So, as mentioned earlier I went camping two weekends ago with Graydyn, Dad, and Jay. We drove up Friday afternoon, stopping in Barrie for a pretty excellent burger. I wish I could remember the name of that place; there aren't many people left in the world hand-making a patty these days. At any rate, following our epic burger stop we drove up to the lovely town of Killarney. Unfortunately the best part of the drive, the final run along the Hwy 637 into Killarney was marred by some strange form of road repair that seemed to involve just covering perfectly good paved road with gravel. The road surface along many stretches was slick with gravel and we drove through a haze of dust kicked up by other cars. Not very pleasant for us, but far less so for the motorcyclists who frequent the road. I'm happy to report though that traffic and rain conspired to pack down the gravel into something resembling a road again by the time we left. I think that may be a driveable road again already.
We did our usual trick of staying at the lodge the night before camping so that we could start out refreshed. Our biggest departure from tradition came from our means of travel: we left the kayaks at home and opted for some rented canoes. Kayaks and Canoes each offer their own unique sets of pros and cons, and we got to experience each of these first hand on this short trip. The biggest benefit that the canoe offers is the ease with which it can be loaded for travel. Gear goes into drybags, drybags get thrown into canoe. It's just that easy. The joy of that becomes abundantly clear at the portages, which were a piece of cake on this trip. It wasn't too difficult to adapt to the different style of paddling either, with Graydyn and I managing to get into a pretty good rhythm within the first couple hundred meters. It really didn't take us long to get to our destination on Lake Killarney.
We decided on campsite number 16 which is at the North of the lake just as it begins to turn East and is on the Northern side of the Crack. It was a beautiful and very sheltered sight. Not one I'd recommend if the wind is coming straight out of the North, but aside from that situation you've got a lot of shelter on all other sides, which turned out perfectly since the prevailing winds were southerly while we were away.
After we'd setup camp we just chilled out around the campsite. At one point we attempted to go swimming in the stunningly clear waters of Lake Killarney... that way brief since the water temperatures were more than just a bit bracing. It was pretty refreshing though!
Sunday morning we got up, got ourselves fed, and got right back into the canoes again. We stuck to Lake Killareny, but paddled around to the portage into Lake Kakakise, which links up to the main hiking trail. We abandoned the canoes at the head of the portage and walked it, but even that was enough to make me have serious second-thoughts about ever attempting that portage with a fully loaded boat; it's pretty rocky, and there are some steep sections. Once we hit the main trail we hiked up to the Crack. It's a hike that we've done before, but it's no less spectacular the second time around. The leaves were in their fall colours and the sky was clear and bright, offering up stunning views of the surrounding landscape.
When we returned from our hike we didn't have a lot of day left, so we spent that time casually trying to fish. We didn't have any luck, but this wasn't terribly surprising since it's reported that all the lakes in that area were heavily damaged by acid rain and have yet to recover.
The weather report had called for rain the entire time we were to be out in the park, a threat that didn't materialize until Sunday night. It was kind enough to wait until we'd all got settled comfortably into our tents though, which I thought was nice. The rain absolutely hammered down all night, and showed no signs of lagging vigor the next morning. Unfortunately, as with my last camping trip, the rainy morning was the one where we had to break camp. As expected all of our gear was completely soaked by the time we had it all loaded into the canoes and set out back to park entrance. This is where we ran into the major downside of the canoe; it doesn't handle bad weather nearly as well as a kayak. You see, a kayak is a very streamlined and low-to-the-water affair. A canoe is open and subject to the will of the wind, and also takes on a lot of water when the rain gets hard, which it did. We paddled through quite the storm, and were all thoroughly drenched by the first portage. We managed to escape the park in one piece though.
The plan was to spend Monday night in Killarney, hang out around Killarney Tuesday, and then leave on Wednesday. However, the weather was calling for the rain to continue through Tuesday and so we made the decision to just spend Monday night and then leave on Tuesday. We just felt that if we were going to be held indoors due to the weather then there was no point in hanging around. It wasn't a big deal though since we'd already had a great trip.
Well, that's all the details for now. Unfortunately I really didn't take many pictures since my Dad had his far superior camera with him, and I thought I'd leave it to him, so I don't have any pictures to post right now, but I should have some for next week's post. Tune in next week for photos!
1 comment:
t was a fun trip. I could have gone without the drenching though. The lodge as usual has fantastic food, and Graydyn being all concerned about calories resulted in me getting two deserts. We checked out the newly renovated Sportsman for lunch on Monday food was nothing to write home about but the room rates seem decent if the lodge were to be fully booked.
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