Isabella River to Bald Eagle Lake, 11.0 miles, 6 portages, 448 rods.

The weather radio forecast had predicted a period of “unstable” weather starting today and continuing well into the next week with a 50% chance of showers or thunderstorms for today. I woke up to cloudy and dark skies, and hoped the rain would hold off, and was on the water by 7:00am.

I quickly came to the 130 rod portage, and it was not all that bad. There was good boardwalk crossing over a wet, boggy area, and there was actually a bridge across a small ravine. I felt good having not pushed too hard the day before, and the portage went by pretty easily.

I passed the entrance to Rice Lake and entered what my map showed to be a very swampy section of river. The river was very easy to paddle here (not a lot of weeds or anything), but it did really feel like being in a huge swamp because there just didn’t seem to be any shore anywhere.

Met a Forest Service crew doing some work on one of the short portages, which looked in good shape. In general, the portages on this side of Isabella were in better condition than on the east side. I also found that I was able to dodge two of the short portaged by running the rapids. I would not have expected this in low water, but it was quite easy.

As I turned around one corner of the river I encountered a pair of Trumpeter Swans with two cygnets, all four of which started swimming downriver the way I was going. The river was just about 20-25 yards wide here and I tried to get around them on the opposite side, but they just kept going. Finally one adult turned with the two cygnets, and one adult continued on course making a lot of noise in front of me. I tried to give him every chance to turn by squeezing up next to the edge of the weeds, but he (?) was clearly intent on leading me away. About 100 yards on he (?) dipped his neck and started flapping his wings in the water in a false effort to take off. These are big birds which huge wings, and this was suddenly almost too much action for Rainy to handle. She stood up excited (a violation of boat rules) and I quickly yelled at her and tapped her on the back with my paddle to get her seated again. The swan did not take off, just splashed a lot to make sure we would follow. He would do this 2 more times in the next quarter mile, then finally just turned and swam back toward his family.

I exited the burn once again, and after a short paddle did the last portage of the day of 190 rods into Bald Eagle Lake. I have to say, the length aside, the portages were in better shape the river faster paddling west of Isabella compared to the eastern upstream parts.

The first campsite on the right was open. That southern end of Bald Eagle is still sort of “river-y” and I contemplated heading on looking for another site, but could see heads above the reads heading my way so landed and started unpacking. The site was ok, bigger and more open than I had had for two nights, and more heavily used. With all the swamp around there, it would also be overrun by mosquitos in the morning once again, but I would be off the rivers for a while so hoped that would not continue.

With the tent, tarp, and bug shelters up, I set about my standard nightly ritual; feed Rainy, slice some Soprassata sausage and smoked cheddar, pour a splash of bourbon, and wait for my home dehydrated meal to come back to life – then go to bed with the sun still up. The rain held off.

Boardwalk on the 130 Portage

Isabella River Near Rice Lake

Post-Rapids

Trumpeter Swan