Got back Monday evening from a couple of nights on Parkside Bay. Happy to report that the pond between Ragged and Claude is now full and passable. Less happy to report that there are aggressive hornets stinging people on the 350 m portage to that pond from Ragged. I reported both things to the park via the contact form on the website on Monday night, and on Tuesday afternoon they replied by email and removed the low water advisory for that pond on the advisories map.
 
This was the big family trip I’d mentioned I was planning. The group consisted of my girlfriend, my most common tripping partner these days; my dad, who got me into canoe tripping as a child but hadn’t seen the inside of a tent these last 7 years or so; my brother, who doesn’t camp nearly as often as me but is just as good with a paddle; my older cousin, from overseas, who’d been on one canoe trip with my dad during another visit to Canada when she was a child and I was nowhere near born; and two of her kids, aged 18 and 11, for whom this was very much a first. Hence my choice of unambitious route. We rented two 16’ Kevlar ultralights and one 17’ three-seater from Algonquin Bound and had them delivered to Smoke.
 
We took the “direct route” to Ragged Lake on Saturday, ie the portage from Smoke. I knew it would be busy, with the main lake fully booked and Parkside Bay almost full, though it didn’t feel like a lot of canoe traffic on the route down. At some point while paddling down Smoke Lake, an OPP boat stopped by and made us show them our PFDs and bailer kits.
 
We ended up taking the first campsite that counts as part of Parkside Bay for permitting purposes, ie the southeastern most site on the north side of the channel between Crown Bay and Parkside (see map farther down). As we were passing it I saw a couple of people there getting into a canoe, but there were no tents set up, so I asked if they were camping there or leaving or what. They said they’d just stopped by for lunch, the site was free, and that it was nicer than the other one or two Parkside sites that were still available. So we just grabbed it. Turned out to be a pretty good site… it’s not one of those dramatic points that begs you to camp there, but it’s got a lot going for it. Spacious and reasonably level, with a small gravel beach for easy landing and a shoreline boulder for sitting on and swimming off… and most surprisingly, with no other campsite in sight, it was a lot more seclusion than I was expecting to find on an almost-full Parkside Bay. The only downside was that the shoreline bolder faced southeast, so it didn’t get sun in late afternoon.




 
The kids were champs. As soon as we got to the site they wanted to learn how to stern, and after a quick lesson from my brother, the 11-year-old went for a solo.

 (Actually, my gf also took her first shot at soloing that afternoon.)


The 11yo was also set on fishing, so I showed him how to use a rod and then along with my gf we paddled across the channel to a bay with lily pads and sunken timber. A few casts and snags in he had a feisty smallie on his line. He kind of got scared and tried to pass me his rod, but I refused, and coached him on fighting the fish until I had it in my net. The bass was about 14.5 inches and we all shared it during dinner. I’d created an addict.

 
I went for an early morning solo spin while everyone else slept in on the second day, tried lowering a spoon to trout depths in Parkside Bay proper but wasn’t really there for long enough to expect results. Just nice to be out in the morning mist.
 
Returning to the campsite my girlfriend had gotten up, and we took rods and paddled over to the spot where the bass was caught the evening before. But instead of bass there were hoards of perch plainly visible, following our tackle around, but mostly not biting the big plastics we had meant for bass. I caught and released a couple and we returned to camp. When everyone was finally up and ready we went for our big day trip, towards Big Porcupine Lake. I’d thought we might explore that lake but between our late start and modest pace, we ended up just walking the portage and having a picnic at the Big Porc end before returning.
 
I wanted the last day to take the Claude Lake route back to Smoke in order to make the whole trip a loop, but the staff at the permit office didn’t know the status of the pond with the low water advisory. So after returning from the Big Porc portage, my girlfriend and I paddled towards the pond and walked the portage just to see the other side. We found a nice reflecting pool that could obviously support a canoe.

 
Walking the portage back to Ragged Lake we both got stung by hornets. Then we fished a bit near the portage and the gf caught another bass, a little smaller than the one from the previous day.
 
It was raining when we woke up on Monday morning, cancelling plans for more early morning explorations or fishing. It stopped raining in time to break camp and have breakfast, which was convenient. On the portage to the pond my girlfriend and the 11-year-old got two hornet stings each and my dad got one. Taking up the rear I managed to avoid getting stung by bushwhacking around the nest. (I’ve had anaphylactic shock from a hornet sting before, so even though I’ve been immunized since then it always makes us nervous.) There was a man and his son travelling right behind us who knew about the hornets, and one of them got stung as well.

We crossed the pond with no water-level-related difficulty. The far shore had a lot of mud between the water and the solid ground but there was still a good spot to land one canoe at a time at the portage.
 
On the 275 m portage from the pond to Claude Lake, my cousin asked if it would be so bad if we made two trips, so I said we could try the 1.5 trip technique. But when everyone had loaded up for their first trip there was already nothing left behind, so I guess my whole family are single-carriers by nature. We stopped for lunch at the end of the 840 m portage to Smoke. The father and son travelling right behind us did this portage in two trips, completing their second one as we were packing up after lunch, and I took the opportunity to point out to my family that we’d had a leisurely picnic in the time it took for them to double back… and that’s my case for the single carry.

The full route and campsite location: