Nippising River Route        7 Days in Early August

Canoe Lake Loop via the Nippissing River    Jenn and I

Moose at Top Thompson	Latour Creek	Highview Cabin	Nippissing RIver
Moose on Big Trout	Campsite Blowdown	Rescue Chopper	McIntosh in the Morning

 

Day 1 - Canoe Lake to McIntosh Lake

A short day, 9:30 to 4 pm, but we fought a strong headwind all day and stopped for a long time to watch a young bull moose between Littledoe and Tom Thompson Lake.  It seems like the beaver pond is always home to a moose, every time we come through here there is at least one!  The portage to Ink Lake was rough, but there are rest stops 1/3 and 2/3 of the way through where you can lean the canoe.  We are still wondering where Ink Lake gets that color from.

Day 2 - McIntosh Lake to Rosebary Lake

We encounter two moose today - and almost rammed the one!  The first was in the mashy area going from Timberwolf to Misty Lake (this area could be a problem in lower water) and the second was on the Tim River.  As we were slogging upstream on the Tim, we rounded a 180 degree corner and nearly ran into the moose that was standing midstream.  I'm not sure who was more startled, the moose ran / jumped up the bank and tried to hide about 10 feet away in the bushes and we tried not to yelp too loudly!  We also encountered a few beavers on the river, one of which actually growls at us when we tried to get by.  We met several groups coming down the river (smarter than us?) and we were the first people they had seen going up the river.

Day 3 - Rosebary Lake to Allen Rapids on the Nippissing River

Today we started with over 2km of grueling low maintenance portage to get into Latour Creek.  I've hear the one portage described as "a widow maker" from another canoeist.  Latour Creek should be renamed Latour Ditch - this creek was barely wide enough for the canoe and you can forget about paddling for the first 20 minutes - but at least we are finally going downstream!!!  After the odd liftover and 3 point turn in the sharp, narrow corners we start to paddle.  Soon we portage into the Nippissing River and it was a small meanering stream in a large bog at this point.  We had to portage / wade through all of the rapids (and left a fair amount of Portage Store paint behind on the rocks - so much for no trace canoeing!).  We met some rangers at the Highview cabin, and put into the river there as they said there were only 3 runnable swifts remaining in the long portage.  We had dinner at the dam before Allan rapids, this was a beautiful site and we should have stayed there  We saw yet another moose on the river in the evening, and were amazed at the number of brook trout that were taking the flies off the river.  We made camp just at dusk at the campsite on Allan Rapids, it was a crummy site on the portage trail. 

Day 4 - Nippissing River to Burntroot Lake

The river has been moving for a while now, a lot less of the bog stuff, it seems to hurry towards High Falls - which is spectacular.  There are two large drops and the river turns to run out a chute into a large boulder garden.  Next time we will stay at this campsite and take a picture!  The portage is impressive as a missed step would result in a tumble down a steep slope into the river.  After this the river slows down again and marshy areas are common, butit was here that a beaver almost jumped into our canoe when we startled him.  It was very nice to get to Burntroot lake and have a swim off of the rocks at our campsite.  It was also the first time we saw other trippers for over two days.

Day Five - Burntroot to White Trout Lake

Overnight a storm has whipped up and we have to battle headwinds and large whitecaps all day.  The waves are big enough that we put our lifejackets on - this is rare for us on a lake in mid summer!  We spot two more moose today as we move through a very nice area between Burntroot and Big Trout Lakes and the portages here are two rapids - both could be run at higher water levels (and there is a fair amount of paint on the rocks in the rapids).  There are some great cliffs on White Trout Lake, if you didn't mind bushwacking there might be some good climbs there.  We made camp on the east shore of the lake, and pitched the tent way back in the bush since the clouds looked a little funny.  Just as we finished dinner, one mother of a storm blew in.  There were huge gusts of wind and sheets of water - but the wind was moving in all different directions.  The storm passed quickly and shortly after we heard three repeated whistle blasts for help.  There was a group of 9 girls two sites south of us that had seven large trees blown down on their site.  It crushed two canoes, two tents, one elbow was broken, one ankle was broken or badly sprained and there was a bumped head.  And looking at the site in daylight the next day, they were lucky.  I went with two of the girls to the ranger station at the south end of White Trout Lake (we had seen the rangers fishing earlier that day) right away.  The two rangers grabbed lights, chainsaws and 1st aid stuff and towed our canoe back up to the site.  By this time it was pitch black, except for the lightening.  To top things off, with the waves on the lake we managed to sink our canoe!  The rangers cut out some of the gear and ferried the girls to their cabin in their boat.

Day Six - White Trout Lake to MacIntosh Lake

This morning some of the girls were airlifted out by air ambulance - and the others continued their trip after more canoes were flown in by float plane!  At least the weather has broken and the sun is out.  The wind is even with us today!  It is funny to see the roadsigns in Grassy Bay to tell us which way to go, and we head up the Petawawa River.  It is a nice paddle as the current isn't terrible and we start to think about the ultimate Algonquin Trip - to go from the West side of the park to the East side via the Petawawa River.  But the shuttle would break the bank...  We watch a family of otters playing / eating / swimming at our campsite tonight and watch the stars from the tent.

Day Seven - MacIntosh Lake to Canoe Lake via Potter Creek

The best part of this section is the solitude - everyone else heads up the Joe Lake system and we are alone near the busiest part of the park.  The portage out of MacIntosh into Straight Shore Lake is almost all uphill, but it is the worst one.  Some of the other portages are even along a gravel road around some small, rocky rapids.  We got out and headed for home at 3:30 - and later we heard that by 5 pm Hwy 60 out of the park was closed.  A tractor trailer crashed on the Smoke Creek Bridge and everyone was forced to go east out of the park.

190 km, 25.5 km of portage

6 moose, 3 beavers, 3 otters, 1 mink, hawks and herons galore and 2 smelly people

The Algonquin Canoe Routes Map is the only map you really need, but the topos are nice for finding out where the bogs and cliffs are going to be.

Click on the following to enlarge...