Review: Fenton Lake, Lake Superior Provincial Park

View South from Fenton Lake Campsite,
a few hours after sunrise

Location: Fenton Lake, Lake Superior Provincial Park
Website: Ontario Parks or Friends of Lake Superior PP
Map: Friends of Lake Superior PP or Google Maps
Camping Facilities: Backcountry
Grade: C
Stargazing: Decent
Summary: A serviceable last-minute backcountry option, but not a reflection on the quality of the park - highway noise is an issue
Thoughts: It was getting late by the time I arrived in Lake Superior, on my way back from my first trip exploring the true "up north" in Ontario. I had the chance to explore Thunder Bay with some old friends and have a peak at Quetico, so I was happy to return to Lake Superior PP for a relaxing evening. As I've said in my other posts, Lake Superior is my favorite Ontario park, mainly because of its diversity of camping opportunities and the unparalleled beauty of its shoreline.

The single campsite on Fenton Lake

There were a few options available to me; I could stay at Old Woman's Bay at the backpacking site on its shore; I could try one of the car camping sites at Rabbit Blanket Lake campground; or I could backtrack (never a desirable option) to Fenton Lake or one of it's interior lakes. Old Woman's Bay was available but looked far too conspicuous for my liking - your tent would be in clear view of anyone who came to visit it's spectacular shores (but yes, Old Woman's Bay is hard to beat for a lunch stop or picnic). Rabbit Blanket Lake's sites were decent, but nothing too exciting (not scenic in any way, but decent privacy). But I didn't know much about Fenton and wasn't sure if it was worth it. I consulted a member of park staff at the Rabbit Blanket Lake gatehouse. We had a chat about the park in general, how underused it was, and how even the summer staff (mostly university students) didn't do very much exploring on their days off. While she hadn't been up to Fenton herself, she said that I'd have it all to myself as nobody else had registered there that night, so I decided to go for it.

Fenton Lake Put-In

By the time I put in at the end of the 500 m downhill, well-maintained portage (score!), it was nearly 6 pm. I decided that it wasn't worth the trip into one of the deeper lakes (Treeby, Shakwa, Junction or Underhill). In hindsight, if I had given myself more time, I would have.

Transport truck roaring by Fenton Lake

Fenton is a narrow lake, especially by the campsite (there is only one site), which means your view of the sky is mostly obstructed. The bigger problem is that the highway is aligned parallel to it, with traffic clearly audible from any site, especially the big rigs. Late at night, when the traffic dies down and the fire is crackling, you can nearly ignore it. The highway noise was mostly gone by 10 pm, and it's peaceful enough that I could hear the sound of a duck taking off on the other side of the lake. But if you're trying to get some peace and pretend like you're actually in the deep woods, Fenton Lake is a bummer. The big rigs just don't really ever stop. Plus I had a hard time finding a flat spot for the tent, and the site itself isn't terribly scenic. It's main saving grace is that there is a beautiful old white pine tree out front.

Not much beats a big stack of firewood
with an hour to spare before dusk

But it's not all bad news. For the anglers - the fish were constantly jumping 2 hours before sunset so I think you might have some luck there. For the swimmers, the water was calm and warm, so you might enjoy a dip. For the campfire lovers, there is so much firewood around the site. As well, there are beautiful hills surrounding the lake. Other than the highway, the lake is very peaceful (cause you'll be the only person on it). Important to note that interior sites are not reservable in Superior PP,  but they are mostly available due to low attendance.

Canoe route map for Fenton Lake -
erected during Ontario Parks' glory days

Some pointers from the MNR

Review: Pickerel Lake, Quetico Provincial Park

Location: 2 hrs West of Thunder Bay

Website: Friends or Ontario Park
Map: Google
Camping Facilities: Backcountry (Wilderness)
Grade: A+
Stargazing: Didn't have the good fortune, but probably pretty good
Summary: Wish I had more time...
Thoughts: I remember the first time I heard about Quetico, back in 2001, calling up the Ontario Parks reservation line and being told that "a $100 deposit was necessary for any bookings" in the park. I remember thinking "Where? Why?". It seemed odd that this random park needed an arbitrary deposit fee, but there must have been a good reason. That reason is still a mystery, mainly because I've never bothered to ask anyone up until this point. But I did look up the park to see what all the fuss was about and it is an enchanting concept: imagine a park that's about half the size of Algonquin park, where logging activities are strictly forbidden (i.e., no false vistas for the paddling thoroughfares like those found in Algonquin), where motorboats are not welcome, where the current natural state is preserved in perpetuity, where there are no grandfathered resorts in the interior, where the campsites are unmarked, where the portages are unsigned, and where you can cross the Canadian-American border by canoe. It all sounds like what a backcountry park should be. But this is one of the few in the park system where all this is true.

The call of a calm bay is hard to resist on Pickerel...

I had myself one night to check out Quetico. One night - 400,000ha. Needless to say, you can't even scratch the surface. And it had to be somewhere that wouldn't crush us in our attempt to access the park in the midst of a fierce late-summer storm. Plus it had to be a reasonable drive from Thunder Bay. It's limiting, to be sure, and our first pick (Baptism Creek - a fitting name for one's first foray into the park) was not taking any new campers that night. So we took the next best thing in Pickerel Lake. It's a 30-minute drive off the Trans-Canada, down a pretty sketchy road, till you're finally at the Pickerel Lake parking lot. Then you have to do a long 500m portage. I say "long" because it's one of those ones that feels a lot longer than what's marked for some reason. It's narrow and rocky, plus I found some folks on the trail less than respectful of portage etiquette (the person with the canoe on their head has right of way, people). It's also pretty mucky, but staff do their best to keep your boots clean with some boardwalks. Note: there is no park office on this road, so you'll have to check in at the park pavilion / car campground. The pavilion is probably worthwhile stopping for in itself, one of the nicer park gatehouses I've seen. Nice facilities too.

A panorama of Pickerel

Pickerel Lake is a monstrous, wind-whipping East-West lake. All the canoeists we met on the lake were raring to go and we all smelt a whiff of competition in the air as the sites are first-come first-served. More so than in the Algonquin or Killarney spirit, because there's no guarantee a good, clear campsite will be waiting for you (at least in those other parks, you book a spot on Big Crow Lake, you know you have a spot on Big Crow Lake). There a quota systems in place which limit the number of people in the backcountry, so there's probably no reason to worry that you won't find anything good; plus seeing as you can technically camp anywhere, well, all  you need to find is an open flat-ish piece of ground.

We set off into strong gusts that nearly swamped us within the first 15 minutes; they slowed our progress to a crawl as we tried to make our way east into the Lake. Our fellow canoeists were off to the races, everybody seemed to know what they were doing and where they were headed. We fell to the back of the pack and quickly realised that if we wanted to enjoy what was left to enjoy of the day, we had to take the first campsite that we could get. After two false stops (they looked like sites from the water, but on shore they were not worth unloading for), we found a keeper. And it was a pretty nice one to be sure, but that's the trick of unmarked campsites - you never know where the next one is and if it might be a bit better.

Nothing beats knowing you have

a good stack of firewood

Our site was full of dead fall, even though it was on a narrow point with sparse tree cover. The bugs were kept at bay and we were able to enjoy a roaring fire for 6 hours while we polished off a bottle's worth of bourbon (no bottles or cans allowed!). There are no picnic benches, no privies, no firepits with accompanying grills. It's all as basic as camping gets. Sometimes it left me wanting, but the benefits outweigh any of the strikes against. Oh, and contrary to what my ignorant Southern Ontario brain guessed - yes, you do get leeches in lakes up north. So watch where you're swimming, a number were trying to make a meal out of my canoe (nice try, jerks).

Endless wilderness...

I can't recommend a trip up to Quetico enough. It's the true canoeists mecca in Ontario, maybe Canada. The setting is magical, mainly because you know that it just goes on forever and that it's as pristine a spot as you'll find this far south in the province. The promise of all the countless wilderness lakes, pictographs, old growth forest, giant white pines, waterfalls, and human history that reach far beyond big Pickerel Lake's treeline, it's enough to blow one's mind. Support our great Northern Ontario parks and don't worry about the $100 deposit.

Review: Interior Camping, Mississagi Provincial Park

Semiwite Lake

Location: 30 mins from Elliot Lake
Website: Ontario Parks or Elliot Lake Tourism
Map: Google
Camping Facilities: Backcountry (excellent car camping also available in the park)
Grade: B-
Stargazing: Good on a clear night
Summary: Disorganized but easily accessible backcountry camping
Thoughts: I had been dreaming about backcountry camping in Mississagi for quite a while. It's a bit further than the backcountry crown jewels of Algonquin, Killarney or Temagami, but it was smaller and promised smaller crowds as a result of its distance. I finally had an opportunity to get in my boat and paddle out into the interior in the summer of 2015, exploring beyond the excellent car camping that's available in the park. Unfortunately, I must report that I was disappointed.

The first thing I should state is that Helenbar Lake and Semiwite Lake are beautiful lakes. Semiwite

Well-marked trailhead from Semiwite Lake

does host motorboats but Helenbar is free of them. While paddling solo, it took me about an hour to paddle to the portage into Helebar (so it should take 45 mins or less with a partner). The portage into Helenbar is a dream: pretty flat, nice and wide, not very buggy, and relatively short. Plus there are clear markings to the hiking trails that branch off of it, so you won't get lost. Unfortunately, this is where my problems began. I put in to Helenbar and was excited to see this gorgeous lake and know that I had it all to myself. I say "all to myself" because I booked the lake's only site with park staff upon registering. Hence, it was going to be just me. Or so I thought.

Helenbar Lake

As I paddled into the lake, in search of the site, I noticed a splashing in the water along the shore. I thought it must be a deer or a moose going for a swim but I looked more carefully and noticed it was a human being. There were no canoes docked on the shore, so it I was confused. I figured they must have stashed their boat in the weeds, somewhere invisible. I disregarded it and kept searching for the site. I consulted my map and it seemed like I had must have passed the site. I went back to roughly where I saw the person swimming and noticed a campsite sign tucked away on shore. The swimmer was no longer in the water so I started to get the sense that something was amiss.

A horrible campsite on Semiwite Lake

I paddled up to the (my) site and discovered the person had already set up camp and was prepping a fire. She came up to greet me and I explained the situation, showed my park permit as evidence of my booking. She apologized but explained that she was hiking the McKenzie Interior Trail. As part of the permit for the trail, hikers can camp at any site along the way without expressly booking them. It just so happened that the Helenbar Lake site is also a site on the McKenzie trail. She expressed discomfort at sharing the site with me (which would have been a reasonable solution in most cases, as the site was very large), as she was a single woman and I was a single man (awkward turtle, indeed). Besides, both of us came there for seclusion, and we'd both lose that if we shared the site. I could appreciate her discomfort so I decided that the first-come, first-served rule had trumped my booking and headed back to Semiwite. Her apologies seemed sincere, if uncompromising, and she did offer me an energy bar as a consolation prize. I declined and grumbled my way back to my boat.

So I trudged back across the portage trail, I plunked back into Semiwite. Two out of three campsites on Semiwite Lake are terrible. The eastern-most site is the best, hands-down. The other two are rocky, grassy messes and I doubt that you could comfortably pitch a tent anywhere except if you squeeze it up in the fire pit / dining area. Not ideal. The eastern site is along a narrow sandy beach that also seems to be part of the McKenzie trail, so it's entirely possible that hikers will tramp through your site while you eat your lunch or sleep in some morning. It also gets too shallow to paddle about 30 meters from the shoreline, so you'll have to drag your canoe across the sand.

In summary, this is a beautiful spot, and, given it's distance from major urban centres, there is a high likelihood that you'll find seclusion on scenic Helenbar. I sincerely doubt my experience was typical and I imagine you'll have the Helenbar site all to yourself if you book it. But if you're arriving late in the evening and a hiker has usurped your site, you're going to be mightily annoyed. So if you think a late arrival is a possibility, you might want to reconsider, or at least spend the first night in the excellent car camping area (I stress this because so much of the car campground is top notch). There are also other canoe camping options in the area that you might consider, but I can't speak to their quality. Good luck!

The best site on Semiwite

- also has a hiking trail cutting through it

Moonrise over Semiwite Lake

Review: Backcountry, Charleston Lake Provincial Park



Charleston Lake from Site 505

Location: 15 mins NE of Lansdowne (30 mins from Kingston)
Website:  Ontario Parks
Map: Google Maps
Camping Facilities: Pseudo-Backcountry (and excellent car camping)
Grade: C
Stargazing: Good
Summary: Not to be mistaken for backcountry, but you gotta love tent platforms
Thoughts: (Dear reader, prepare for a rant).

Site 504 - with two picnic tables (grrr...)

Without exception, every lake that's accessible by car in the fair province of Ontario (indeed, the entire continent) must be frequented by those who own motorboats. A boater has got to boat. It's not enough that motorboats have superior stability relative to the graceful canoe (though that never held a true Canadian back, said Pierre Berton).  It's not enough that they're sometimes furnished with seating that is readily interchangeable with that found in the most luxurious of suburban man-caves. And it's not enough that they can travel vast distances through no greater effort than a single yank of a pull cord, on the same water that those with self-propelled watercraft. Sure, we canoeists struggle to displace the choppy water while charging headlong into the pummelling wind (one back-wrenching paddle stroke at a time), while the boaters bombard us with their wakes. The simple truth is that motorboats must be on all lakes, all summer long, buzzing along carefree, completely oblivious to the havoc they play on the nerves of paddlers and campers with whom they share the water. And, of course, a lake the size of Charleston Lake is a special motorboat haven.

Site 503 - swampy and only two tent platforms
(don't bring a third tent)

There is no peace, quiet or solitude to be found in Charleston Lake's backcountry. Note the subtle hint on the Ontario Parks website (the emphasis is my own): "These sites are excellent for visitors who want to see a different side of the park or for those who are developing their interior camping skills."  Motorboats, humming away, swinging by your campsite to gawk at your quaint low-impact ways, fishing in your cove (okay, it's not really yours, but I'm sure they wouldn't welcome you to paddle up to their dock...). So when the Ontario Parks website tells you all about Charleston Lake's "interior" campsite offerings, take that wording with a grain of salt.  I mean seriously, interior relative to what? Lake Ontario? The Atlantic? 

And motorboats are just one of the things to disturb your peace.  Among the list of things that intrude upon your wilderness experience are:

• Trains (audible from nearly 10km away!);
• Barking dogs;
• Large-screen TV screens flickering in the windows of neighbouring cottages;
• Morons loudly yammering on while they trawl for fish at dusk. 

Taking shelter from the waves in Bob's Cove

Okay, so my rant has gone on long enough.  But here's the bare truth. The sites are positioned in clusters (a la Frontenac Park), which is not apparent from the reservation site (instead, have a look at this map, which is much more truthful about the camping situation). Be prepared to be sharing your quiet patch of wilderness with others (i.e., you're going to have to be considerate and keep your exuberance to a minimum, no matter how many tallboys you've downed to drown the sorrows of your disappointing backcountry experience). As well, to be fair, the boat traffic was at a relatively low level on the weeknights that we were there.

These sites don't even get
individual site markers

Our cluster was housed in the quaintly-named "Bob's Cove", and I'm sure Bob deserves a better memorial to his earthly accomplishments. The website will tell you that each site "comes equipped with three elevated tent platforms, a picnic table, a fire grill and a privy)". This statement is mostly lies. We stayed at 503 (not recommended, as it's nestled right in the armpit of a swampy, mucky mess), which only had 2 platforms, and the same was observed at 505 (also not recommend, as it was a bit cramped and lacking any natural shade for the picnic table). As well, 503's picnic table wasn't even there (some group of ninnies moved it over to 504 - thanks, ninnies). The privy does indeed exist, but it is shared with the campers at 503, 504, and 505 (it is a real outhouse, stocked with toilet paper and dozens of well-fed spiders).  So it's a bit misleading to say that each site is equipped with a privy - in this case it's more like a third of a privy. The saving grace of camping on Charleston Lake is the ease in setting up your tent on the platforms provided.  Beautiful. In the rain, they'll save you from flooding and damp misery. Plus it'll save you the trouble of searching for the flattest piece of ground to sleep on.  


Site 504 in the centre, 503 on the left

Now, I know there is a lot of kvetching going on here, but it's meant to counterbalance the magical imagery that often accompanies one's reverie of peaceful solitude when Ontario Parks carelessly throws out the words "backcountry camping". Let's face it - there just isn't very much true backcountry camping south of Algonquin Park.  Charleston Lake is no exception.  It's a half-assed attempt to eke out an interior camping zone without actually providing the experience one would expect.  The cottagers and pleasure boaters have already conquered this lake.   

If you insist on camping in the "backcountry" here, aim for sites 504, 507, 508, maybe 510 (though there only seems to be one platform on 510 - Please, OntarioParks.com, accurately disclose on the reservation site exactly what us campers should expect, no surprises).
 

Site 505 - hope you're not looking for shade

On the positive side of things, I want to point out that the car camping sites in this park seem to be a bit of an anomaly for anything south of Sudbury.  They are roomy, well-treed and spaced appropriately apart (i.e. private).  As well, they're arranged in loops, not grids. I highly recommend this park for car camping, it seems to be well worth the drive. 



Site 505 - just two platforms

Research: Camping in the Thousand Islands National Park

A bit of a departure from my usual format - I've been doing some research on camping in the 1000 Islands National Park and thought that I would share some of this consolidated information for people who are interested.  The park is an unusual camping experience, where you'd be camping alongside an important waterway of both touristic and commercial value, so you may share the water with cargo ships, speedboats, yachts, sailboats, motorboats, kayaks, and/or canoes.  This is enough to turn off a lot of the backcountry camping set, and with good reason.  But if this doesn't deter the intrepid, adventurous spirit that compels you to explore every last patch of nationally or provincially controlled parkland, then I've created list of pointers from various sources to help get you on your way.  Personally, with all the logistical issues, I'm hesitant to head out to these campgrounds. However, it certainly is a unique camping opportunity in Eastern Ontario, which is sorely lacking in quality camping opportunities (though this one may not qualify). 

Things to consider

• There are 20 islands of varying distance from the mainland available for camping, dispersed along an approximately 75 km linear stretch of water.  This means that some islands will be very far from mainland pubic docking points, while others might be more conveniently located - consult the following services chart from Parks Canada and Google Maps.  Some docks require payment, some do not (likely watercraft dependent). 
• There are no water taps at any of the island campgrounds.  This means you'll either want to lug in bottled water or filter from the river. Most sites I've seen are written by folks who are put off by this, as am I; as great as my water filter is, I'm not confident in its ability to remove the potentially wide array of contaminants flowing in from neighbouring municipal wastewater treatment plants, boat traffic, cottages and industrial effluent.  This is likely an overly cautious position to be taking, as the concentrations are likely low and dosages are small, but the uncertainty here is also high - hence I'd choose to avoid it (has anybody seen any testing on St. Lawrence water quality in the area?)
• The islands typically have multiple docks, with many campsites scattered along their hiking trails.  Some of these require payment, some are free, some are designated for paddlers. Hiking into your site on an island hiking trail sounds great until you consider you're likely lugging in your water.  Fortunately, it seems most sites are located within a few hundred metres of the docks. As well, be warned that many of these sites are clustered together - e.g. Camelot Island, Beau Rivage
• You're on a busy seaway - you will not find solitude, peace & quiet, nor dark, starry night skies here.  In addition, many islands have mooring buoys just offshore, so the potential for noisy neighbours exists both on land and on the water
• A few campers have recommended certain islands:
• From Trip Advisor (lecdm) - Camelot, Aubrey
• From CCR (Kim Gass) - Endymion, Camelot and Gordon and Mulcaster

Valuable Resources

• Parks Canada - It's in dire need of a redesign since this website feels very "early 2000s", but we must appreciate that Parks Canada gets shamefully little funding. If you do enough digging, you'll find a lot of valuable information here. Most notable are the pages with the maps for the individual islands and the chart of the facilities and services.
• Frontenac Arch Biosphere - Trail information, maps, outfitters, route info, etc., just a fantastic resource for this area and the rest of the Frontenac Arch Biosphere
• My Canadian Canoe Routes - The forum should be browsed for the latest information, though in truth this park doesn't get much discussion.

Review: Buzzard Lake, Kawartha Highlands Signature Site

Location: 70 km north of Peterborough
Website:  My CCR or Ontario Parks
Map: Google Maps 
Camping Facilities: Backcountry Exclusively
Grade: B+
Stargazing: Excellent 

Long Lake Access Point

Summary: A decent backcountry experience, as long as the cottagers are away.
Thoughts: I have been avoiding visiting Kawartha Highlands ever since it has become an operating park, not because I don't want to support the park system, but because of the seemingly cumbersome phone-in reservation process that they had in place in its first year as of operation.  This has fortunately been fixed, and you can even reserve your site online - a first for a backcountry park in Ontario.   The reservation system is impressive, with detailed information about each site in the park, along with photos.

Site 427 on Buzzard (note the marsh)

Regarding the camping, the main issue I have with the park is that it's plunked down on top of previously developed cottage areas.  While these developments are not quite on the scale of the Muskokas, cottages are found on nearly every lake.  To be fair, I haven't had any unpleasant experiences in the park due to cottagers (no rowdiness, no loud generators kicking in at midniht so that they can watch CNN on their plasma TVs), but the potential exists.  And given that most of us rarely get a chance to enjoy a backcountry experience, the last thing we want is for it to be soiled by motorboats or noisy yahoos.

Star gazing is great from this rock

The paddle from Long Lake is not too bad, roughly 45-60 mins, depending on wind.  There were plenty of motorboats, none of which slowed down as they passed us (impeding our progress as we had to reorient our canoe to contend with their wakes).  Once you arrive at the portage into Buzzard (a nice, sandy shoreline access, with two docks to receive you), you have a 300 m trek to cover, which is nice and wide.  A few ups and downs, but generally easy.  The put-in into Buzzard didn't have many nice options for loading up the boat, so you're likely going to have to get your feet wet here.

Tent pads are a bit scattered

Buzzard was an enjoyable lake, perhaps partially due to my stay occuring on weeknights.  The cottages on the lake appeared to be unoccupied on those days, so I can't comment if the owners are the boisterous type or not.  A friend tells me that from her experience, you do get a few motorboats over the course of the day, and even some chainsaws, but she found it generally tolerable. But I would suggest a mid-week trip, if you can do it.

The lake is reasonably big, but somewhat lacking in high quality sites.  We stayed at 427 after being informed by park staff that it was one of the nicest on the lake.  While it had some good features (nice rock on the northern part of the site to catch some breezes or stargaze, in addition to being pretty large), it had awkwardly laid-out tent pads.  We kind of just scattered to any part of the site where we could find a flat spot.  An unfortunate point about this site is that it is sandwiched between two marshy areas, so the bullfrogs can keep you up all night and the bugs can be bad at times.  We also had some whippoorwills visit us each night.  While they are pretty cool birds, with a haunting call, they created quite a ruckus (one morning they stopped in around 5am and called out relentlessly for about 5 mins...hard to get back to sleep after that). (For a video of whippoorwills going bananas, see below).  For those who are curious, there was cell phone network access on this lake, though don't take that as an invitation to watch youtube videos all night by the campfire (seriously, don't do that).

428 didn't seem to have as much space as 427, though its location might be slightly better and I'd recommend it over all others.  Sites 425 and 426 seemed nice (especially 425, which had a picnic table on a 15 ft high rock overlooking the water), though were adjacent to a cottage on a nearby island - again, the cottagers were away, so I can't comment on what their impact would be.  Sites 420 - 424 all are within view of one cottage or another, so exercise caution.  A fellow camper mentioned that 420 has some nice islands close by to the site that make for a nice destination for an afternoon swim.  A note about the fishing, there seems to be plenty of bass here; one of my trip mates caught about 9 smallmouth bass over 3 hrs of fishing (during one particularly productive hour, he caught 5, one of which was large enough for lunch).

Panorama off the star-gazing rock

We made a day trip down to Vixen (just the northern half), which was a narrow lake with a few nice island sites on the north end.  It didn't seem like there were any cottages here, but the topography is quite flat and the lake is small, so it's somewhat lacking in scenery.  However, you really got the feeling that you were in the middle of nowhere here.

All in all, Buzzard is a reasonably nice spot; it's not a far drive from Toronto, there's very little light pollution, the fishing isn't bad and there's some semblance of remoteness, even though you aren't actually remote at all.  A worthwhile trip, though I'm interested to hear what people have to say about the cottagers.  


Canoe Rentals: For those looking to rent a canoe to use during their visit at the part, two outfitters are within close proximity of the park: Wild Rock in Peterborough and Adventure Outfitters in Lakefield.  If it's on your way, Adventure Outfitters seems to be the way to go, their rentals are significantly cheaper than Wild Rock. 

Review: Bartlett / Tom Thompson Lakes, Algonquin Interior

Fantastic site on Bartlett Lake

Location: A day's paddle north of Canoe Lake put-in (which is 60 km E of Huntsville on Highway 60)
Website: Friends of Algonquin Ontario Parks
Map: Canoe Routes Map Google Maps
Camping Facilities: Backcountry exclusively
Grade: A-
Stargazing: Excellent.
Summary: A quiet corner along one of Algonquin's busiest routes

Thoughts: I showed up at Canoe Lake on a weekday at the end of July to find myself a suitable solo trip.  I had been hoping to get a site on Tom Thompson or Little Doe, but to my surprise, everything was booked.  The only available site was on Bartlett Lake, just off of Thompson.  The park attendant assured me this was a good way to go; not only was it secluded, but it also had some really nice sites (the one in particular he suggested I aim for was on a point and it was large and secluded - you can see it in the photos below immediately left of the name "Bartlett" on the online map provided above.

Lonely gull on Bartlett Lake

Seeing as this was only my 3rd ever solo trip (and I was still having nightmares about my first, when my muscles seized up on my first night after a hard paddle against the wind), I was a bit nervous about some of the more open parts of the trip.  In the end, the worries were needless, and the trip was pretty smooth.

Sailers from Camp Arowhon on Teepee Lake

 I suggest you do your best to get to the Canoe Lake put-in as early as possible; it is a very popular lake, especially with newbies and motorboats, so it can be a bit of a fiasco.  The line-up to pull your canoe out of the portage to Joe Lake probably took longer than the act of portaging itself (a minuscule 300 m).  Then you make your way up Joe to Teepee, which hosts camp Arowhon (there were lots of kids out puttering around in their laser sailboats).  Try to get to the western shore as soon as you've passed the bay, it was useful as a windscreen.  After Teepee, the paddle is pretty easy when you're solo, not much in the way of big water to really let the wind pick up speed.  You'll come to a lift-over, which can be a bit tricky when paddling solo, but totally manageable.  It was on the other side of this lift over that I came across a moose grazing in the lily pads on my way back out (see video below).   The paddle across the bottom end of Thompson is pretty easy, not much of an opportunity for the wind to bother you.  Then once you arrive in Bartlett, you're not only sheltered from the wind but all the canoe traffic in this busy part of the park as well.  During my two night stay here, I might have seen half a dozen canoes roll by (perhaps on their way to Sunbeam Lake or Burnt Island Lake.  Bartlett feels like a refuge within the refuge, a great place to relax, enjoy the water and get some reading done.   

Moose on Tom Thompson

My trip to Bartlett was also the first time I've ever fallen out of my canoe.  I've got a Watson Canoe Prospector, 15 ft, and what I thought was a sufficient tumblehome to keep me vertical when I leaned into my strokes in the centre of the canoe; turns out I was wrong on that count.  Even with the calm, peaceful waters of Bartlett Lake, I found myself in the drink on my paddle to harvest a fallen pine on the other side of the lake. Not Bartlett's fault, purely me being too ambitious in getting to know my canoe.  

In summary, a great solo paddle trip, giving you a sense of seclusion and a relatively smooth paddle if the wind cooperates.  And even if it doesn't, there aren't that many opportunities for it to bother you.  

Free Online Algonquin Map

For those who love Algonquin Park, Jeffrey McMurtrie has created a fantastic (and free!) online map for you to explore the park from your computer.  This is by far the most detailed map I've seen and he's chosen to provide it to the rest of us at no charge; it's a fine example of the excellent work that's be provided on the "open" realm of the internet.


Visit the Park Map Here

Support Jeffrey's efforts here - he uses it to make this free resource better.  Great work!

Screenshot of Jeffrey's Map

Review: Barron Canyon, Algonquin Interior

Location: 1 hr drive west from Pembroke
Date: July 2006
Website: Friends of Algonquin Ontario Parks
Map: Google Maps or Canoe Routes of Algonquin Park
Camping Facilities: Car Camping at Achray or Backcountry in the vicinity
Grade: B
Stargazing: Who knows, you're in a canyon.
Summary: Spectacular scenery, so-so sites, not a great base camping trip.

View from top of Barron Canyon

Thoughts:  The Barron Canyon is mos def one of the nicest areas of Algonquin, one which any camper in Southern Ontario and Southwestern Quebec should make the effort to visit.  With many trails and the deep canyon itself, there is much nature to be appreciated here.  While a great view is found at the top of the canyon on the Barron Canyon trail, it gets even better when you paddle the Barron river itself.  The camping, like most river camping, can be unfulfilling.   Personally, I like having a sense of endlessness in the natural environment, stretching beyond the horizon  past the shores at the opposite end of the lake.  You don't get that sense when camping in a valley of any sort, given the claustrophobic feel inherent in these landscapes (especially on a narrow river such as the Barron).  Throw the bugginess that you can encounter (due to the absence of breezes), plus the lack of a good view of the night sky, there really isn't much to draw you out of your tent at night.   Hence, don't take this as an indictment of the Barron Canyon, more a presentation of the general problems of camping along a river.

View from top of Barron Canyon

The campsites on the Barron (below the falls) are nothing to marvel at.  Ours was a pretty rocky one, with some decent tent pads, but not really much else.  The paddle in is a fun one (if you like river paddles) with plenty of variation in the scenery; you pass through marshes, rockslides, and wind through canyon with the path the river has made.  It's a decent paddle all the way up to the falls.  The single portage you'll have to do if camping in the valley (coming in from just above Squirrel Rapids) is a short 340 meters trek.  It can be a bit rocky in places, but nothing too difficult. I remember when we did this portage going upstream, there was a couple that was new to camping, who had likely just purchased their camping gear (including one of those ridiculously heavy Wind River canoes you get at Canadian Tire).  They were trying to carry the canoe (with all their gear sitting inside it) by using the deck plates as handles.  Ouch.   I tried to explain that its much easier to just put the yoke on your shoulders and carry the rest of the gear by hand, but I think the strain was getting to them and I don't know if they even finished the 340 m portage.  Hopefully they weren't turned off of camping forever, it would have been a shame.

The boredom that struck our group was likely attributable to our poor trip plan; this isn't a great base camping excursion.  Perhaps you can manage a linear trip starting from Achray (leave one car there and one at the picnic area at Squirrel Rapids), and just keep on moving each day (perhaps move up NW of Grand Lake and come back down).  That would probably be the only fun way to see the Barron Canyon from the river.  Otherwise, there's nothing more than a one-nighter here.

Inside Barron Canyon

Review: Galeairy Lake, Algonquin Interior

Location: 100 km from Huntsville (1.5 hrs), 240 km from Ottawa (3 hrs)
Website: Friends of Algonquin Park or Ontario Parks
Map: Google Maps Canoe Routes
Camping Facilities: Backcountry
Grade: C+

Cloud Lake - Centennial Ridges Trail

Summary: Uneventful paddling on a lake filled with tourists on pontoon boats.
Stargazing: Good   
Thoughts:  I'll keep this brief, because I didn't venture far enough to have much meaningful material to provide.  We did this trip with the aim to base camp while making day trips around the highway 60 corridor, specifically to hike the Centennial Ridges trail.  As a result, our campsite would ideally be a short paddle from the highway, quiet and in a scenic spot.  Two of my first options (Rock Lake and Canisbay) were completely booked up, Galeairy didn't really fit any of these criteria.


First, the access point is actually located outside the park so you drive past the west gate to get there and paddle back into the park.  The paddle back into the park was manageable on the occasions we did it mainly because the winds weren't to fierce.  If this hadn't been the case, I can imagine it being a bit of a struggle.  Either way, its an hour-long paddle going against the wind, and 45 mins in its absense, till you reach the first site.


Second, you won't find much peace and quiet here, due to relentless motorboat traffic all the up until sunset.  I think this is primarily due to the resort on this lake, but not entirely; on our way out at 6am, some cottagers were already out to try water-skiing on the otherwise calm and peaceful lake.



Finally, there's nothing worth seeing here. We stayed at the first site; though we checked out a few more sites further in, the first site was quite nice and the others would just tack on further paddling to our day trip.  But what we did see during our paddle wasn't noteworthy.  It might get more interesting closer to the portage into Rock, but I suspect it doesn't given that the topography.

Whitefish Lake  - Centennial Ridges Trail

Regarding the Centennial Ridges hike, I was pleasantly surprised at both how nice and short it was, given what I'd read.  The signs post a 6-hr estimated completion time, though my wife and I did it in 3 1/2, with plenty of breaks to enjoy the scenery.  Admittedly, the trail pretty well gives you a single landscape to view (overlooking Whitefish and Lake of Two Rivers), but from many different view points.  The best view point from my perspective is the final one (signpost #10) overlooking Whitefish Lake.  The most unpleasant signpost was at Cloud Lake, due to the clouds of mosquitoes that descend upon you as you approach (this was early July, I'm sure its much better after mid-August).  A fun and worthwhile hike, though if you don't want do the whole 10 km hike, just head south toward signpost #10 where the trail splits.

Review: Ragged Lake / Parkside Bay, Algonquin Interior

The bay into the portage from Smoke
to Ragged Lake

Location: 55km East of Huntsville (~ 1 hr)
Website: Friends of Algonquin Park or Ontario Parks
Map: Google Maps Canoe Routes
Camping Facilities: Backcountry
Grade: B- (Ragged), B+ (Parkside Bay)
Summary: Congested, but less so than Canoe Lake. Ragged has few high quality campsites, but better options are available on Parkside Bay.
Thoughts:  The less desirable cousin south of Canoe Lake, Smoke Lake is a nice introduction to Algonquin, with smaller crowds at the portages due to fewer canoe route opportunities south of Highway 60.  As far as the challenge of the paddle, crossing Canoe Lake is likely easier than crossing Smoke, due to the winds and waves that can whip up on Smoke.  These can be especially strong in the southern 1/3 of the lake after passing the narrower northern portion, where the lake gets suddenly wider in the east-west direction.  Once you throw in the wakes of the many motorboats whizzing by, it can be a pretty choppy ride (but not altogether unpleasant).

View from site NW of island on Ragged

Remnants of a
mussel dinner

Things get better once you get to the portage into Ragged Lake.  Though there's a sharp incline right at the beginning, its a very short portage.  Its one of those instances when you wonder if the length was accurately recorded on the map, as it seems even shorter than its 250m.  The put-in on Ragged has some historical significance as it was once the site of a log chute between Smoke and Ragged, though not much remains.  There is a trail that is perhaps 15-20 m north from this put-in, along the east side of the portage, where you can hike down to the rapids and have a look at the old chute site.  Its a nice, peaceful set of rapids, but don't expect to see any remnants of the chute.

View from south "point" site
on Parkside Bay

The sites on Ragged are hit and miss. While many will suit most needs (decent site sizes), they are extremely tightly packed, especially around the island.  We stayed on a site on a NW point, just across from the island and 6 other campfires were clearly visible (and audible).  A few exceptions are the northern most site, just after the portage (though you're bound to see plenty of paddlers come by your site on their way further south or to other lakes) and the two southern most sites (the southeastern sites have very nice private beaches, making great docking points, in addition to swimming/sunbathing opportunities).

Parkside is even tolerable in the rain

Parkside bay is slightly better, though I haven't been here on a long weekend (in fact, only on weekdays).  Its much wider, with greater space between the sites.  There are two sites on long points on the east side of this bay that are winners, get them if you can. There is also good fishing on this bay, where we've tangled with some feisty bass.

Family of ducks on Parkside

While the variety of routes is often much greater north of Highway 60, the availability of sites is probably better to the south.  We booked our stay about one month in advance on Ragged Lake, and that was booking for the August long weekend.  While it's best to stay away from Ragged if you can, you'll still have a decent camping experience, with loons, large sites, and clear views of the night sky still possible.  Be warned however; you may have to share this with experience with a few dozen others.