Two Rivers and a Big Lake (plus others)
by bapabear
There is a very interesting portage between Juno and Vern Lakes. You start climbing straight up to where you can see out over a rough area that contains a large beaver lodge and the Hoover Dam of beaver dams. When I thought the portage was about to end it continued on to get us clear of the beaver dam. An interesting place.
About 11:30 we laid claim to the second site down on Vern Lake. It’s right across from the entrance to Vern River and about a hundred yards from the portage into Whack Lake. We set up camp and had lunch as the wind continued to pick up. We couldn’t get the last portage out of our mind so we made plans to travel back up the lake to explore some more.
We headed back up Vern Lake dealing with the wind around 1:30. Just as we got there we were startled by a huge clap of thunder and a sudden pouring rain. There were dark clouds in the area but they didn’t alarm us until now. A video of me would have been hilarious as I’m grabbing rain gear from the pack, hopping on one foot after another pulling up pants, and zipping and buttoning to stay dry only to have, on the final zip, the rain stop on a dime and the sun pop out. Terry had forgotten his rain gear and was going to “ride it out” while I was going to be high and dry. By the time I got everything off and dried and back in the pack I had worked up more sweat than he had gotten wet in the whole deal.
On the way back to camp we fought some stronger wind but made a few stops to pick up some really decent firewood from all the downed and dead stuff there was.
We were able to sit on our camp stools and observe a susnset worthy of a few pictures before hitting the sack.