Sunday, June 23, 2013

We are up at 6:00 am and the day is overcast and damp. We move all our gear down to the dock on Round Lake, move the car back to the visitors parking lot and get ready for breakfast. The waffles, strawberries and whipped cream are amazing. We talk to a couple of other groups that are heading out this morning as well, but we are the only team starting from Round Lake and entering through Missing Link. Our ride for the next few days is a 17' Wenonah Escape. Compared to the USS Wisconsin, this is a Cadillac. Plenty of room, light weight and stable. Isaac has been in a canoe a lot, but this will be the first extended tour of duty for him and Andy from Tuscarora thought this should be a good fit for us. I will admit as we are loading the canoe and getting ready to get underway, that I am a bit nervous. Like I stated before, when you are young, bulletproof and invincible, you usually don't have a lot of fears. I am older now, have lived through many things and learned that fear is not always a bad thing, especially when I have another, younger person to watch out for. We are prepared. We camp a lot. We are involved in Scouting. Both of us are first aid trained and CPR certified. I can read a map well and Isaac is pretty fair. We will be running two sets of maps on this adventure, one with him (he is going to be the navigator) and I will either confirm or reject his suggestions about where we are and which way we should be heading. It is just after 9:00 when we board the boat and away we go. Round Lake is still and silent as we head off on a Southwesterly course looking for the portage to Missing Link. As we are approaching the portage, another group of guys is coming out from Missing Link. This is their last day of a week long trip, and they have already done the long, tough Tuscarora portage earlier this morning. The landing on the Round Lake side was a bit rocky. The 143 rod portage in general was very beautiful. Isaac loaded up his pack, grabbed the fishing poles and away he went. I decided to just take the canoe to start with and then come back for our food pack, paddles and other small items. As I said, the portage was pretty nice. It rises about a 100' in elevation over the 1st half, had some twists and turns, and then was downhill past an old beaver pond on our way to Missing Link. It was a bit slippery in some places, but overall not bad. When we arrived on that end, I stored all our gear off to the side and left Isaac to do some fishing while I made my way back for the rest of the gear. I made the round trip in about 30 minutes. The put in on Missing Link is pretty good with not a lot of hazards. We loaded up and Isaac kept us along the North shore as we made our way to portage going to Snipe Lake. The takeout was a bit rocky. The portage is interesting. About 15-20 rods in you come to a 6' drop off into a trench. I set the canoe down, jumped into the trench, picked up the canoe and placed it on the other side of the trench and scaled the small 5 to 6' wall there. Isaac had a bit more difficultly as he is under 5' tall and had a pretty heavy pack on. With some assistance, we got him down, across and up again to continue on our way. The portage was gently rolling and then downhill into Snipe. The Snipe side was a bit rocky as well. We headed Southeast on Snipe and looked around for various campsites to see what they looked like, made it through the narrows and then headed East towards the portage into Cross Bay. It started raining while we were heading through the narrows, but we decided to skip the rain gear and just paddled along silently listening to the rain hitting the still waters of Snipe Lake. It is amazing how much we miss in our ordinary life because we either have so much going on and don't stop to enjoy it or listen to the sounds. My fears of going back into the wilderness were receding and I was beginning to really enjoy this trip, even though I was wet and the bugs were pretty thick. The take out on Snipe kind of sucks. Very rocky and difficult to get out of the canoe. The trail is pretty short into Cross Bay (47 rods), but it was a bit uphill in slick mud to start. It follows a bit of a crick (there is a difference between a crick and a creek) coming out of Cross Bay. The put in on Cross Bay was very gentle and easy. We were originally hoping that the campsite on the Southeast end of Cross Bay would be open, but it wasn't, so we continued on to the Rib Lake portage. The portage is about 58 rods long, uphill to begin with, very wide and well maintained. It follows the river coming out of Rib Lake and the music from waterfalls at the South end of Cross Bay can be heard along a good portion of the portage. The put in on Rib is difficult because of the amount of rocks. We found it best to walk through some thick marsh grass to the South of the portage and load the canoe up from there. Rib Lake has some pretty cool rock structures on the North end. The lake itself is long, fairly narrow and not very deep for most of it. The rain had stopped awhile back and the clouds seemed to be wanting to burn off. We had no trouble finding the only campsite on Rib (560), and pulled over to the sand beach. There is a rather steep climb up to the camp site from the lake. We toured the site, found some messes from the previous occupants that we cleaned up and decided we would call it home for the next two days. We ate a quick meal of trail mix and then set up camp. We went fishing after all was in order. Isaac hooked a pretty decent sized Northern Pike along the West shore and he ended up breaking his rod!!!!! I usually never, ever purchase a warranty agreement on things, but luckily for him, we had one and Gander Mountain would replace this once we got back home. (Note to self, on future trips, bring an extra rod in case one breaks). Well, I guess I was done fishing for the trip. I would just be the mode of transportation while he fished!!!!!! He caught several small perch as well and then we decided to head back to camp and make supper. After supper (Mountain House Beef Stew)we paddled down to the portage between Rib Lake and Lower George Lake. There must be an old dock or pier in Rib that was used in the past and the remains are very visable as you approach the portage. We left the canoe on the landing and walked over to check out Lower George Lake. We kind of just hung out and laid around on the rocks for over an hour while enjoying the smells of the woods and listening to the sounds of water lapping at the shores and the wind blowing through the trees. Once we headed back to camp, we looked at the maps and I let Isaac choose the route for tomorrows day trip. We built a small fire and sat around talking for awhile. Once the fire was out, it was off to bed. I found it interesting how bright out it was. At 10:30 at night, I could actually read in the tent without my lamp. I am not sure if it was a combination of being much farther North than where we live in Central Wisconsin, being so close to the actual date of the summer solstice, or just because my eyes adjusted so well without having artificial light. The only people we have seen all day are the initial four guys coming out of Mising Link and one canoe with two people that was Southbound on Rib Lake while we were making supper.

Round Lake, Missing Link Lake, Snipe Lake, Cross Bay Lake, Rib Lake, Lower George Lake

Lakes Traveled:   Round Lake, Missing Link Lake, Snipe Lake, Cross Bay Lake, Rib Lake, Lower George Lake,