Sunday, July 02,2023

DAY 5 July 2,2023 Sarah to Lost Bay Campsite YF   Paddle: 2 miles P1,2,3:Sarah to Side: River route w/15,20 &10R portages, about ½ mile total with paddles between them   Paddle 0.75 miles   P4:94 R Side to No Name, Paddle 0.3 miles   P5:50 R No Name to No Name, Paddle 0.3 miles   P6: 26 R No Name to Isabella, Paddle 1.7 miles   P7: 110 R Isabella to Unnamed, Paddle 0.4 miles   P8: 76 R Unnamed to Isabella outlet Paddle: 0.5 miles P9: 15 R, Paddle 1 mile (+ 1 beaver dam) to campsite on Lost Bay Total: 10.9 miles

BF sausage cheese taquitos picante sauce. L fried corn tortillas w cheese. D Mountain House Pad Thai w FD Broccoli and fresh small bell pepper

We decided to have a substantial meal because we knew how far we had to go. We scraped the dishes with the scraper and wiped them with our napkins but put off washing them by stowing them in a used zip lock bag for later. We’re learning. We put lunch stuff in smaller Blue guide pack, packed up camp and got on the water at 9:30am.

We paddled the 2 miles back to 1st portage and started up the trail. We had decided to do the overland 115R portage since we weren't sure what the river portages were like. We started down the trail and in about 20R the trail ended at the creek and we figured out we were on the creek trail. Oh well, we weren't going backwards. It turned out to be a better choice. I hadn't been looking forward to that long uphill. The creek ended up being much faster and easier and we didn't have such a long hike to get all our stuff to the same place. It might have been a problem if the water levels were much lower since there was a section where we were poling across a shallow moose mucky looking area with the canoe barely floating. I'm glad we didn't have to get out in that section.

We got to the next portage, and Dan took off with the canoe and small pack. I got up the steep hill to where the 2 trails meet. I should have remembered it from 2 days ago, but I got worried I would end up in the wrong place. I dropped my pack and went back to the landing to check the map in a pack there and figured I could get all the packs up the hill since I had lost some time. I put the shoulder straps of Dan’s pack on and realized I couldn’t stand up with it even with my hiking sticks. I fell over and after extricating myself from under the pack, I tried to pick mine up and realized my legs were too fatigued, so I carried it over to a big rock and put it on top, got it on and got going. I passed Dan before I passed my dropped pack and he reinforced that I should take the left trail as we had already discussed earlier. He was a little irritated at my lack of progress. The Fisher and McKenzie maps both show the three trails as completely separate. I had a printout of the portages from another site that does show our trail ending when it hits the other trail.

We worked our way through the other portages to Isabella Lake and stopped at the campsite we were on before and cooked Cheese corn tortillas with Picante sauce so we could take a little break on the way out. We filtered some water also since we had cut back to only one Nalgene full apiece to cut some weight.

We had decided to take the 2 land portages out of Isabella this time. When we got to the 1st portage out of Isabella, we had a hard time finding it. The map shows it going along the creek, but usually the trail doesn’t go right next to the creek. There was a faint trail that looked like a game trail through waist high grasses, so we took some of the hand carry items to scout it out. After about 30 R it went into a forested area and looked more like a real trail. Dan kept going and I went back for the pack I had left close to the landing. The trail emerges from the trees into some taller broad leafed bushes overhanging the trail at the other end making for a fun time getting the canoe and us through.

15 rod Portage trail around beaver pond I guess the 2nd trail wasn’t too bad, since I don’t remember much about it. We got back to the Isabella creek inlet and started down it. The 15 rod portage is interesting. It goes around a small pond formed by a beaver dam, then through shoulder high bushes mostly hiding a very rocky trail. We got our gear over to the other side, and then paddled, lined and carried the canoe over to the landing. It’s a beautiful little stream and pond through here. I was a little too tired to appreciate it much. We kept going The creek is a bit shallow, twisty and channelized at points, so we weren’t able to paddle as fast as normal. We got to a final beaver dam just as the sun was setting and found a spot on the beaver dam that had a fair amount of water flowing over it. We were able to remove some sticks to get through without unloading. It’s easier going downstream, too. Another mad beaver. We saw a group camped on the site at the entrance to the inlet. Only the 2nd people we’d seen since we’d been here before.

We finally got to our intended campsite on Lost Bay at about 9pm at last light. It was empty, fortunately. We could never have expected something like that in BWCA. There were a lot of potential campsites about ½ mile back, and 1 unlisted one across from this site, but we were really glad not to have to go somewhere else in the dark.

We got all our gear up to the fire pit area. Found a place for the latrine with the little light left, popped up the tent, and got water filtering. Dan worked on bear ropes while I boiled water for dinner. We had brought a Mountain House Pad Thai meal just for this type of occasion. We had extra noodles since we had decided it was a little short on noodles, but I didn’t feel like doing anything extra. I added hot water to some FD broccoli and the Pad Thai and mixed them together with a sliced mini bell pepper. We put it in bowls and had dinner. It is one of the few premade freeze dried dinners a can say I really like. It’s not spicy at all, but I’ve found I don’t really like heavily spiced food on the trail. I had found the Gatorade we couldn’t find before and we mixed some up also. I think we needed it.