In September of 2023 some of us members from our canoe club went to Algonquin Provincial Park in Canada for a few days of paddling. 3 members, Coleen, Liz and Steve have a 6 bedroom house outside of Burks Falls, a very close access point to Algonquin Park. After that trip Steve told me he wanted to paddle from the south end of the park to the north end, around 70 miles. Throughout the course of winter and spring we made plans, found routes and started being serious about doing it. No one else in the club was up to such an ambitious adventure so Steve and I it was.
A little background, Steve is 61 years old and I just turned 65. No spring chickens are we but we knew we could do it because we wanted to. Fast forward to September 10th, 2024, 2 days before we leave Ohio for Canada and I get my wives cold. I really think it was a strain of covid because my muscles ached, eyes burned, chest and sinus missed up and just plain miserable. Steve, Coleen, Murphy (the dog) and I left at 12:30 pm on the 12th for the 9 hour drive to Burks Falls. They told me they didn't care about riding in the car with me sick and sneezing, blowing nose, etc. We got to the house at 10:30 pm, tried to see some northern lights then went to bed. The 13th was a kicker day, check packs and repack again for the 10000th time. I felt slightly better and was not backing out. Steve is just hoping he doesn't get sick halfway though the trip.
After breakfast in the morning we played tourist and drove around the area sight seeing in the hot, sunny, fall afternoon. Later we took naps (me 2 hours which I never do, damn cold). Around 8:30 pm I took a real, long, hot shower and crawled into bed.
At 4:30 am on Saturday September 14th I was up getting ready for "Steve & Tony's Great Adventure." We are calling it an adventure or journey but not a destination. We are not in any hurry. I felt better now and even ate some breakfast of ham, bacon, sausage and potatoes. At 6:28 am sharp we loaded in the car for the hour drive to entry point #5 on Canoe Lake. Coleen and Murphy were our shuttle drivers and without them the trip wouldn't have been possible. Thanks Coleen! Steve had been telling me all along that it's after Labor Day and the park would not be busy. When we pulled into the parking lot it looked like a huge used car lot. No people my ass. Coleen dropped us off with hopes of seeing us the next Saturday and we were on the water at 8:15 am.
DAY ONE:
There were 2 young ladies launching behind us and you could tell they were experienced and strong paddlers. After a 2.5 mile paddle we came to our 1st portage. 240 meters or 262 yards. The young ladies single portaged and were paddling out of site by time we finished our double portage. In fact we had to double portage every time with the canoe weighting 40-45 lbs, food bucket 29 lbs, my personal pack 31 lbs and Steve's personal pack had to be 45 lbs or more. We didn't weigh his. We were on Joe Lake now going to Little Joe for 1 mile. We were seeing lots of people now, somewhere around 14 canoes, half going with us, the other half the opposite direction. From Little Joe we paddled into Lost Joe, 3.1 miles total. From Lost Joe to Baby Joe there are 5 little portages. We saw people coming down the creek and they said it was passable. We had to line the canoe in a couple spots but it saved us a total of 710 meters (776 yd) of portaging. We were then on Burnt Island Lake. The big lake was very still, flat and nice to paddle. We went 4 miles then found a campsite for the evening. It was 12:51 pm and we were done for the day. Supper was the traditional steak and potatoes wonderfully cooked over an open fire. We are both doing our own meals separately, I with homemade dehydrated food with boiling water added and Steve is doing more cooking. The silence was golden, No human sounds. There were 2 loons in our bay and I love hearing the loons talk. We were in our separate tents by 8:36 pm because of darkness. I was on an incline and my sleeping bag kept sliding off my pad. Flat site next time!
DAY TWO:
I was up at 4:45 am, made a cup of tea and sat on a rock to watch it get daylight in the north woods. It was just so peaceful and quite. Even the now 3 loons out front didn't care I was there. Steve got up around 6:45 am and after breakfast we packed up camp and moved on. A 1.2 mile paddle brought us to the 1st portage of the day into Little Otterslide Lake. The 780 meter walk felt good and I think the exercise helped me get over my cold faster. I felt good. We portaged past 2 canoes going the opposite way, said hi's and kept going. The one canoe was a lady doing a solo trip with her dog. She said her boyfriend got sick so she decided to do it alone. Little Otterslide Lake is very pretty, small and quiet. There is a lily pad choked channel that leads into Otterslide Lake after only a mile of paddling. It's a bigger lake but we only saw the west side of that lake before portaging into the Otterslide Creek. 5 portages were on the creek before we reached Big Trout Lake. A 250m, 390m, 165m, 730m and an easy 100 meter. We are both doing great on the portaging.
Steve and I are 2 different types of paddlers. He is the bow man, me in the stern and Steve uses short, fast strokes while I try to let the canoe glide more between strokes. Ever once in a while I would have to ask Steve to slow down so I could keep up with him. Steve has no musical background which made our rhythms hard to sync so quite often I paddled 1 stroke to his 2.
We only saw 1 canoe, a guy and gal on Otterslide Creek until the end then saw 4 more leaving Big Trout. The creek was neat, very snake like curvy, tea stained color and narrow. Turning the loaded, 17 foot canoe was challenging in some of the tight turns. What a workout from paddling, portaging and the hot sun. The weather has been beautiful and the portages through the woods were cool and shaded. We got on Big Trout and paddled around 2 miles and took a tree covered campsite on a nice hill with a north and west view from some rocks. We are tired now with a total of 8 miles and way too much portaging. We got unloaded, got water using the squeeze Sawyer filter, then set up camp. It was 3:30 pm and a long day for us. We dried some gear and chased small squirrels out of camp, ate and relaxed. I took a quick dip in the water and man was it cold. We saw a flock of some type of ducks for the day but not much else in the way of wildlife.
DAY THREE:
It was another beautiful sunrise with temperatures in the mid 60's. The weather is more like August not mid September. We were up at 6:00 am and Steve is starting to get sick. Not good! We were going 10-12 miles to Burntroot Lake today. There are only 3 portages, a 300m, 40m and an 80m. Not too bad. The thing about the trees up here is they are pines with shallow roots. In the campsites I keep tripping on the roots and rocks in my plastic bomb shoes hurting my toes. It kept me cussing but it's a small price to pay for being in paradise. Steve keeps thinking we are behind schedule and I tell him "I'm not in a hurry, we are on a journey". We were on the water at 8:30 am for a 2.4 mile flat water paddle on big water to the 1st portage of the day. The 300m walk into Longer Lake was in dense, damp woods but it felt good. Longer Lake is boring and the north end has grass that slows the canoe. A little over 2.5 miles there was a 40m "pull over" but it was very rocky and hard to walk on. A small pond, then an 80m and it was rough with steep drop offs. The rapids were pretty and we are now in Redpine Bay. The trees in this area can be up to 350 years old but the banks are so dense with younger trees that we couldn't see bigger ones. A small breeze was blowing now which made keeping the canoe straight a little difficult. I'm lighter than Steve and the breeze moved the stern sideways. We rounded left in the channel from Redpine Bay into the full Burntroot Lake and the wind was getting stronger. We saw 2 guys paddle to a campsite, the 1st folks of the day. After 2.5 miles of paddling we stopped at the last island on the north end of the lake and made camp at 2:00 pm and by 3:30 the winds were so strong we were glad to be off the lake. Maybe the weather is changing. We only saw 1 other canoe paddle by camp heading the way we came from. We are in a pretty isolated spot now and yes Steve, there aren't many people around.
DAY FOUR:
I was up at 5:45 am just as the sky was turning gray. Steve was already up and sitting in his chair. Yes he had a chair and a cot! He is now officially very sick. Damn! We got on the water at 8:00 am and were at the 1st portage, a 150m into Perley Lake. It was basically a wide spot in the Petawawa River but wide enough to be named. The Perley is around 3 miles long then it was back as the river at Cedar Rapids. A 360m portage around and now it's the river with rocks, grass and lily pads. Next was a short 100m then a long 420m portage around snowshoe rapids, then a final 380m portage at Catfish Rapids and we were done with portages for the day. Poor Steve took lots of medicine and just kept plowing ahead. He is a trooper. At Catfish Rapids is a campsite and there was an old canoe laying there with its side split open. It was an older rib style canoe and it appears someone tried to run the rapids without success. There were also some old bottles stacked up like someone was searching old ruins for stuff. The rest of the river was around 3 miles long then we were in Catfish Lake. Steve had enough for the day as he's getting weaker now so we stopped at a campsite to eat lunch and rest. After a short nap he was good enough to continue. We took a route through a narrow gap northeast and found a nice island campsite for the night. Islands are great for campsites because you can see the sky better at night. We stopped at 2:20 pm in another hot, sunny, windless day. The weather had not changed from the clear sunny 80 degree days. We only passed 1 solo guy and saw a distance canoe when entering Catfish Lake. We paddled a total of 8 miles for the day and walked 2.7 miles on portages. The night before there wasn't any dew in the morning so I decided to not use my rain fly overnight and watch the almost full moon. It was nice but at 6:00 am there was more dew than any night yet. My sleeping bag was very damp. Steve and I did sit on some rocks and watch the moon rise until the ungodly hour of 8:34 pm. When we got into the tents, Steve was snoring immediately. Hope he feels better in the morning as it is a big day.
DAY FIVE: LONG PORTAGE DAY!!
We left our nice, little island at 8:20 am and thank goodness Steve feels better. From camp the 1st 100m portage was a mile away. That easy portage took us into Narrowbag Lake but still the Petawawa River. The sun was very bright and reflecting off the water which made seeing big rocks very hard. There are lots more rocks in this section. At the end of Narrowbag is a 170m portage but we missed it. The lakes sometimes look different in person then they do on the map. When we saw the rapids we knew we couldn't run them so we back tracked and found the portage. We walked to a small pond, paddled across and saw it. IT was the entrance to the grand daddy of the portages on this trip. A 1.8 mile one way walk with all the gear, canoe and food. Remember we have to double portage so I was going to leap frog, carry a pack halfway then go back for more. When I started walking I just kept going the whole way checking out the trail and the walk felt good. I made it, took a drink of water and went back. I found the canoe where Steve dropped it so I picked it up and finished that part. After checking the distance, Steve carried that 40-45 lb canoe 1.2 miles with me only having .6 of a mile with it. On my way back to get the food barrel I passed Steve with his pack and he was doing great. No flu, cold was going to keep him down. Lucky for us, the way we where traveling the big portage was mostly downhill. Back at the starting point I sat down and ate some lunch. I was feeling good and started back with the last load. We finished the portage in 2 hours and 45 minutes and I walked a total of 6 miles. We paddled on a small un-named pond then had a 290m portage around some waterfalls. Steve is tired now but we still had a short paddle then the last portage of the day, 690m. The falls were called Hollywood Falls and they were beautiful. By time I finished that portage, I also was tired but now we are on Cedar Lake, just across from the village of Brent. A 1.5 mile paddle and we were going up to the general store for Pepsi. Steve kept telling me about the store and when we walked to the back door a lady came out and said, what to do you want? There wasn't a general store there anymore. Steve was last up there 9 years ago and covid kind of killed the store. The same guy still runs a canoe rental out of the house and he gave us each a can of coke and we talked for 20 -30 minutes with him telling us how the government is raising the lease prices to try and run the locals out so they can sell the leases to rich folks. We then paddled a short distance up the shoreline to the little Brent campground which is entry point #27. We sat up camp for the night next to 2 RV's. For the first time this trip we didn't have to filter water. It came out of a spigot. There was supposed to be a partial Luna eclipse so I splurged and had a 2nd cup of tequila and lemonade while we sat on a boat dock watching darkness set in. From 7:45 to 9:45 we played music on our phones, talked and watched the sky. We never did see any eclipse. We were in bed a little after 10:00 but I stayed awake and kept glancing at the moon to no avail. This was the chilliest night of the trip and very damp with big fog greeting us in the morning.
DAY SIX:
When you take a big trip such as we did, you always plan a wind day in case it gets to windy to paddle. We had scheduled to stay on Cedar Lake for 2 days but since we had beautiful, sunny, windless days we decide to move on and maybe end the trip a day early. We slept in getting up at 7:45 am. Everything was wet from the fog so I made a cup of tea and went to sit on the boat docks. On the way I saw the entrance to the Limestone Cliff Trail. It is the only limestone in the park on that Canadian Shield Rock. I walked the short trail and had an unintelligent conversation with a chatty squirrel. After packing damp gear we hit the water for a 3 mile paddle from Cedar Lake to Little Cedar Lake. It was getting very hot in the cloudless sky. There is an old railroad bed that runs from Brent up and past Kiosh Lake from the old logging days. We crossed under the railroad bed in a concrete bridge built in 1921 then we were in tiny Aura Lee Lake. A short paddle and then a 275m portage and it was Laurel Lake. That 1st portage of the day brought out sore muscles from the day before but we quickly loosened up. Laurel was small but very pretty and the 130m portage into Cauchon Lake was the steepest portage of the whole trip. Thank goodness it was only 130m. Our hearts were beating fast by time we saw Little Cauchon Lake. It has a narrow tail before opening up into the lake body and Little Cauchon has more paddling then Cauchon. Go figure! We crossed another old railroad bridge, a wooden one this time and the railroad bed is now to our left. We talked about paddling into the next lake, Mink Lake and doing the 430m portage but it was almost 3:30 and that hot sun was draining us. We paddled 11 miles for the day in 5.5 hours so we found a campsite on a point of land that had good sun for drying our wet gear. I didn't feel real good and didn't have an appetite so I only ate potato soup for supper. We didn't have a campfire for the evening so bedtime was 8:05 pm. In the morning I realized that I didn't get up all night to pee which is very unusual for me then it hit me, I didn't feel good last night because I was dehydrated. I drank lots of water to restore the balance and was much better.
DAY SEVEN:
My tent was so bright that I put my socks and pants on, reached for my watch and saw it was only 3:25 am. It was the moon not the sun so I went back to sleep until 5:08 am. Steve is feeling much better now and we were on the water at 7:15 in a misty fog. It was eerie paddling in the stillness. We paddled an hour then took the 430m portage into Mink Lake. Mink is a 3 mile long, skinny lake and by now the sun had cleared the mist. We saw a beaver swimming and when it saw us we got the tail slap. That was the only animal we saw other than water fowl, birds and squirrels. It seemed like we paddled forever before we got to the Little Mink portage. It was next to the railroad bed, a 150m walk then less then a half mile paddle to a 640m portage into Kioshkokwi Lake, our last lake of the trip. Steve thought we could walk the railroad bed and save putting the gear in and out of the canoe so we each took a load and started walking. The 640m portage soon crossed the railroad bed and we took it to Kiosh. It was 1 mile so after our double portage we finished our last portage doing 3 miles. I lost the sole off my shoe and thankfully it was on the last portage not halfway in between. We are now 2.25 miles from the ending point at entry #29. We finished the paddle and went to the office where the lady told us we may get cell service at the end of the building next to a booster. My phone worked but Steve's didn't do so well. We got a hold of Coleen, who also got my cold and she picked us up 2 hours later with a cold beer and Pepsi. Steve & Tony's Great Adventure was officially over.
Conclusion:
The drive back to Ohio was uneventful except when I got home. All that clean fresh air in Canada was wonderful but when I got out of the car at my house all I smelled was soybean dust. The farmers were cutting the fields.
Steve's 2 gallon collapsible jug that I made fun of him for buying really came in handy for storing dirty water at camp before filtering it.
Steve is the loudest sneezer I've ever heard. He says his dad was louder.
I had too many meals with rice. Need more noodles and potatoes.
I was making fun of Steve for having what I called a T-Rex paddling technique. Both elbows bent and close to his chest as he paddles.
We paddled around 70 miles and my pedometer which tracked all my movement for every day reached 34 miles for the trip. That's portaging and milling around camp.
We left the park on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning it rained. Great timing.
View All Pictures From the Algonquin Trip
2 squirrels chasing video Flowing Stream video Hollywood Falls video Burntroot Lake video Unnamed Falls video Cedar Lake video