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Summer 2008 Trip Log
(3 days)
June 21st – June 23rd
Cedar – Little Cedar – Bug - Ironwood
– Carl Wilson – Little Cauchon – Laurel – Aura Lee –Little Cedar – Cedar
Above you
will find an extrapolated section of the Algonquin Park Canoe Routes Map©, blown up to easily
show you where we went.
Well, here we go
again. Another trip into the greatest
place in the world, and another trip log.
This trip was slated to be a six-day stay where Kevin and I were
supposed to meet up with Markus Rubino (Mark in the
Park), Jim Cavers (Algonquin Canoe Trips) and a
few other regular AA’ers (Swede, Racoon and
perhaps Sean of Ajax) As it turned out
things were quite different then planned.
We arrived at the shores of Cedar
Lake around 7:45 A.M. to find sunshine and calm waters on the
lake. We packed up the canoe and headed
up the lake towards our first portage.
We were headed to Carl Wilson
Lake to meet up with Swede and
Markus, who were supposed to be already there.
Temperatures were good as we paddled up the lake towards the top end of
the lake and it took about two hours to cover the distance. On the way we passed a mother Merganser and
two “chicks?”. Mom was very protective
of her little ones as we attempted to get close for a picture, but I managed to
snap a shot while they made a dash away from us.
Calm waters
on Cedar Lake
When this trip was
originally planned we were supposed to get to Carl Wilson via Bug and
Ironwood Lakes, but Markus decided he
would not go in that way because the portage to Bug lake was a low-maintainence
portage and supposedly was a very steep climb.
Even though the bugs were out in full force, Kevin and I decided we were
going to tackle this approach. We had
already traveled through Aura Lee and Laurel
Lakes on our first loop together in
2005 so these lakes would be new to us. We
had a little trouble finding the portage sign indicating the way to Bug until
we were almost on top of it. Trees and
the leaves of summer covered the sign almost entirely from view. We landed at the base of the trail and headed
up the steep incline with our packs for the first of two trips for this
portage.
The portage to Aura Lee as seen from the
Bug portage
The climb on
this portage was steep and steady, but dry in most of the places. About half way up the portage it is crossed
by a small stream, which turns the trail into a soggy, muddy mess covered with
section of tall grass, slippery rocks and roots, as well as masses of mosquitoes. The climb continues for practically the
entire portage, finally leveling out just meters from the end of the portage.
Bug
Lake was a small, quiet little lake
surrounded by trees and host to two small campsites. One of the sites is located at the end of the
portage trail and the other is located just slightly to the right of the put
in. The site at the end of the trail was
quite large with plenty of room for several tents. We did not explore the other site, but I did
manage to get a shot of it while we were crossing to the other portage.
We
paddled across Bug and began our second portage to Ironwood
Lake. This portage was considerably easier than the
first, with only a couple of small uphill climbs. The mosquitoes where out in force along this
portage too, so we tried to travel the distance a quickly as possible. Along the trail, a small garter snake crossed
our path, but it slithered into the tall foliage and slipped away before we
could get a picture of it.
 
A few of the residents of Ironwood Lake
Ironwood
Lake is slightly larger than Bug with
only one campsite located along its northern shore. We crossed the lake easily and headed towards
our last portage of the day.
 
A couple of shots of Ironwood Lake
This last portage was our easiest and proved
to be the most level of the three. We
quickly made short work of this carry and headed out onto Carl Wilson in search
of Markus and Swede who were supposed to be waiting for us. The lake was calm with only a slight breeze
caressing the lake in a southerly direction.
We headed for the far shore and traveled down the lake, crossing in
front of the first campsite located on a point on the eastern shoreline. A collection of canoes was beached here and a
small group of students was occupying this campsite. We paddled past them and continued down the
lake towards the next site when we noticed a white canoe paddling up the
opposite shoreline. Kevin and I crossed
the lake and headed for the campsite located there. As we approached Markus greeted us from his
canoe a little up the shoreline. We
beached and unloaded the boat just as Markus pulled up to the site and jumped
out to see us.
Markus sporting his Algonquin Adventures
t-shirt
We
unpacked, set up the tent and then sat down with Markus to have a drink and
relax. It was not long after we had
parked ourselves when Markus noticed some weather coming in from across the
lake. Rain was moving down the valley
between the hills that surrounded Carl Wilson and was heading directly for our
campsite. It crossed the lake like a
curtain moving towards us and finally hit our camp with the force of a small
hurricane. We dashed for cover under the
tarp over our fire-pit but the wind drove the rain right into us, soaking our
clothes. Markus had just placed a large
7-8 foot log against the tarp to keep it from being swept up by the wind. As we were sitting there waiting for this
storm to pass, I mentioned to Markus that perhaps sitting under the log might
not be a good idea. No sooner did I say
it did the tarp give way and the log fall directly towards Markus. He dove to one side and was narrowly missed
by the falling piece of lumber, avoiding serious injury for sure. Kevin and I made a mad dash for the tent
while Markus braved the elements and attempted to repair the damage done to the
tarp.
Once
it was all over (almost as quickly as it had began), we exited our tent to help
Markus clean up the mess. One of the
grommets on the tarp had been completely torn out, but Mark repaired it with a
small rock and some string. We tidied up
the area and got the fire stoked up again and sat back down to finish our
drinks. One more example of the freaky
Algonquin weather.
After the
freak storm
Markus was knee deep in water,
fishing out a plastic bottle of beer from the lake where he was keeping them
cool, when he noticed Swede paddling down the lake towards us. He was camped on Laurel Lake and had
made the trip over to Carl Wilson to see if we had made it in or not. He beached the canoe and told us immediately
of his encounter with the freak storm that had just passed through. Markus offered him a cold one and he sat down
to enjoy the now sunny skies with us.
Swede decided to stay with us until Monday and would bunk with Markus
until then.
Swede and Kevin around the fire
We
relaxed and told stories for the rest of the evening while Kevin and I continuously
ribbed Markus about his precious Maple Leafs.
Once the sun went down, we headed off to our tents and fell into dreamland. That is all of us except for Kevin, who was
situated in a position in our tent, which put him between Markus and me. With the two of us snoring, Kevin did not get
a whole lot of sleep that night. Swede
was smart…..he brought earplugs!
Summer 2008 Trip Log - Day 2
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