of my favorite things. Add a book and a cup of tea to that and I am in ecstasy. I really like hot tenting. I hope to do more winter camping in the future.

Michael Maruska

Michael Maruska has been an avid winter camper for over 20 years. He has designed and crafted more than 30 ‘modern traditional’ canvas winter hot tents, including micro-yurts, A-Frames, hoop tents, spike tents, and various double-wall styles. An ISA Certified Arborist, Michael works for the City of Superior Parks, Recreation, and Forestry Department and has also worked with the US Forest Service in both the BWCAW and remote central Idaho. He enjoys exploring the outdoors with his wife Elizabeth and their two young sons Iver and Otis.

Doug Ashton

Doug Ashton lives in Ontario, Canada and is an avid backcountry tripper

who started his wilderness adventures 40 years ago when he joined the

Wilderness Canoe Association. Since those early days, he has paddled

rivers and lake systems in Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia and NWT.

Twenty years ago, he embraced winter tripping which has become his

preferred time of the year to be in the wilderness…no people, and no bugs.

Combining his love for the wilderness and wanting to share his passion

gives him great enjoyment.

"As I walk this lovely path, my heart is at peace,

my eyes embrace the sky, and my feet embrace

the earth"

Amy and Leigh Hunter

Fun fact, between the two of us, we have over 80 years of t-shirt wearing experience.

We started screen printing during the pandemic as a way for us to our creative wiggles out. Leigh spends way too much time making memes, so this was a natural leap to more shenanigans.

I (Amy) find myself involved in the tech support, printing onto the transfer sheets, advising on the art work, shopping at our local thrift store for blanks and emotional support.

We also make canvas bags as a hobby. The canvas is recovered from the dumpster at one our work place, the reinvented (un-stiched and sewn back together) into shopping bags. We found that these bags were perfect for screen printing & a way to keep something out of the landfill. A huge lot of these bags have found themselves in the homes of various co-workers, loved ones and WCS participants. We also donate many to our beloved local food shelf, where they let us hang out and mop out the walk in cooler from time to time. We look forward to hanging in the basement with you and making whatever you bring a little better.

Chris Ozminski

Chris Ozminski, Brighton, Michigan, Livingston, County. For several decades I've been a wilderness explorer, photographer, and videographer. I frequently travel Off-Trail all over North America in all seasons, on foot and by canoe. Navigation has been a huge part of all that exploring. I've made several wilderness films that screen at film festivals. I am also a former Long Range SAR team member.

Joshua Stamper

Joshua Stamper is a pasture based livestock farmer, scientist, former backcountry guide, and has slept in many hollow logs. Joshua lives to ski and explore the frozen rivers that drain into lake Superior. The Stamper family (and their many fine hogs) live on a glacial sandbar high above Lake Superior.

Jeff Hasse

Veteran paramedic, wilderness enthusiast, Scoutmaster, Search Manager for missing persons cases, woodworker, and epic-trip nut.

Joe Stromski

Joe is a lifelong outdoors enthusiast, with a deep interest in the natural world. Camping trips as a child set the stage for countless family trips as an adult. Winter camping started on a whim, as a way to get outside during the cold, and has quickly become a favorite. Over a decade of winter camping with his wife Lori has imparted a wealth of knowledge and experience on what works for them. Joe's approach is pragmatic and practical. A woodworker by trade, Joe's hobbies include boatbuilding, paddling, hiking, biking, and pretty much anything outdoors.

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