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5/27/2016 7:47 am  #1


Harness Lake May 21-23

So as I mentioned on a couple of other threads I spent the long weekend on Harness Lake, thought I'd share some pics and notes.

We stayed at the southern-most site on the lake, on a west-facing point full of hemlocks and some cedar. The campsite sign was missing, possibly the reason it was vacant, but I used my phone's GPS through Jeff's map on Avenza to confirm we were in the right place and not on a backpacking site. It was an alright site for our purposes but I wouldn't recommend it to a larger group as tent space was a little limited. If you camp there I suggest hiking to the top of the rocky escarpment behind the site to find a good supply of birch bark for the fire.

I wouldn't say the site was filthy, but there was some interesting junk left behind, including an old trolling rod (no reel), and a matching pair of kitchen knives stuck in the ground. One of the knives had a message on the handle kindly asking passers-by to leave it in place, so I didn't use them.

As this was a 2-night base camping trip, Sunday's itinerary was a hike north on the Highland trail to the waterfall at the outlet of Head Lake and back. One of the nearby backpacking campsites had become vacant that morning, so we landed our canoe at it and then carried the canoe along an informal trail down to an inconspicuous shoreline area outside the site in case anyone arrived to claim it (if they did we could have pushed the canoe through the swamp to launch from there). The site was very pretty and would be ideal for a group that wants no tree cover at all, such as on a weekend like this when the weather is sunny, the shade is still cold and the breeze keeps the bugs away.


The trail was mostly hardwood, open and flowery at this time of year, with the occasional stand of nice mature hemlock. A couple of different species of trillium were common occurrences.
One curiosity along the trail was a single tree with a burned trunk, no other sign of fire nearby:

I had picked the falls as a destination with the thought that there might be fish to be had at the bottom. I didn't find any, but the falls were nicer than I had anticipated, and made a great picnic and nap spot.

And botanists can feel free to ID these ferns that were at the falls:


The two of us shared a lake trout for dinner each of the 2 nights (with pasta and sun dried tomatoes) and one for breakfast on the Monday, all of them caught right at the appropriate meal time.
Weather was sunny and hot in the days but we were cold at night, partly because we'd read too much into the daytime highs and not prepared for cold nights and partly probably just because the ground is still cold. The creek between Head Lake and the Harness portage was a very easy paddle, all the beaver dams had gaps we could slide through without stopping.

 

6/15/2016 10:09 pm  #2


Re: Harness Lake May 21-23

Great photos. The lake looks amazingly glassy in the second photo.
Interesting report. Thanks for posting.

 

2/11/2017 10:54 am  #3


Re: Harness Lake May 21-23

Great pics!
And nice fish.
I stayed on Harness for two nights 12 or 13 years ago with 4 high school buddies.  It was our first trip into the park alone without adults.  Had a lot of fun.  I wish I fished back then though because from what I hear now its a great trout lake.

 

Board footera

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