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- Feb 28, 2007
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September has been an incredibly busy month for me and as such, my last camping trip was in late August with my wife. Since that time I've been saving this weekend (Canadian Thanksgiving) calendar spot for a trip, originally planned with RangerJoe. We had wanted to explore a new canoe route in a different park called Queen Elizabeth II Wilderness Area. Given the time of year (low water), we anticipated the trip to be rather technical with many portages. Unfortunately, Joe had to cancel last week for emergency matters. Accordingly, not wanting to face new territory, several portages and the unknown in general, I defaulted to my usual haunt of Puzzle Lake. However, this time I had a goal in mind to make my way (with canoe in tow) to Bear Lake, something I haven't yet accomplished in all my travels to the park. This would also mark my first time camping in this area on a solo trip. Again, two firsts making the trip an exciting experience.
I left Wed. night after work and hit the road by 7:00 pm since I had to pack after coming home. I wasn't able to drive the 7.5 h trip all at once, but rather took a few catnaps at rest stations along the way, arriving on site at 5:00 am. It was still dark at 5:00 am (sunrise is about 7:00 am), so I went to sleep in the truck until 7:00 am. Early Thurs. morning, it was time to start. Some of you have seen this map posted in my earlier threads. I put in at the far left at Gull Lake, portaged to Puzzle Lake (mild but hilly portage), portaged to Loyst (easy 100 m portage), portaged to mud (easy 50 m portage), from Mud-Norway its just a matter of lifting the canoe over a beaver dam. A relatively good paddle through Norway and then the longest portage (~500 m) to Bear Lake.
The morning was brisk, but the waters were calm and it took about 3h to make my way over to Bear. The fall colours were in their full glory as a paddled through brilliant yellows of birch and poplars intermixed with the reds of sugar maple and sumac.
Shots of Gull Lake (Thurs Morning)
Onto Puzzle Lake
Canadian Geese flying in their signature V-formation
Of course, Loyst had its share of colour!
I was greeted by a green frog (Rana clamitans) at the Loyst/Mud Portage entrance
Mud Lake
Norway Lake (Bottom)
Bear Lake
I new exactly where I wanted to camp and set up my simple tarp shelter and bush chair. Seeing some bear scat and a couple of prints in the area, I was sure to keep my food/camp fire well away from my sleeping quarters (about 300 m apart).
At night, I tried my hand at fishing. I managed to hook into a couple largemouth bass including this guy right away (used a texas rigged rubber worm, bouncing off bottom)
But the steady breeze chased me off the lake. Also, I must admit, I brought too much food with me (trying out a new dehydrator, I made a bunch of ziplock bag meals to test out in the bush). My little Ikea canister twig stove was the perfect set up for rehydrating my meals. The first meal was chilli con carne from a home brew earlier in September. It rehydrated as nice as the fresh pot!
Friday morning....
I paddled around Bear Lake and took another two largemouth, this time using an orange rapala twitching minnow lure. The fall colours inspired me to go bright. The bass didn't seem intimidated by my orange lure! I have them on video but didn't take pics of them. Some of the rugged shoreline surrounding Bear Lake....(I have a few of the identical spots from our winter trip last Feb).
Yet again, the breeze came up and I returned to my campsite which turned out to be a sizable island surrounded by marshland. The walk around to the marshy side was very picturesque...
Wintergreen carpeted much of the ground throughout the island. Some of the plants still had their very minty berries and I gobbled them hungrily.
The recent wet weather spurned numerous types of mushrooms..
Behind my campsite, accessible through a small (very shallow stream) was another tiny pond called Big Sunfish Lake. I had to pole my way through the floating mats to access, but it was a little fishing mecca and much easier to handle than Bear as it was more sheltered from the wind.
On a lark, I decided park my canoe at the eastern side of Big Sunfish lake and explore the mainland which I had not ventured forth before. I soon stumbled onto an ATV trail and after consulting my map and GPS decided the trail likely continued onto Sixth Depot Lake which is part of a different but adjacent park and conservation area. My curiosity was peaked so I followed the trail, about 2km to sixth depot.
The view facing the North end of Sixth Depot Lake:
Phew, that was a good walk.
However, as I was not planning on doing a four kilometer walk when I landed my canoe on the other side of Big Sunfish, I only had on my paddle shoes (neoprene booties) and I developed a good blister on my right foot as a result. Sucks to be me! I stuffed some of this soft and fluffy lichen around my blister and that helped me out on the long walk back...
One of the beaver ponds on the way back
A hidden little crevice in the rocks.....I imagined that somebody must call this home.
This was just a pre-shot of myself for framing a video shot and speaking to the camera about how tired I am.
Of course, I wasn't completely unequipped. I had my sak, firesteel and trusty Brian Andrews bitterroot on my belt.
Do the colours ever get boring??? NO!!!
Fungi on birch...
Okay, seeing my canoe again was a great site and I poled my way through that bloody marsh back to my campsite. This time, I rehydrated a delicious ramen noodle stir fry with broccoli, field tomatoes, onions, pork (from a pork chop) and sauce of oyster sauce/teriyaki. It rehydrated brilliantly except for the pork chop bits which were still a bit chewy. They were still good tasting, but the chewy pork didn't compliment the stir too well and most of them ended up at the bottom of Bear Lake...
My entertainment fire at night and taking advantage of the coals, I boiled up some water for morning.
Saturday morning was sunny but with some pretty scary looking clouds. The breeze was also picking up and I decided to head out. The brilliant blue sky and big clouds did make some stunning big-sky style pictures. However, I was fighting a head wind all the way back. I often prefer to sit in the back seat and load my gear at the front to give it some weight preventing the 'wheelie' effect. But the wind that morning required me to kneel in the center of the canoe leaning towards my strong paddle side to sustain enough power, speed and control to overcome the frecquent gusts of wind which would otherwise turn my bow.
Back to Norway/Mud entrance...
Paddling my way through the top of Mud lake amongst the hummocks
When in Mud, you have to drop a line in because the bass are bad ass there...I couldn't even get to the other side of the pond onto Loyst without landing this guy. Having caught about 8 fish at this point and not eating one yet, I decided I would keep it and bring it out of the park with me (I was heading to a friends cabin a couple hours drive away and hoping the fish would pay my board via good intentions --- oh it worked!)...
Big Sky, Big Clouds on Loyst Lake
More big sky/clouds on Puzzle Lake
That about ends the pictures for this trip. Once I came out of the main embayment from Puzzle, I had to content whitecaps for the main part of the lake. It wasn't that bad, but it was slow going. Similarly, the wind just never stopped even as I paddled through Gull Lake to my truck. I was really beat this time and it took the better part of 5 h return with the wind at my face rather than going there with the wind at my back. Aside from the little bit of opportunity fishing at Mud, I really didn't take any breaks from breaking up camp at Bear in the morning to coming back to my put-in spot. I was famished. Fortunately, I had a pumpkin pie in back seat purchased on-route to my site and another gift for my friend at his cabin. Needless to say, my friend never got a chance at any of that pumpkin pie, it was finished even before my truck hit the road (canoe loaded up).
I also put together quite a bit of video footage for this trip and will start editing it later in the week. Hope you enjoyed the photos.
EDIT - Videos of the Trip:
[Youtube]DZYv0JM6p_w[/youtube]
[Youtube]CqlKJlihD0Q[/youtube]
I left Wed. night after work and hit the road by 7:00 pm since I had to pack after coming home. I wasn't able to drive the 7.5 h trip all at once, but rather took a few catnaps at rest stations along the way, arriving on site at 5:00 am. It was still dark at 5:00 am (sunrise is about 7:00 am), so I went to sleep in the truck until 7:00 am. Early Thurs. morning, it was time to start. Some of you have seen this map posted in my earlier threads. I put in at the far left at Gull Lake, portaged to Puzzle Lake (mild but hilly portage), portaged to Loyst (easy 100 m portage), portaged to mud (easy 50 m portage), from Mud-Norway its just a matter of lifting the canoe over a beaver dam. A relatively good paddle through Norway and then the longest portage (~500 m) to Bear Lake.
The morning was brisk, but the waters were calm and it took about 3h to make my way over to Bear. The fall colours were in their full glory as a paddled through brilliant yellows of birch and poplars intermixed with the reds of sugar maple and sumac.
Shots of Gull Lake (Thurs Morning)
Onto Puzzle Lake
Canadian Geese flying in their signature V-formation
Of course, Loyst had its share of colour!
I was greeted by a green frog (Rana clamitans) at the Loyst/Mud Portage entrance
Mud Lake
Norway Lake (Bottom)
Bear Lake
I new exactly where I wanted to camp and set up my simple tarp shelter and bush chair. Seeing some bear scat and a couple of prints in the area, I was sure to keep my food/camp fire well away from my sleeping quarters (about 300 m apart).
At night, I tried my hand at fishing. I managed to hook into a couple largemouth bass including this guy right away (used a texas rigged rubber worm, bouncing off bottom)
But the steady breeze chased me off the lake. Also, I must admit, I brought too much food with me (trying out a new dehydrator, I made a bunch of ziplock bag meals to test out in the bush). My little Ikea canister twig stove was the perfect set up for rehydrating my meals. The first meal was chilli con carne from a home brew earlier in September. It rehydrated as nice as the fresh pot!
Friday morning....
I paddled around Bear Lake and took another two largemouth, this time using an orange rapala twitching minnow lure. The fall colours inspired me to go bright. The bass didn't seem intimidated by my orange lure! I have them on video but didn't take pics of them. Some of the rugged shoreline surrounding Bear Lake....(I have a few of the identical spots from our winter trip last Feb).
Yet again, the breeze came up and I returned to my campsite which turned out to be a sizable island surrounded by marshland. The walk around to the marshy side was very picturesque...
Wintergreen carpeted much of the ground throughout the island. Some of the plants still had their very minty berries and I gobbled them hungrily.
The recent wet weather spurned numerous types of mushrooms..
Behind my campsite, accessible through a small (very shallow stream) was another tiny pond called Big Sunfish Lake. I had to pole my way through the floating mats to access, but it was a little fishing mecca and much easier to handle than Bear as it was more sheltered from the wind.
On a lark, I decided park my canoe at the eastern side of Big Sunfish lake and explore the mainland which I had not ventured forth before. I soon stumbled onto an ATV trail and after consulting my map and GPS decided the trail likely continued onto Sixth Depot Lake which is part of a different but adjacent park and conservation area. My curiosity was peaked so I followed the trail, about 2km to sixth depot.
The view facing the North end of Sixth Depot Lake:
Phew, that was a good walk.
However, as I was not planning on doing a four kilometer walk when I landed my canoe on the other side of Big Sunfish, I only had on my paddle shoes (neoprene booties) and I developed a good blister on my right foot as a result. Sucks to be me! I stuffed some of this soft and fluffy lichen around my blister and that helped me out on the long walk back...
One of the beaver ponds on the way back
A hidden little crevice in the rocks.....I imagined that somebody must call this home.
This was just a pre-shot of myself for framing a video shot and speaking to the camera about how tired I am.
Of course, I wasn't completely unequipped. I had my sak, firesteel and trusty Brian Andrews bitterroot on my belt.
Do the colours ever get boring??? NO!!!
Fungi on birch...
Okay, seeing my canoe again was a great site and I poled my way through that bloody marsh back to my campsite. This time, I rehydrated a delicious ramen noodle stir fry with broccoli, field tomatoes, onions, pork (from a pork chop) and sauce of oyster sauce/teriyaki. It rehydrated brilliantly except for the pork chop bits which were still a bit chewy. They were still good tasting, but the chewy pork didn't compliment the stir too well and most of them ended up at the bottom of Bear Lake...
My entertainment fire at night and taking advantage of the coals, I boiled up some water for morning.
Saturday morning was sunny but with some pretty scary looking clouds. The breeze was also picking up and I decided to head out. The brilliant blue sky and big clouds did make some stunning big-sky style pictures. However, I was fighting a head wind all the way back. I often prefer to sit in the back seat and load my gear at the front to give it some weight preventing the 'wheelie' effect. But the wind that morning required me to kneel in the center of the canoe leaning towards my strong paddle side to sustain enough power, speed and control to overcome the frecquent gusts of wind which would otherwise turn my bow.
Back to Norway/Mud entrance...
Paddling my way through the top of Mud lake amongst the hummocks
When in Mud, you have to drop a line in because the bass are bad ass there...I couldn't even get to the other side of the pond onto Loyst without landing this guy. Having caught about 8 fish at this point and not eating one yet, I decided I would keep it and bring it out of the park with me (I was heading to a friends cabin a couple hours drive away and hoping the fish would pay my board via good intentions --- oh it worked!)...
Big Sky, Big Clouds on Loyst Lake
More big sky/clouds on Puzzle Lake
That about ends the pictures for this trip. Once I came out of the main embayment from Puzzle, I had to content whitecaps for the main part of the lake. It wasn't that bad, but it was slow going. Similarly, the wind just never stopped even as I paddled through Gull Lake to my truck. I was really beat this time and it took the better part of 5 h return with the wind at my face rather than going there with the wind at my back. Aside from the little bit of opportunity fishing at Mud, I really didn't take any breaks from breaking up camp at Bear in the morning to coming back to my put-in spot. I was famished. Fortunately, I had a pumpkin pie in back seat purchased on-route to my site and another gift for my friend at his cabin. Needless to say, my friend never got a chance at any of that pumpkin pie, it was finished even before my truck hit the road (canoe loaded up).
I also put together quite a bit of video footage for this trip and will start editing it later in the week. Hope you enjoyed the photos.
EDIT - Videos of the Trip:
[Youtube]DZYv0JM6p_w[/youtube]
[Youtube]CqlKJlihD0Q[/youtube]
Last edited:
