Day Trip: Algonquin Provincial Park - November 16, 2013

With some decent weather finally making a day of hiking possible, we headed up to Algonquin on Saturday hoping to do the Whiskey Rapids trail.  This trail suffered damage during the flooding this spring, and only opened a week ago.  We were really curious about how much the trail had changed, and if there would be any signs of just how high water had gotten.

The plan was to hit the visitor centre first, ket the kids spend their gift certificates, then hit the Tea lake Dam picnic area, cook up some hot dogs on mum's BioStove.  She'd bought this in the early summer and hadn't had a chance to try it out.  Then we'd do the trail and head home.

Unfortunately, when we were paying for our things at the gift shop, the lady working there told us Whiskey Rapids was closed again because of flooding.

What?  We couldn't believe it!  After all summer of wanting to check this out, it closes again after only a week.  We couldn't help but laugh.  Unsure what to do, and with the trails having a bit of ice on them, we decided to play it safe and just do the Spruce Bog Boardwalk trail.  Kind of a a let down, but it was better than sitting at home watching the kids play video games.

On the way to Tea Lake Dam, we saw two moose!  We hadn't expected to see much in the way of wildlife.  It was a cow and her baby.  On the way through the park earlier in the day we saw a six point buck.  Biscuit barked a few times, not crazy barking but the little woofs he let out made the moose raise their heads, giving us better photo opportunities.  I should say it gave everyone else photo opportunities.  I was seating in the middle of the back seat, holding the dog.  No matter where I tried to move, there was either

Once we got to Tea Lake Dam, we hunted for dry sticks, which wasn't easy.  Thankfully, the BioStove lights easily and it takes hardly any time to get enough heat going to cook some hot dogs on the grill attachment.

All in all, it was a great day.  The temperature dropped pretty low by the time we ate, but otherwise, it was a great day.

Day Trip: Algonquin Park - September 28, 2013

With the fall colours at full peak, we headed to Algonquin yesterday to get some photos, and enjoy the weather.  It was a beautiful sunny day...and though a lot of the colours seemed dull (cool spring or early frosts? I don't know) we certainly weren't the only ones up there enjoying mother natures show.

I have never in my life seen so many people at Algonquin.  Not only was there a team of people directing traffic at the West Gate, but each and every trail parking lot was full.  There were people parked on both sides of the roads leading to each parking area, and at least 20-50 cars parked along the sides of the road at each one as well.  The most popular trails seemed to be the Lookout Trail, Hardwood Lookout, and Track and Tower.  Even Spruce Bog, which was closed, had cars lined up on the sides of the road.

The visitor's centre was a zoo.  It was nearly impossible to walk through the doors, and the line ups for the women's bathroom were a nightmare (out the bathroom doors, across the front of the entrance door to the gallery entrance, around the statue and across in front of the big map on the wall)  Oddly enough there were no line ups for the men's room.

Still, we had a good day.  We'd really hoped Whiskey Rapids trail would be opened back up, but it wasn't.  We ate lunch at the Two River's store, getting there just before a big rush of people arrived, and headed to Mew Lake to check out the waterfalls.  Not much colour there, just one small maple tree clinging to a rock.  Our next stop was the Beaver Pond Trail.  We lucked out and got a parking spot in the actual lot, and hiked backwards to the lookout.  Mum and the kids went back to the truck with the puppy while dad and I continued on a bit more to take pictures.

We stopped in at the Opeongo Outfitters (Biscuit got a doggy backpack for Christmas...) but they didn't have much ice cream so we headed to the Portage Store.  This area was a zoo as well.  We got ice cream then went to watch people from the city try their hand at canoeing.  There were so many canoes on the water it was amazing.  Sadly for us, nobody tipped.  That makes us sound a little sadistic, I know.  I just am always amazed how many people ignore the quick lesson the rental shop employees give, and end up facing each other in the canoe, paddling with both hands at mid paddle, or tipping over with several thousand dollars worth of camera equipment sitting at their feet.

It did make me wish we'd taken our canoe.  I think we might have to keep the kids out of school one day this week and go up for a paddle.

So, I have a few recent trip logs to write up.  Biscuit has taken to jumping on my lap whenever I have the laptop out, and he eats the cables if he gets into my office.  I apologize for not being around as much lately.

I'll try and post some fall hiking pics...if I can find a hiking trail where there's some good colour!

Trip Log: Rock Lake to Pen Lake - Algonquin Park - June 22-23, 2013

Our first trip into the interior of Algonquin...okay so we only went one lake in, and it was a short portage, but it's a step.  This trip was kind of a test, just Chris and I, to see how we fared with gear..what were we forgetting?  What didn't we need?

So, we got up early, 7am (I know a lot of experienced campers get up in the middle of the night and head out so they can get to the put in when the permit office opens, but in our defence, Chris works nights.  I didn't think asking him to start a trip on an hours sleep was very fair) and got our permit by about 10:45.  We were expecting the bugs to be bad, but pulling into the parking lot at the put in, and seeing the mosquitoes swarming the car didn't seem like a good start.

Chris unloaded the canoe while I carried the packs and loose gear down to the water.  Once he had the canoe in, I held it against the dock while he put the packs into it.  I had mosquitoes going down the back of my pants, up the sleeves of my sweater, and I kept thinking maybe this was a bad idea. Maybe we should have waited a few weeks...

Once we were on the water, it was fine.  From the boat launch, go to the left.  There's a sign across the river, to the right is Whitefish Lake, to the right, Rock Lake.

We made good time, and though it started to drizzle about 20 minutes into the paddle, we were too excited to care.  I've camped at Rock Lake before, in the campgrounds, but everything looks so different from out on the water.  The buildings that line the right bank were actually mostly very nice little cottages, not run down old shacks like I thought they were when looking at them from the opposite shore.  We both decided we were super jealous of the people that get to use them.

Finding the portage into Pen Lake was pretty easy.  Chris speculated over each cliff we saw, wondering if they'd be good cliffs to jump from. We obviously didn't stop so he could swim down at each of them and see if there were rocks jumbled a foot below the surface of the water, but I'm pretty sure it's on his to-do list.

The bugs hit us again once we got to the portage, so we didn't take the time to head down the little paths to the water falls.  I wish we had.  I didn't end up taking many pictures on the whole trip and now that I'm home (and safe from mosquitoes) I'm kicking myself for being such a wuss.

It was hot, humid and mucky on the portage.  I'd made the mistake of putting my lifejacket on under the backpack so I wouldn't have to carry it, which proved to be a big mistake.  With the lifejacket on, I couldn't get the pack straps to sit right and the right one kept sliding down my arm.  With Chris close behind  with the canoe, I knew I couldn't just stop (or I'd end up getting cracked in the back of the head).  Finally I let him go by me.  At this point, both straps had slid down and were caught in the crook of my elbows so I had no choice but to stop and bounce it back into place.

By the time we got to the end (it's only 375 meters) I was thinking this whole interior camping thing isn't as awesome as I'd been led to believe.  Maybe I'd be okay with just sticking to campground camping from now on.  Then Chris points and says, "look, cow moose with a baby." and yep, in the small marsh about 40 feet from the put in, there was a moose with a baby.  My doubts  about canoe camping were erased in like .4 seconds and I was back to "this is the most awesome thing ever!"

I photographed them while Chris went back for the other pack.  I figured I'd get some pictures then go back and help with the last of the loose items, but I didn't think the moose would be there too long.  I guess I'm used to the ones on the side of the highway...they are there for a little while until someone drives by honking a horn or a motorcycle goes by and the moose takes off.  After we got the stuff into the canoe, we paddled a bit closer and they couldn't have cared less.

So, the plan was to find the site mentioned in a trip log as having a sandy beach, since I'm not really big on just jumping into deep water...I have a fear of weeds...and snapping turtles...and muskie.  Okay that sounds dumb, I know, but I grew up working in my grandfather's bait shop, and heard all kinds of stories...most of which probably weren't true.  Since there were several other parties heading into Pen Lake behind us, we paddled quick to find the site...hoping it wasn't already taken.  We found the site easily enough, but it was very closed in and all I kept thinking was there would be no chance of a breeze to keep the bugs at bay.  So we moved on.

We spotted a point with a clump of big pines and what looked like a sandy beach nearby, but upon drawing closer realized the site was already taken.  There was one of  those coleman brown and beige tents up high on the hill, the tent Chris and I had almost bought, but it blended in so well, we didn't see it until we got really close.  A few minutes further down the lake, Chris spotted another moose on the western shore, with two babies.  We detoured over and photographed them.  The mother seemed pretty determined to gorge herself and barely stopped eating to look at us, though she was careful to move herself so she was between us and the babies.

We crossed the lake again and ended up taking the last site on the east side.  The rocky shore made unloading a bit of a pain, but we managed and set up the tent and tarp.  At first we were going to set up closer to the water between two big trees, but then we looked up and saw a lot of dead branches.  Since the weather was forecasting storms we weren't sure it would be safe.  Having just gone through a bad storm in Killarney, Chris was more worried about the tent blowing into the lake than the possibility of branches falling on the tent.

The site was kind of...rough?  I don't know how to describe it.  I've read a lot of trip logs and watched a lot of youtube videos of people's canoe trips and all the sites seem to have these benches around the fire pit, lots of open space...this one was all hill with no where to sit in front of the fire pit and this weird tripod thing someone had rigged up over top of the fire with branches and bright green string.  I'm sure they thought it was clever, but it just managed to look kind of junky.  We didn't take it down, but I couldn't help but wish it wasn't there.

After we set up, we sat on one of the rocks overhanging the shore and ate some snacks (apples, kielbasa and crackers, and Chris pointed out that he could still see the cow moose and babies across the lake.  Then he pointed a little further to the left and said he saw another moose there.  So we got back into the canoe with the camera and fishing gear and headed out to see if he was right. My eyes are bad so I couldn't tell if he was just seeing a dark rock or an actual moose.  Turned out he was right...it was a big bull moose with the start of some nice antlers and the loveliest chocolate brown fur.  I'm so used to seeing moose in the spring, when they all look ragged and grey, so this was a nice change.  He didn't stick around once we got closer.

Even from across the lake we could hear the rush of white water from this area, and decided to try and find the first portage that leads to Welcome Lake.  It looked like just a big marsh until we realized there was a section with a good current so we followed that until we got to a rocky pile and couldn't go any further.  Okay we could have.  There was a small sandy mucky spot we could have used to life around the rocks but the problem was, battling against the current was a pain when in most places there was only 2 inches of water.  It was impossible to dig my paddle in and get a good stroke because I'd just sink it into soft sand.  We ended up turning around and heading back to see the mother and twins.

On our way back to the campsite, we noticed a neon green canoe heading down the lake, and as we got closer realized they were clearly making their way to our site.  In fact, when we got there, they were trying to decide the best place to land the canoe until they noticed our tent.  I felt bad.  It would suck to haul all your gear out of the canoe and then realize the site actually was taken.  The two young men in the canoe were from Montreal, and though we couldn't tell them anything about other sites that might be available, we did let them know about the moose across the lake.

I pumped some water then Chris fished from the boat while I paddled toward the portage into Clydegale Lake.  The lake was so calm it was easy and I was able to practice my j-stroke without worrying about waves or wind.  Chris had no luck fishing, but we did run into the guys in the neon green canoe again, and they invited us to coffee in the morning after thanking us for telling them about the moose.  We didn't go, the bugs were so bad the next morning we didn't even make breakfast, but it was nice that they offered.  I always read about that kind of thing in people's trip logs. A lot of the time in the campgrounds, people barely acknowledge you when you walk by.  The only real interaction we have with neighbours is when someone is leaving and they come over and offer us the last of their firewood, or we offer them ours.

I hauled out the vital stove and made bannock and spaghetti for dinner.  Usually at home when I make spaghetti, I never have enough water, and I'd seen online that the easiest way to make it in the back country was to cook the noodles and rehydrate the sauce all at once.  I didn't fill the pot to a crazy high level, but it still ended up being spaghetti soup and had to be boiled down more than I'd thought.  Still it was tasty.  I'd added a bit of garlic powder and italian seasoning to the bannock mix and it was really yummy.  Chris had gotten a good fire going, which helped keep the bugs at bay...there was no breeze at all.  Funny how on our last trip, we were cursing the wind as it kept blowing the tent over, and now we were praying for even a wisp of breeze.

We went to bed around 10:30 and spent the entire night listening to the buzz of what sounded like a billion mosquitoes.  It seriously sounded like we were at a race track, or were being attacked by angry bees.  Even worse, because the tent was so small, it sounded like they were right in our ear all night.  But the worst?  The no-see-ems.  Oh my God. It was super hot but we had to hide in our sleeping bags just to keep from getting bitten all over.  Just when you start to doze off one would bite.  I don't think I fell asleep until 5am.  By 3 I really had to go to the bathroom but there was no force on earth that could get me to get out of the tent into what sounded like a horror-movie swarm of mosquitoes.  I finally got up at 6 and afterwards, took some pictures of the lake.

Early morning on Pen Lake

It looked like  it was going to be a gloomy rainy day, and I hoped it wouldn't rain the whole time we paddled home. The lake was very pretty though, calm and mirror flat, it almost looked haunted with the mist and haze. I crawled back into the tent (the bugs weren't as bad as I'd feared but still pretty horrible) and slept until 9.  By then the sun had come out and it was hot and humid.  We had originally planned to stick around until after lunch, but we were so tired and the bugs were so bad we ended up making tea, skipping breakfast and heading out with some granola bars and Snickers to eat in the canoe.  While chris was rolling the ropes from the tarp he said he counted twelve mosquitoes on the knuckle of his baby finger.  I almost asked him why he thought counting them was a good idea when the smart thing to do would be to swat them...but maybe it was just being so tired that had him losing common sense.

Momma moose and her twins were back out in the bay. (just to the right of the island in the picture...the bull moose was in the bay to the left of the island the day before) so we crossed over and saw them again then headed up the lake.  It was pretty busy on the water.  Lots of people in rental canoes.  We figured a lot of them were day trippers, maybe camped in the Rock Lake campground.

As we neared the portage we both got our bug hats ready, only to find no bugs!  Weird.  Lots of people though.  There was a group of 8 young men just finishing the second leg of their portage.  Chris had thought we'd brought too much, but these guys had 4 canoes loaded down.  They even had 2 big Rubbermaid containers.  I didn't feel so bad after seeing that.  

By the time we got in sight of the Rock Lake campground we were both done in.  No sleep, the heat, and only snacks to fuel us, we just wanted out of the canoe and into the water.  It seemed to take forever.  Luckily, there were no bugs at the boat launch either, so we loaded up, and headed to Pog Lake campground for a quick swim.  I'm not sure if you're supposed to use campground beaches if you aren't staying at that campground, but Rock Lake's beach was over run with geese and baby geese.  Neither of us wanted to get attacked, and the prospect of swimming in an area with that many geese didn't appeal.  We could have gone to the Two Rivers picnic area but were too hot and icky to wait.  We only swam for about 5 minutes, just enough to cool off, then headed to the Two River's store for some lunch and a cold drink.

Despite the bugs it was an awesome trip.  I had three wishes for this trip, hear lots of loons, see moose in a setting that wasn't the side of the road, and camp in the interior.  We managed to do all three at the same time...listened to loons while on our interior campsite watching moose across the lake.  I did learn a few things...

1. Ladies, if you are going to be wearing a bug hat...tie your hair back!  The whole portage, while the pack was sliding down my arms and I was worried about Chris ramming me with the canoe, my hair kept falling in my face.  Trying to hold the paddles and camera bag in one hand while sticking the other hand up the mesh to tuck the strands behind my ears was not easy.  I couldn't see and kept tripping over rocks and roots.

2. Bring some kind of flag or something that you can hang near the water so if your site is sheltered people can tell it's occupied well before getting there, saving fellow campers extra paddling.  Early in the day it's not so bad, but I would hate to be arriving late, paddling all over the lake trying to find an empty site...then get to one that looks empty but isn't, and having to paddle all the way around the other side.

3. Before the trip, we went to Canadian Tire and looked at the bug screens you just hang from a tree.  We both thought they looked kind of flimsy and we'd be okay with just bug hats.  I think if we'd had something like that (wanna look into the parawing backpack tarp/screen thing) we would have eaten breakfast, had dessert after dinner and maybe stayed for lunch.  I had packed some quinoa salad stuff for lunch the second day, but I barely had the patience to boil water for tea that morning.

4. If you are going when bugs are going to be bad, taking food that is super quick to make is the way to go.  Maybe if we'd taken a different stove it wouldn't have been so bad.  I could have left it simmering and walked around as at least when we were moving the bugs weren't as bad, but with the vital stove, I had to sit and keep feeding it sticks.  Don't get me wrong, I love the Vital Stove, it works really well, but you do have to sit and feed it. Also, breakfast was supposed to be oatmeal, but not instant.  I'm not a fan of instant oatmeal, but the thought of getting eaten alive while cooking oats that take 15 minutes to simmer was not appealing.  Not only that, but it would have been messy to clean up.  Scrubbing the pot would have been no fun while fighting off mosquitoes.

5. Interior camping is just as awesome as I'd thought it would be.  Despite my initial misgivings on the portage, it really was a wonderful trip.  We learned a lot, saw so much wildlife.  At one point in the night we heard this noise that sounded like a screeching rooster.  I did some looking online when we got home and we think it might have been an adolescent barred owl.  It sounded like this but more screechy like these baby barred owls.  Chris said it sounded like someone at the next site over was murdering a baby. We also heard loons, wolves and lots of frogs.

I can't wait to do this again, with the kids along...but maybe wait for the bugs to die off a bit...

Trip Log: Mew Lake April 21-23, 2013 Yurt Camping

Last week, my dad got a big telephoto lens for his camera, and we were eager to take it for a test run during moose spotting season in Algonquin, so we checked the weather and booked a yurt for a few nights.

With all the flooding in Algonquin this spring, we weren't sure we'd be able to actually do much.  A lot of trails were closed, and many of the roads as well, but we spent most of the trip driving back and forth along the highway looking for moose.  The moose, unfortunately were pretty elusive until monday night when we finally spotted a few.

Western Uplands Backpacking Trail

But, I'm getting ahead of myself.  We arrived at the west gate just after 2 on Sunday afternoon.  The sun was out, but it was pretty chilly. We stopped at the Western Uplands Backpacking trail entrance and checked out the water levels.  You could probably canoe the first part of the trail right now.

After unloading all the bedding and kitchen stuff at the yurt, we had a quick lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches, then piled back into the truck to begin our moose hunt.  We didn't see any, but we did spot a Great Gray Owl perched on the top of a dead tree.  I've never seen an owl that close before, nor had I seen one twisting its head around.  I mean, I know they can do it, but seeing it was pretty cool.

We stopped at the visitor's centre (I bought a book) and took a few pictures from the viewing platform.  You can see how high the water levels were in Sunday Creek.  I hope to canoe there this summer, and usually, when you see it from the deck, it looks so narrow it's hard to imagine canoeing on it.

We headed in to Whitney after passing the east gate because we realized we'd forgotten a few things for meals (sauce for pita pizzas being one thing) but the store was already closed.  We spent some time checking out the very high level of the water flowing over the damn and under the bridge.  It was kind of scary really, standing on the bridge looking at that much water flow beneath you.  I'm not even sure why it was so eerie, when we've stood by other fast flowing rivers.  Maybe it was because the river isn't usually that high or fast, and it's kind of unnerving to watch huge waves barrel over an entire island.

On the way back into the park, just before the east gate, we spotted a fox sitting in the sun.  We pulled over and took a bunch of pictures, and he just sat there watching us.  After a few minutes he came close so he was only maybe 5-10 feet away (it's hard to remember when I had the camera pressed to my face almost the entire time, looking through a 300mm lens.) and posed some more before running off.

Trail leading to the bridge over Madawaska River

After a few failed attempts to get pictures of Great Blue Herons we kept seeing in swampy ponds, we headed back to the yurt then hiked to the falls near the junction of the Track and Tower offshoot trail and the Highland Backpacking trail.  The backpacking trail was closed and we soon saw why.  The water level in the river was so high, you couldn't get within 30-40 feet of the bridge.  We bush wacked our way along the water edge and managed to get a few pictures (not good ones as you can see, the trees were pretty thick.  In August when we were there, Chris and the kids walked along the bottom of the river and walked under the bridge...now there's maybe a foot of clearance beneath the bottom.

It was starting to get dark when we got back so we made dinner and headed into the yurt.  We heard wolves howling a few times during the night.

High water on Madawaska River

The next morning was pretty chilly.  Dad, Bubbie and I went up to the field by the garbage area to see the morning sun on the frosty trees and took a few pictures then we headed back to make breakfast.  We headed back towards the west gate for more moose spotting. We saw one, a young one, dead in the ditch (about km10) with several vultures hovering around it.  As we sat there, observing it and wondering if it had been hit by a car the night before, we noticed a wolf on the ridge behind it, partially hidden by trees.  I tried to get a picture as it stalked off, but it was gone so fast all I got was a blur.  Other than that, we had no luck, but stopped to take pictures of run-off waterfalls, ponds and some beavers.  Then hiked the Hardwood Lookout Trail before heading back to camp to wait for Chris.

Once Chris arrived, we had dinner and started on a bottle of wine (much to the kid's horror) when we decided to try moose spotting at dusk, since early morning and mid day had been a bust.  Mum doesn't drink, so she drove.  We headed towards the west gate and spotted two moose at about KM17.  On the trip back, we spotted another one, a big male this time, in close to the same spot.

The next morning, we went out moose spotting again, this time going east with the intention of heading to Whitney to show Chris the high water levels.  On the way back towards Mew Lake, across from the Pog Lake Campground entrance, we saw Hydro employees and a truck driver watching a male moose.  We pulled over and walked right up to about 10 feet from him and he completely ignored us.  When the truck driver pulled away it startled the moose and he ran back a bit, but came back to his drinking hole a few minutes later.

Back at camp, we made a late breakfast and packed up the yurt to head home.  Along the way we stopped at Ragged Rapids Provincial Park, a day use only park just outside the west gate.  Chris and I had stopped before and only ever checked out the bottom trail, and so we didn't realize the falls is actually pretty big.  With a crazy amount of water rushing over it, it was kind of scary.  Even scarier, Chris and I ended up scrambling down the cliff and shooting pics from closer to the bottom of the falls. I saw on the Friends of Algonquin FB page that others had done the same, only they used safety harnesses which would have been smart (had I even owned any)  It was pretty tense going, especially since if you slipped you'd fall into frothy, freezing water and probably have no chance of surviving it.

All in all, it was a great trip.  We saw lots of wildlife, which is a rarity for us.  We always find it strange that in the park we see hardly anything, then on the way home, see tons of deer and other animals closer to Haliburton.  We also took a lot of pictures, saw some impressive sights (thanks to the flooding) even though a lot of the side roads and trails were actually closed.

MENU
Lunch day 1 - Grilled cheese sandwiches, chocolate chip cookies
Dinner day 1 - rustic vegetable ragout with rice and caeser salad
Breakfast day 2 - Red River Cereal, bagels, toast, coffee
Lunch day 2 - pita pizza
Dinner day 2 - stir fry vegetables  with noodles and caeser salad
Breakfast day 3 - french toast, hot chocolate pancakes, fried potatoes, maple baked beans, bacon

WILDLIFE SIGHTINGS
Moose
Fox
Deer
Wolf
Wild Turkey
Vultures
Canadian Geese
American Black Ducks
Common Mergansers
White Throated Sparrow
Great Blue Herron
Great Grey Owl
Beaver
Crow
Common Flicker