Loons in the morning on Sandy Lake
We left on May 27 and spent the next six nights at Sandy Lake, staying in our trailer. During the day we either paddled, hiked, or biked.
On Wednesday, May 28 morning I awoke early and spent a couple of hours filming and photographing some of the birds — loons, grebes, and a small shorebird that I haven’t yet identified. Later, after a really great breakfast, and I was very hungry, Enid and I paddled to the far side of Sandy Lake. It was a bit hard to get through the reeds into the small lake, although the water is very high. Perhaps it has silted up over the last year. We saw some otter right in the very narrow channel. They poked their heads high up above the water, and snorted their breath loudly while looking at us for a few seconds, then darting away.
On our first day we’d walked to McKenzie Creek. The park has done a lot of maintenance on the Elk Creek trail, and at the creek they’ve taken out the bridge and put in a ford with large stones. We walked to there again on Thursday, May 29, but once again didn’t cross it. The water looked very cold.
Friday, May 30, we drove to the Spruce River and then paddled into Anglin Lake. The river was extremely high. Last year we had to pull over several large beaver dams. This year there were no dams at all. It took us 40 minutes to reach the lake, and an hour and 20 minutes to return.
On Saturday we paddled from Amiskowan Lake through the small creek into Sandy Lake, and then a couple of kilometers up Beartrap Creek. Once again the water was very high. We couldn’t find any place to get out and eat lunch, and since we had no real target area to reach we turned back and ate on the shore of Sandy Lake.
Enid fording icy Mckenzie Creek
Sunday, June 1, we walked in along the Elk Trail. When we got to McKenzie Creek we took off our boots, and waded through the water. It was as cold as we’d expected! The trail though is in good condition. Unlike the other trails, and even the roads, which are tree littered from the windstorms that took place over last fall and winter, this trail is quite clear because of the maintenance that was undertaken. The culverts have all been replaced, and in order to get the machinery in, they have pushed back the fallen trees along the edge of the trail. There were only three large trees, which must have just fallen across the trail.
Alder catkins
We stopped after about 8 km, again since we had no real target in mind, and ate our lunch at one of the fallen trees. Before eating though we pushed the broken part of the trunk from the road. We had just started our sandwiches when we heard a lot of noise. It sounded like large animals running through the bush, and I anticipated seeing a herd of stampeding elk. Instead it turned out to be two men on a horse-drawn covered wagon. They were going in to Camp Lake to fish. Since they’d forgotten to bring matches they asked if we had some, and so we were able to help them out. The week before they said they’d come up the trail from the other way, with two other younger men, and it had taken them all day to cut out the trail with a chainsaw.
That night we were one of the only two campers left in the Sandy Lake campground. A couple of large boats were out on the lake, but when they left it became very quiet. I looked out our window of the trailer just before dusk, and there was a fox in our campground. I pointed at it and told Enid, and when I did that it ran away and up the road.
Monday, June 2, was our last day. We biked up the old highway, and just past the campground saw a fox. I think I found where it’s den is up in the bank just off the road. Once we got back from biking we packed up the trailer, ate our lunch and came into town for the afternoon.