Killarney Northwest - Again
September 2-9, 1989
Those of you with long memories will remember our tale of wandering around lost in a swamp in the northwest corner of Killarney Provincial Park in July 1985. We decided then that someday we would return and find out how we went wrong. The trip reported below was finally the opportunity.
We left Brighton Saturday, Sept 2, and drove straight through to the French River Trading Post, arriving in the early evening after about six hours of driving. Canadian traffic is moving faster than ever - we were often moving 85 mph and were still passed frequently. Sunday morning, we slept till 8 am (it had been a busy and relatively sleepless week), had breakfast at the Hungry Bear, and drove the additional hour and a half to George Lake. They are STILL rebuilding route 637. They were working on it when we first started coming here in 1976. They seem to build about a mile per year, and by the time they are done, they will have to start over and do it again.
This was a holiday weekend in Canada as well as the US, and the park was close to full. We were able to get a reservation for Three Narrows L. for Sunday night. After that, the Park became almost empty and reservations were no problem anywhere. At the Park office, we discovered that our intended route through Murray L. was impractical since the water was low and a couple of kilometers at the east end of the lake was essentially impassable. We had to replan on the spot, going even futher north to the chain of lakes along the northern boundary of the park. This added an additional 2200 meters of portaging, but had the advantage of taking us through a long chain of lakes which we had not previously seen. The park maps are now entirely metric, so I'll give distances in meters.
We started paddling about 11 AM and travelled the familar and spectacular route through George Lake, Freeland L., Killarney L., O.S.A. L., Muriel L., Artist L., then took the steep 1900 M. portage to Three Narrows L. We stopped at site 47 on Three Narrows for the night at 5:10 pm. The weather was cool but pleasant, clear, with a light north wind. Muriel L. had rather low water, and we tried to help out by repairing a leak in the six foot high beaver dam next to the portage. I think we slowed the flow substantially - but we couldn't stay around to watch the lake rise.
The portage into Three Narrows was just as steep and rocky as we remembered. This was our first trip of the year, and we were not in condition, so the portage went pretty slowly - 75 minutes for 1.2 miles. We decided early that with the rather large number of portages and carryovers, and the water still fairly warm, this would be a wet sneaker trip. We stepped out of the canoe into shallow water, I lifted up Helen's pack while she slipped into it, then I put on my own pack in the water, lifted the canoe onto my shoulders, and started walking. This is a very quick and convenient transition from paddling to walking, but it requires walking in wet shoes all day. It sure feels good to get into dry shoes and socks after a swim at the camp site.
At about the second portage the carry yoke began to feel strange, and I found the old crack beginning to re-open and the fiberglass patch beginning to fail. I babied it for the rest of the day, and then fitted a spruce splint in camp in the evening. You can do amazing repairs with 1/8" nylon line, a folding saw, and a pocket knife. This is the third time this yoke has failed. It's comfortable, so I keep fixing it - but this is the last time. This winter, I will build a new one. I now think I can improve on the yoke design to enable better weight transfer from the yoke to the stays of my internal frame pack, getting most of the weight of the canoe onto hips rather than shoulders.
Three Narrows still has a few private cabins and one was right across the bay from us. We could occasionally hear voices, but cabin owners in the park are generally a quiet and well behaved bunch, who seem to be here for the same purpose as the canoers. These folks had pots of Petunias on the dock and other flowers planted around the cabin, so they are probably resident all summer. Tough life! We finished dinner early and read while the sun set - a faint pink sunset, augering well for tomorrow - then watched the stars appear.
On Labor Day, we got on the water about 9:30 and were quickly around the dam and into Kirk Creek. Several of the optimistically labeled "liftovers" are in fact steep rocky unmarked portages of 20 to 50 meters. There was still enough water flowing to create pretty waterfalls at most of these. The creek drops 18 M. on its way down to Georgian Bay, most of it over these granite-sided waterfalls. There are several beaver dams which aren't on the map.
We know we are over the last dam long before we can see open water, because the water quickly turns from crystal clear to the murkier Lake Huron look. We stopped for lunch at site 136 on Georgian Bay. There are usually yachts anchored in these protected deep-water passages, but we saw none on this trip. It would be fun to explore and camp among the hundreds (perhaps thousands) of islands which fill this corner of Georgian Bay. A few are private and have cabins, but much of it is government land. A separate camping permit is needed, from a different government office somewhere, for camping on crown lands outside the official parks.
After lunch, we headed on up the East Channel to find the series of portages where we went astray four years ago. On that trip we were traveling in the opposite direction, so we expect things to look somewhat different. However, comparing the 1984 and 1989 park maps, we found that this area looks quite different on the map. A new lake has appeared on the 1989 map, thanks to a large beaver dam, and the map and our eyes now agree. Also, the park has put up marker signs on the portages since 1985. As a result, the trip up the creek to Low L. was uneventful. We took another short portage into Helen L., and discussed going on to Nellie Lake, a beautiful lake where the water is reputed to have 80 M visibility. Studying the map suggested that it was another two hours to get there, and we were tired, so we pulled into site 140 and made camp.
This is a pretty site, with deep soft duff under the tent. The existing fireplace was meager and rarely used, so I tore it down and moved it to a new spot on top of a huge flat rock. This placed the cooking fire conveniently at just below normal kitchen counter height. There were comfortable sitting rocks of the same height, with back rests, right next to the fire. How's that for luxury? The sky became cloudy during the afternoon, and by sundown, it was a solid overcast. It sprinkled lightly during the night, but things had mostly dried by morning.
Next morning, we took the long portages into Nellie L. (500 M., 1780 M.). On our 1985 trip, the portage trails through this part of the park had been unmaintained, nearly unused, and hard to follow. This time, the trails had been recently cleared, and most were marked. A decaying cabin at the head of the portage trail on Nellie L. has now been completely removed. There was absolutely no sign of it except a clearing with the soil a bit disturbed. The sky was clearing, it was still early in the day, and we felt fresh. We were also a bit uneasy about the long stretch of completely new territory ahead of us, so we decided not to stop at Nellie, and headed on north.
We portaged 1530 M. to Murray L., then 950 M. to Leech L., 200 M. to Hanwood L, 120M. to Van Winkle L., where we stopped on site 162 on a small island. This site wasn't on last year's map, so we hoped that there still might be some firewood, unlike most small islands. However, it appears to be fairly frequently use by local fishermen who portage in from the Bear L. area outside the park to the north. So the site had little wood, a number of "improvements", and wasn't as clean as most interior sites. Nice view though - to the south and east down this long winding lake. The weather had changed again, another high is over us, and the sky is so clear in the evening that the milky way is clearly visible even with the moon up and about half full and the sunset glow not quite gone.
On Wednesday we paddled east down Van Winkle L. while I watched a small spider spin a web between my knee, the map case, and the thwart ahead of me. It's an interesting process. On the 450 M. portage to Van L. we saw our first wild porcupine. It sat in the middle of the trail watching me approach, then grudgingly and slowly moved off the trail and climbed a small tree while we watched. It must have taken five minutes to climb the tree, stopping just above our heads. It draped itself over a couple of small limbs, then settled down to watch us watch it. We continued on, 120 M. to Grow L., 50 M. to Rocky L., 50 M. to Goose L., down a creek, 220 M and a carryover into Round Otter L., 110 M, 210 M, into Fish L., and 470 M. into Great Mountain L.
Although none of the portages were long on this day, there were a lot of them and the packs felt very heavy. We should have taken a rest day today to let the muscles recover from the last three strenuous days, but I had wanted to push on and leave a free day later to do the high ridge hike from Three Narrows L. over to Silver Peak.
My nearly new $9.95 discount store sneakers grew increasingly uncomfortable during the day. When I took them off in camp, I discovered that the foam insoles had disintegrated completely, and that the heel was constructed from a fairly hard hollow plastic with thick waffle-shaped plastic cross ribs for reinforcement, and I was now standing directly on the cross ribs with no padding. Fortunately, the spare pair was still in reasonable shape.
We watched a young loon trying to fly (a little late to be learning, with migration starting next week?). It would run across the water flapping madly, then trip and do a header with a loud splash, then try again. It hadn't succeeded by the time we left.
Thursday, we continued on to Three Narrow Lake: P 80 M to Little Mountain L., P900, P1200, numerous beaver dams, more short portages, and lots of swamp and creek paddling. In the middle of the day we paddled out into a swamp and saw a moose cow and calf feeding in the swamp - seems unusual this time of day, and this is the first moose we have seen in Killarney. Later in the day, we saw another cow with two calves, in the swampy extreme northeast end of Three Narrows L.
Along the creek, we discovered delicious blackberries hanging down over the banks. We made very slow progress for a while as we picked and ate handfuls. We climbed out onto the boggy land along the creek, but here most of the berries had been trampled and eaten by large animals (bear?), who apparently couldn't reach or didn't notice the ones hanging over the creek.
After arriving in Three Narrows L., we stopped briefly to explore site 39, distinguished by having an antique car in the woods a few yards from the site. A late 20's roadster had been modified for off road use. Gears had been fitted on the old rear axle where where the wheels had been, and these gears drove a large ring gear on the inside of new larger steel wheels mounted on their own axle. This gave an additional gear reduction of 20:1 or so. I suspect this yielded a top speed of 3 mph or so.
We went on down the lake to site 41 and made camp. This site appeared to be a good starting point for our planned hike up to the high ridges of the South La Cloche Range. I also turned out to be one of the most pleasant sites we've been on - nice view, comfortable, adequate protection from wind. We'll certainly be back to this site in the future. It clouded over late in the day, and started raining during the night.
Friday morning, there was still a solid overcast and everything was soaked although the rain had stopped and the temperature was still comfortable. During breakfast, we watched the sky and thought about bushwhacking up through the dripping forest and then hiking across the wet slippery quartzite ridges to Silver Peak, then trying to get a view through the low clouds and fog. Finally, we decided to abort the last day. We packed, and headed back to the car over the familiar route: P 380, P 3160 to Killarney L., paddled the winding route between the cliffs, P. 430 to Freeland L., fought the inevitable headwind and the dense lily pads up Freeland L., P. 50 to George L, and fought more headwind back to the car.
We had lunch at the George L. campground and spent the afternoon hiking the Cranberry Bog Trail. This is a well maintained interpretive trail, with a guide book keyed to markers along the trail. We hoped to see some cranberries in Cranberry Bog, but didn't fine them.
Late in the afternon, we headed into Sudbury to play tourist for a day. Just outside the park, we saw a black bear alongside the road, so they do exist although we have never seen a bear while tripping in either Killarney or Algonquin. We checked into a motel, gorged ourselves on pizza, and went to bed. It hadn't rained during the day, but turned very cold and and started raining hard during the night and continuously through next day, making us glad we had decided to get out.
We had marvelous weather for this time of year. It was sunny for most of each day for six continuous days, warm enough to swim every day, and the wind cooperated except for the last few miles on Freeland and Killarney, where we always get headwinds on the way out. So we really couldn't complain about the last day.
On this trip, we covered about 55 miles of water and 11 miles of portaging in 5 days. The longest day was about eight hours of traveling plus an hour lunch break. The typical day was about six hours of travel plus lunch. On two or three days, we found that a two meal per day schedule worked well for us. After a good breakfast, we weren't particularly hungry at lunch time, and kept moving. We would then arrive in camp in mid-afternoon for a swim and early supper.
On Saturday, we visited Science North in Sudbury, which is a hands-on science museum very similar to the larger Science Center in Toronto. The exhibits and demonstrations were fun. There is a lot of explanation of the mining history of the area and of mining technology. They have a pet porcupine living in the middle of the museum, with his own tree surrounded by a small moat. When he is awake, attendants carry him around and let people pet him. They also have a pair of pet flying squirrels - a locally common animal that no one ever sees because it is nocturnal. They gave us a flying (actually gliding) exhibition: The squirrels grew up living in the pockets of blue lab coats worn by museum employees. So whenever a squirrel was placed on the tree, it ran to the top branch and jumped, gliding out to the nearest blue-coated attendant and then climbing into a pocket.
The museum building is spectacular and would be worth seeing even without the exhibits. The lower floors are carved out of solid granite, in keeping with the mining theme, and this is nicely blended into soaring expanses of glass several floors high.
We also visited the Big Nickel mine. This is a demonstration mine developed for tourism and teaching, but faithful to the working nickel mines nearby. They showed us all how to make explosives out of lawn fertilizer and fuel oil, and demonstrated the complete mining process as we walked through granite tunnels.
Twenty years ago, there was hardly a live tree in all of Sudbury and for many miles around. The acid ash from the nickel ore processing plants had killed everything. Now they have built the "super stack" - a smoke stack hundreds of feet tall, which distributes the acid over Europe instead of Canada, the the town is green again. (They have also greatly reduced the total emissions, of course). We had an excellent meal at Marconi's - which I recommend to anyone visiting that area.
It is interesting to compare the weather we experienced to that reported by Andrea Carpenter in her trip in Algonquin Park about 50 miles or so east of us, during the three days that we overlapped. She reported 44 degree night time temperatures on Sept 3 and 4. We had the same brilliantly clear skies, but it was substantially warmer in Killarney. Although we didn't have a thermometer, we wore rather light clothing early morning and late evening on these days and were never uncomfortable. We brought warm clothing, expecting cool weather, and never used most of it. The proximity of Lake Huron apparently modifies the temperature extremes a lot. On Sept. 5, Andrea reported rain off and on during the day. We had brief sprinkles during the preceding night, clearing skies through the morning and a clear afternoon. The strong winds she reported on the 4th and 5th were lighter where we were (perhaps partly because we were on relatively sheltered water). They were lovely tail winds for us since we were bound north and east on these days - one of the few times we've beaten the wind gods
All the boring details:
Sept 2,
1:00 leave Rochester about 1:30 pm
7:45 arrive French River Trading Post (fast driving - traffic moving at 85 mph on
Canadian roads
Sept 3,
8:00 arise,breakfast at Hungry Bear (not very good - pancakes probably
microwaved from frozen)
10:45 at float plane dock on George Lake
11:00 on water
11:45 portage into FreeLand Lake
12:15 on portage to Killarney Lake
12:25 first narrows on Killarney L. Rangers in canoe asked for our papers.
1:30 by NE island in OSA L.
2:35 at P210 west end of Muriel L.
2:45 on (Little) Artist L.
3:30 start P. to Three Narrows
4:25 Helen reached top of P, Dave had been there 15 minutes
4:45 H. at Three NarrowsL
5:13 at campsite #47. White house across the bay Beautiful small inlet - bay south of Site
5:50 tent up, dry shoes for Helen, photos taken, fire started
6:25 cooking lentils and rice. Dave putting spruce splint on yoke
7:07 dinner over - read until dusk
8:30 too dark to read. Bear bag hung, sky clear, slight pink in the west
9:00 bedtime, after seeing the major constellations appear.
Sept. 4
7:45 arise, oatmeal for breakfast, Sunny and no clouds 9:15 closing the packs
10:50 after first carryover on Kirk Creek
11:35 end of "last" carryover in Kirk C.
12:16 several beaver dams and more carryovers
1:35 site 136 for lunch - bagels & cream cheese
2:45 end of lunch
4:30 at P40 into Low Lake sky clouding over
5:11 leaving Low Lake portage in right thru large bare rock campsite
6:15 Tent up, fire built on Helen L. site #140 good site for us. We built a fireplace on a
large flat rock that put it at waist height, with other flat rock seats adjacent.
6:30 water boiling
8:30 overcast, too dark to read.
Sept. 5 travelled from Helen L. to VanWinkle L. Natural High Sherry Beef was good for dinner
Sept. 6 travelled from VanWinkle to Great Mountain L.
Sept. 7 travelled Great Mountain L. to Three Narrows L. stayed on site 41
Sept. 8 travelled all the way to car, drove into Sudbury stayed at Journey's End(?) Motel, dinner at Pizze Hut
Sept. 9 breakfast next to Motel, most of the day at Science North, late afternoon at Big Nickel Mine, dinner at Marconi's (goood), stay at Journey's End(?) again
Sept 10 drive home. total canoeing time - almost exactly five days (plus a couple of hours) total water distance 55 miles total portage distance 11 miles