You might have noticed that, instead of veering east at the bottom of Smoke Lake, I'm going the other way and doing a three-portage route into Parkside Bay. Now, in light of the fact that unless I find a way to really go gear light this trip I'm looking at double or even triple carries across these portages...and that'll epically suck....so, I know you're asking why do three portages instead of the one into Ragged Lake and then just paddle around and back up...
The thing is, though...I have no idea how long it'll take from the put-in at the top of Smoke Lake down to either the portage into Ragged Lake or the series going directly into Parkside Bay...Could be 2 hours, could be 4...and depending on when I get there, That could make it early to late afternoon and then do I REALLY want another 1-2 hours going the long way around through Ragged into Parkside???
Two factors, then:
1) possibly getting there near dinner and then having to set up quickly.
2) the sites being filled up and having to settle for something less than good...
The real factor, I think is going to be how efficiently can I pack???
If I can do double carries, then the 3-portage route makes wayyyy more sense; it's faster and far more direct...If I am doing 3 carries (or more, let's be honest, last year was not a banner year for gear efficiency...) I'm doing ONE carry and paddling the long way around....
Friday, April 10, 2009
Well, this is the route I'm currently planning to be day 1 of the three day solo run from Smoke Lake Access down into Parkside bay, then down into Big Porcupine to camp, then exploring up into Bonnechere for the rest of the day....
I love this map, which was put together by a guy named Jeff McMurtrie.
Really an outstanding job of combining a topo map with an informational brochure format...truly a work of art and love and a great resource to use...his map is truly awesome. He's pretty much married to APP and does at least one 30 day trip a year. All the history and information he's able to stuff into that map, including parks that border APP is really sweet.
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