BWCA Guide Services

"We're large enough to serve you. Small enough to know you." 

ImagePersonal Service is what  Jasper Creek  is all about! From the moment  you reserve one of these fun filled wilderness trips; your needs and expectations for a trouble free vacation are the top priority of our guides and staff. Once a reservation is confirmed; pre-trip correspondence using E-mail and telephone will set the stage for a memorable BWCA and Quetico Park vacation. Jasper Creek Guide Service will do it's very best to bring your vacation dreams to reality!

We have over a quarter century of experience in this business of serving Ely, MN area vacationers and fishing enthusiasts. Define a 'Guide Service', ..."It's a personal service rendered," and that's it;  and Jasper Creek has operated over the years with a clientele return rate of 85% Plus based on that alone. The sole priority -has been, is, and always will be that you, the customer, will have your needs met!  

Combine our personal service with ...the incredibly beautiful  wilderness setting that's found here, Plus ...our clean and comfortable lodging at A Stay Inn Ely and our new Jasper Lake 'Vacation Rental Home', Plus ...the superb angling opportunities that are available here in the BWCA and Quetico Park, Plus ... the deliciously prepared campfire meals along with the well organized camps set up with the finest equipment. The sum being that Jasper Creek has a  combination that is second to none.

About Your Guides

    

Don Beans

I was raised in the eastern hill country of Ohio and spent a good portion of my early life in the 'Big Woods' ;the hickory, oak and beech hardwood forests. The earliest childhood memories that I can recall are the long walks in the April mushroom woods and playing in the brook behind the family home. At age ten, I was given a beagle puppy and together we chased every cottontail rabbit in our local neighborhood. I fell in love with furbearer trapping at age eleven; and with a basket of #1 longsprings, learned of muskrats in the nearby creeks and marshes. Throughout my teens I spent the Autumns in the colorful Ohio hardwoods chasing grey and fox squirrels. With a brace of beagles in my teens, many a cottontail graced the family table along with a few ruffed grouse. My Dad, along with my Uncle Johnny, and my neighbor, Mr. Barrick, and I always found time to hunt the delectable morel mushroom in the springtime among the may apples. Dad and I fished the Ohio resevoirs and farm ponds for catfish, sunfish, and bass during the summer months.  After years of reading 'Outdoor Life' and 'Field and Stream' stories of the famed Boundary Waters Canoe Area and Quetico Provincial Park wilderness; I packed all my belongings in April of 1983 and headed 'North to Minnesota', "I had to see this place called the Northwoods." Once here, I knew it was home and prepared to make my name as a wilderness guide and trapper.  After several years working for various canoe outfitters and resorts, I struck out on my own in 1988 and became a freelance wilderness guide. In 1992, Jasper Creek Guide Service, Inc. was formed and it has grown steadily ever since. At date, Jasper Creek Guide Service, Inc. boasts an impressive 85% plus clientele return rate, and offers several popular canoe trip/ fishing trip options into the BWCA/ Quetico areas. My wife, Joan and I have expanded over the last 5 years to include deluxe lodging and custom outfitted trips. I take great pride in my  wilderness canoe and fishing trips- my equipment is always in working order, tried and proven.  I pride myself on the preperation of  campfire meals, and most of all, the personal service that Jasper Creek  provides. I believe is second to none,

"Once you experience a trip into this Superior/ Quetico country, the area will sell itself to you. It is that beautiful! The gamefish are here and therefore the angling opportunities will hook you as well.  I feel that the only item that I can offer; that will set me apart from the rest, is the personal service that I can offer."

Dean Bushey  teamed up with Don Beans' Jasper Creek Guide Service, Inc. in 2008. Dean has done a fine job working with customers for the past three seasons, especially on the 'ways of wilderness walleyes'. He reputation in the BWCA wilderness is already getting well known and has several repeat clientele.  He has proven his campfire culinary skills  and prepares a delicious Northwoods Shorelunch! 

Dean was born in Wisconsin's Northwoods and was raised by a father who taught him to respect and understand the wonders of nature as the two of them hunted and fished together. Dean learned of trapping with his uncle, and the two of them harvested beaver, otter, mink and muskrat around the Willow flowage. He also learned to expertly handle a canoe early in his youth, paddling the Turtle- Flambeau and Willow flowages of his home state. 

As a young man, his adventurous spirit inevitably brought him to the Quetico/ Superior country. He has now been exploring the BWCA backcountry for the past thirty plus years. His continued passion with the Northwoods and that ever present adventurous spirit has allowed him to make  numerous sojourns to remote Woodland Caribou and Wabakimi Provincial Parks in Ontario, Canada .

Dean's other hobbies include (when there is no paddle in his hands)-cross country skiing, mountain biking, hunting birds with his Chesapeake Bay retriever, Willow; icefishing, and hiking, back packing and exploring the trails less traveled.

Dean and his Chessie (Willow) had great success with ruffed grouse this past 2010 huntiing season. Dean enjoys taking clients on   Autumn wilderness canoe trips, plus if you want the comforts of warm lodging and showers; Dean will set you up with nights reserved at A Stay Inn Ely with the days spent chasing ruffed grouse through the Northwoods. In the off season, Dean does custom ceramic tile work and as much snowshoeing, ice fishing and cross country skiing as possible.

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Welcome! Bill Griffin
 
 
Bill Griffin and his wife, Ruth;  live in a cabin outside of Ely where the forest surrounds them, and where they take advantage of tramping through the woods and dipping their paddles at every opportunity. Bill learned he had a love affair with wilderness areas at age 16 when he took his first canoe trip. Over the decades, Bill has since canoed and fished extensively not only in Quetico Park and the BWCAW,  but the Crown Lands of Ontario, Wabakimi Provicial Park and even Alaska.
 
Bill graduated from Mankato State University and became an art teacher in southeast Minnesota. It was during those teaching years that Bill found another love; that of taking young adults; (students, church groups, and Boy Scouts) into the wilderness and teach them camping skills and to appreciate wilderness areas and nature. For sixteen years Bill shared this knowledge to our youth, and has been greatly rewarded by learning that many of those students (now grown) continue to camp and take canoe trips of their own with their families.
 
The years’ that Bill spent being a teacher has provided him the ability to work with not only young adults but with adults as well. He is organized, patient, and able to help his group develop the skills needed to enjoy the Northwoods. One of those important skills is Bill knows how to fish and he will provide valuable instruction on angling techniques. Plus, Bill can take your catch of the day and prepare it expertly over an open fire. He also takes great pride in his campfire culinary arts.  
  
In closing; Bill informed Jasper Creek, “That when I guide a canoe trip, my mission is to provide for the group experiences that reveal the beauty, serenity, and a personal connection for everyone while paddling the BWCA wilderness; and that each participant gains a sense of accomplishment, a feeling of pure relaxation, and finds their inner peace.”
 
Jasper Creek, Inc. is glad to have Bill Griffin in the wilderness. If you're interested in bringing a large family group, youth group, or if you just want to visit the BWCA with an experienced camping/ canoe guide that is willing to share his adventures with you on the water along with stories over the campfire; then Bill is more than willing to take you on that trip.