DAY FOUR

July 5th, Thursday

A campsite on an island on the Maligne River near Kahshahpiwi Creek

GPS Location: N 48 degrees 26.843’, W 091 degrees 19.736, Elevation 1308’

Lakes Traveled: Kenny Lake, Kawnipi Lake and the Maligne River

Total time: 6:30 hours

Total miles: 17

Not sure if I heard a noise or not, but about one minute after I woke up at 0438 hours I heard what sounded like the roar of Kennebas Falls getting louder and louder and coming my way. What I heard was the sound of the wind, then the sound of the rain drops striking my tent. The wind sounds so eerie when it comes forward like that. Especially laying in a tent and hoping you made sure no dead branches were above the tent.

After the big gust of wind I tried going back to sleep, but I couldn’t. The wind seemed to stop, but about a half hour later, I heard the wind pick up again. The sky was dark except for some red and orange to the west when I peeked out of the tent.

I got up finally around 0526 hours and began my lower back exercises. Once out of the tent I checked to see how my epoxy had set up over night and it seemed that it was still fairly wet. There was just another drop or two of hardener in the bottle so I smeared what was left of it on the patch on the bottom of the canoe and the paddle. It looked like most of the epoxy did set. I began my morning routine again of breakfast, breaking down camp, packing and getting the canoe in the water all by 0738 hours.

It wouldn’t be long before I would have my only portage today around Kennebas Falls. It was a short 4 rod portage with a tricky put-in. Just before I got to the falls I saw an eagle fly to its nest and land. It stretched out its wings before settling down into the nest.

I paddled toward the northwest on Kawnipi Lake into a slight breeze. This area of Kawnipi was involved in the Bird Lake burn in 1995. There were several more eagles I saw circling over the area as well as over the lake itself. There was one eagle I attempted to get a photo of as it was perched high up in a snag, but it really was too far away to get a decent shot of it. I zoomed out as far as I could while holding the camera by hand so I’m not even sure if the photo will turn out.

Lately, the wind has been slowly building up during the day and I was hoping I would be able to get through most of this large lake before the wind really started to blow.

Off in the distance I saw three canoes about two miles into Kawnipi Lake and shortly after that I saw another group of six people with two canoes. They were coming through a narrow cut when I saw them, but they moved away prior to me getting to close. I wasn’t close enough to talk to either of these groups.

My next stop was going to be the pictographs when I paddled near a C-2 with a man and woman. I was close enough to talk to them. They told me they found one of the pictographs. The man told me that he didn’t find anything at site one, then he continued to say he found a moose pictograph down from it. I’m not sure what site he was talking about. There are two sites on this lake, but I don’t know site one from site two.

Michael Furtman’s, Magic on the Rocks, I have at home, but I don’t remember which site is which. The McKenzie map I have only shows the pictographs on the west side of Kawa Bay. The pictographs that are on the eastern side of Kawa Bay aren’t even marked on my map.

Once I got over to the general area where the pictographs are on the eastern side of the opening to Kawa Bay I begin to scan the rock face above the water for them. There it is, faint, but it’s there. The sun wasn’t in a favorable spot for photos, but I couldn’t wait around. It appeared to me there were three figures in a canoe. The furthest left figure was hard to see, but it’s there.

When I got home I checked my photos and there is something to the left of the other two figures in the canoe, albeit very faint. In the Pictographs of Quetico by the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources, say the pictograph is of two MAYMAYGWAYSHI in a canoe. In Furtman’s book, he says, “my photographs indicate a third identical figure to their left, although it is mostly hidden under a white mineral wash.” (page 75). I would have to concur with Furtman that there is a third figure in the canoe under the white mineral wash.

I took a few photos of this area.

Next I needed to paddle across the mouth of Kawa Bay to the terminus of the next piece of land to the west in search of the other pictographs, but I wasn’t able to find them. I just paddled along shore looking to see if anything popped out at me, but nothing did. After I got home I read that these were very hard to see, so I don’t feel bad about not spending any more time searching for them.

I continued paddling to the northwest along the northern shore of Kawnipi Lake for another mile or so before I jumped down to the southern shore before I wouldn’t be able to do it. The northwest wind was starting to blow up some fairly large waves when I got to the northwest of Murdoch Lake. Now I was beginning to get the full brunt of the wind at that point. I had to hug the southern shore as close as I could get. Eventually I made the turn to go southwest along the south of Rose Island. I decided to stop at the island campsite about in the middle, but to the south of Rose Island for lunch at 1115 hours.

There have been quite a few white puffy clouds building today and the temperature has been down right hot. Another observation is that the eastern section of Kawnipi Lake had been burned in 1995 and there is new growth and old snags every where. The western section wasn’t affected by the fire and there is old growth trees and definitely is the more scenic section of the large lake. In one sense, it’s a shame to see so many thousands of acres of the burned area and smaller new growth compared to seeing the towering old growth trees, but in the long run fire is very healthy for the forest. It’s just not as esthetically pleasing to the eye to see the younger growth, at least for me, but I know fire is beneficial. I think what I have a problem with is that this fire consumed so many tens of thousand of acres. Again, this fire burned between 5 to 8 percent of the park.

The sky to the southwest was very dark and to the north I could see blue skies with some of the larger puffy clouds. I rounded the southwestern part of Rose Island and started paddling north. There are very high cliffs to my left, so I wasn’t being affected by the wind now.

Without the wind I was really being affected by the heat. I normally just paddle in a t-shirt made of Cool-max or a similar material. The last couple days I’ve been applying my sun screen twice a day and today was no different, but today I could just feel my skin baking under the hot sun. My skin was turning very red from the sun beating down on me. Last winter, I bought a long sleeve sun block shirt in the Florida Keys. I bought it on my way home so I never wore it before, but I brought it along on this trip.

Since I had this shirt out I put it on and continued to paddle for a while. The shirt began causing me to over heat even more, because the shirt simply doesn’t breathe. I took it off and just kept taking my t-shirt off, dunking it in the water and putting it back on. I also took my bandana, got it wet and wrapped it around the back of my neck. I also kept drinking water all day long. It seemed this shirt would be better used as a windbreaker.

Looking at my map I figured that I could make either one of the two campsites that are approximately a mile from the Kahshahpiwi Creek around 1400 to 1415 hours. Once I got there I would call it a day.

Not too bad of a calculation I made it to the first campsite at 1418 hours. Pulling the canoe out of the water the best I could while it was still loaded with gear I walked up to the top of this island campsite to check it out. The campsite would work. My only problem is that this is the earliest I recall ever stopping on a canoe trip because I decided to stop on my own, not because of weather.

Once I stopped and got out of the sun I would reassess the situation. I got my maps out and the next campsite besides the one that’s close to this one was over three portages away. I’ve been across one of these portages 10 years ago, so I know something about the first one. The other two portages would be mysteries and there isn’t any distances marked on my map as to the length of them.

I’ve been surprised too many times in the past and I’m too hot to continue, so I grabbed my gear out of my canoe and officially called it a day. I set up my tent right away and did some other stuff around the site. I took off my boots and long pants. I decided to go lie down, rest my back, get out of the sun and maybe start writing in my journal. Only in my tent a minute or two, I thought I heard a voice. I hadn’t seen anyone since earlier in the morning. The wind was blowing, so I listened again. I’m still hearing something.

I got out of my tent and walked over to the edge of my campsite and looked down to the river. Who do I see? The Boy Scouts from Texas who I saw several times on day one and two. I hear several of them say, you again! I was only in my underwear so I went over near my tent and grabbed my long pants and put them on as I talked to them.

They told me that they camped last night after the portage around Koko Falls. They said they were going to camp tonight at the next campsite down from me that’s about 1/4 to 1/3 mile away. I can’t see the campsite from mine, but I told them that I might paddle down later. The younger girl said she was going to make some chocolate brownies later. I guess I have to go down there now. This group paddled by my island campsite at 1515 hours.

This campsite I’m on is on a small island and there are quite a few blueberries that I’ve been eating.

It’s now 1908 hours and I just got back from paddling down to the next campsite to see my new friends, but they weren’t there. The campsite looked overgrown and there probably wasn’t enough room for nine people to camp. If I would have known I would have offered my campsite, because it appears the next one in the direction where they are going is a several miles away. Hopefully, no one from this group got overheated.

I continued to paddle to the next portage that is about a mile away to see if the group was maybe camped anywhere around there. I didn’t see them, so I turned around and paddled back to my campsite. Come to think about it now, I probably would have heard some type of noise if they were at that campsite as it was only a short distance away, but I hadn’t heard anything.

I even put on a clean shirt for the occasion.

Looks like I paddled about 17 miles today not counting the extra two miles looking for that chocolate brownie.

Occasionally, as I sit here and write in my journal a drop of rain will fall from the only black cloud in the sky above me. I think I hear thunder in the distance. The wind has since stopped blowing and it’s hot and humid, again.

My friend’s, I call them my friends even though we don’t know anything about each other, anyways the teenage girl said they were going to paddle from Kahshahpiwi Lake via Trant Lake to Agnes Lake. She continued to say that they were going to do a night paddle down Agnes. I assume they were going to do an evening paddle once the winds lie down and not paddle when it was actually dark out. Maybe I’m wrong about that, maybe there’s a merit badge for “night canoeing”.

I sure am feeling the heat on my face from all the sun today.

I looked at my maps, again. I figure it’s about 12 miles to one of the campsites in the Sturgeon Narrows. I’ll have to see how the portages go for me to see if I can make it that far tomorrow. I would like to get an early start across Sturgeon Lake the next morning or I’ll be doing some evening paddling myself.

It’s time to stop writing now and put my maps away. It’s very peaceful out tonight. There are a few birds singing. I’m going to will try to get some photos of the sky as there is some pink in the sky now. Time is now 2048 hours.