Alex and I went camping in Algonquin Park in July 2025
I woke up around 7:30 needing a pee. It was colder out today than it was yesterday. I found the toque I alex had on yesterday and went out and relieved myself. There was a light breeze and the sky was clear, and it was cold… less than 15 and probably closer to 12 or 13. I retrieved the food barrel from the tree we had stashed it in and made a coffee. The container that I stored it in had about a days left. It will have had lasted 7 days by the time it’s used up. No idea on what to make for breakfast but Alex has the choice between pancakes or oatmeal. We have more than enough food to last us several more days! The loons are back, and calling on the still and quiet lake. A squirrel has been visiting our campsite and was eating an Alex 'dirt' pancake from yesterday that I had missed when cleaning up. Have to be more mindful of that in the future. Alex swore he heard another night time visitor the previous night as we were in the tent but the squirrel is the only one I have witness on site so far. There is a developing frog on shore with a tadpole tail still though.
Today we will go out and explore the lake on the water. There is Carcajou bay and some pictographs amd Carcajou falls. There is also the Tombolo further up the lake beyond achray. I would like to definitely explore the lake more next time, we were completely wind bound because of the weather yesterday. Not sure when we will be back, but sometime this fall in september would be nice. Grand lake and Achray in particular is a nice jumping off point due to the many directions one can take. At grand lake you can head north and meet up with the Petawawa at lake Travers, west via Carcajou Bay, south and the barron river or east via a portage into Berm and Johnston lakes. I skipped put on the portaging this trip due to the heat of the previous few days. In retrospect the extra movement would have kept us warm.
The battery pack I am using to keep my phone charged is now down to 30%. Its from the heated chair I got for Erin last year. I have an emergency radio that also functions as a power bank. I will need it for tonight. But with my phone in airplane mode I find it will last the whole day so even if it is dead tomorrow, we will be leaving anyways. I have just turned on the Spot device and will update Erin and Zoe this morning. It is over kill for this trip but they like the updates. Maybe next year I will get the more advanced one that allows for 2 way communication. There is not anything else we need (accept for a pillow for Alex). The small family next door has been up since I have been up. They are making lots of young family sounds, puttering about and the little boy making higher pitched exclamations. Even so close you can not really hear them that much and you have to really look closely to see their setup. I like having another group beside us, as I tell Alex 'You only have to be faster than the slowest person'- Haha. We will have a campfire tonight. I hope there is a little bit of a breeze to keep the bugs down when we do. The fire pit is a massive affair that is a wall of stones 2 or more feet high to block the prevailing wind off the lake. I have collected enough wood for one night and I’ve kept it dry enough from the storm yesterday. At 9 I used the thunder box in site #2 (Hah!) As I didn’t want to wander next door and I couldn’t located the one in 3 (I did on the way bay). I also collected a marine rope that was tied between trees on 2 and grabbed a couple if burnt split wood pieces from the fire pit of 3, both were unoccupied. I’m now making another coffee. Alex woke up briefly as I grabbed the TeePee he had sequestered away into the tent for his runny nose.
Site 2 has a thunder box where the lid closes on you are you sit on it, actually more like slams yiu in the back. The site is nice though, no sandy beach though. In campsite 3 there is a bit of open space where the sun comes through and overall the site is ok. The fire pit is right at the shoreline. I think it’s pretty rocky to land a boat there the same for site 2. I suspect 1 is similar. I will try and look for it later on today. All the campsites are linked together via a shoreline trail. I suspect that it may continue to the huge beach south of achray that nobody uses. The eastern pines trail is accessible from that beach, so you could hike out to these locations. I also want to see if te old rail line is accessible from one of these sites (maybe 1). It would be nice to fish from the old train bridge into the river connecting Grand and Stratton.
I heard an outboard startup in one of the sites west or here (5 or 6), perhaps they are the ones with the powered square backed canoe I saw ferrying people and canoes yesterday. It sputtered off somewhere and slowly faded into the distance. The waves are picking up and there is a bit of a breeze now.less of a chill in the air as it approaches 9:30. I should wake alex, but I will let him sleep in longer, we were up until 11 last night and I’m enjoying the solitude. Hopefully the water is quiet enough for us to at least explore Carcajou Bay today and see the falls. I’d like to checkout more campsites too for later trips.i don’t mind parking my butt close to the access point, I still feel like I’m further away as you do not see or here the Achray campground even though it is a busy location with close to 40 Car camping tent sites. Alex laughed when I was reading him the contents of this trip log to him yesterday while we sat on the beach in the evening, “send it too me, I will be asked to write an essay on what I did this summer and you are already at a word count that would take me a week to reach. I am paraphrasing but that is what he was indicating. For someone without any obligations this summer he has still done a few things, like biking out to Parliament hill solo, going out on Canada Day downtown. He, Zoe and Erin will be off to Newfoundland later this summer as well, along with a stint of volunteering with the city if his paperwork goes through. Alex if you are reading this, I’ve reminded you of things you have done. We have just about finished the Audiobook. I had bought another one when we stopped at McDonalds on the way up and I thought I had downloaded it there but it seems like it had only queued up. I have a couple others downloaded we can listen too. We really enjoyed the Band of Brothers book as it added on more to the miniseries. The miniseries did not stray too far from the book. Last time we camped (in June, here in Achray) we listened to The Disaster Artist by Greg Sestero, on the making of The Room, a “worst movie of all time" that was the pet project of an eccentric businessman Tommy Wiseau. Alex really enjoyed listening to that too. It is a funny book. We ended up watching The Room shortly thereafter.
It is now 10am and I am on to my 3rd coffee but now it is from the bottle of instant coffee from the “Sunrise Coffee" company. A bottle I bought out of necessity when zoe and I were at Murphys Po8nt back in June. It’s ok. I’m using up about 1 vanilla protein shake a day for my coffees. The same with the four liter water bottles which are about 1 per day. I imagine it would be more if we were on a canoe trip with with paddling and portaging. I havent used the Playtipus water filter yet. The outboard has started up again and is buzzing somewhere to the west of us.
I woke alex up a little while later, made him pancakes while listening to Band of Br0thers. After finishing breakfast we loaded up the canoe with a water bottles and some day trip gear and headed out to explore Carcajou Bay. The wind was up but not too bad and kept the bugs at bay to a certain extent. Carcajou Bay was more protected and went paddled as far as the first bend . Alex expressed interest in heading back and I didn’t dissuade him as I had noticed the canoe had developed a leak in what looked to be previous damage. I’ll duck tape it over for our trip back to Achray, glad I wasn’t on a big trip with it. I’ll make sure to check out any boat we rent more fully next time. It looks like it is from flexing more than anything else and had a similar issue on the opposite side of the boat. We are beck now, its 1:15 pm and we are sitting on the beach listening to the audiobook. Lunch will be next. Lunch is biscuits, a Happy Yak Beef Stew and coffee for me. I made the biscuits first, let the beef stew rehydrate, made coffee and reheated the beef stew. Once heated it sat for 15 mins. Listened to a motor droning on the lake, sounded like another float plane, wind is picking up again more strongly. Waiting for the boat to dry and I will add duct tape to the weak section.
The stew was ok, alex is in the water and boats are motoring close to shore. The wind is up but the waves are not. Its 3pm. Alex is cooling off in the water, made two underwater hand stands and just cleared water from his nose. 5pm and after a short lie down, we are having a campfire. It is so bright out feels like it is only 2 or 3pm. The wood logs that were wet yesterday, remains of a previous fire is now dry enough and is burning well. The fire is in the “Swedish log" style. We are just holding fast as the day continues, and we both know that tomorrow we get up early and head out.
It is now 7pm, only feels like early afternoon as it is so bright out. We are in the bug shelter, just finished a game of 1812, very similar outcome to the last game except I’m american and alex is British. He has Albany and I had Montreal. Alex finished the last of the potato chips and is now snacking on the beef jerky. I should start on dinner soon, but I’ll wait until alex is hungry. Another 2 hours before it starts getting dark. Low wind and waves right now.
Quarter to 8 and very still, I am making Happy Yak Pad Thai. Alex is building a lego set I brought out to surprise him. After dinner we went for a swim as the sun set. We sat out in the water watching the colours turn from orange to pink to purple as the sun disappeared behind the hill on the other side of the lake. This is the same hill that backdrops Tom Thompsons, Jack Pine. It was getting cooler so we left the lake got changed and piled wood on the fire and sat around it in the twilight of evening (9:30). I tried picking up an A.M. station on the radio but gave up after everything I found eventually faded in and out and away. We restarted Band of Brothers earlier after finishing it, and so put it back on and listened to it around the fire while slapping mosquitoes brave enough to risk the heat from the fire. We decided we want to come back again in the fall when the bugs are gone. Same location. Maybe end of September. We cleaned up the area, put up with the mosquitos at the fire until 10pm then called it a night. I brought Alex's book into the tent for him as I came to bed, a spider had hitched a ride in it. Tomorrow comes early and we have to pack up.
