I'd like to push through to Boot lake.  I was unable to get there a few years ago, had to give up on it (got lost on a portage, it was a whole thing), and it has bothered me ever since.  

Also, I'm with AndyW.  I'm concerned about my NY plates up there for an ice out trip this year, but there's only so many more years I'll be able to do this, so I'm figuring on going, at least for now.  Usually I'm concerned with the weather forecast, but the forecast of importance now has to do with the political environment, with bad weather ahead, unnecessarily generated on this side of the border, that I wish had never started.  I apologize for bringing up politics at all, it has no place on this forum, I know, but this situation makes me absolutely sick.  I cherish the friendships, which are now strained, and understandably so.  

Shawn - I apologize for hijacking your post, but the topic is pretty close so I hope you don't mind.  

A few years ago, there was an event where you could buy a paddle for $20, paint/decorate it, then donate it, and proceeds went to Friends of Algonquin as I recall.  I bought two of the paddles, one for my daughter (the artist in the family) and one for me (the occasional woodworker but really just a hack in the family).  We never finished them, so I hope there were some proceeds from the $20.  The plan was to donate both, but that ship kind of sailed, and with what I've done (so far) with this paddle, I'd have a really hard time parting with it.

Still, I thought I'd share how mine is coming along.  It remains on my list of things to finish.  There's a ton of work in it so far, and a ton yet to go.  I had the idea of creating a fake park map on the paddle, done in the colors and styles that were used on the Algonquin Park maps of the 1980's.  Then I added a twist, or more accurately, a knot to it.  

This is one of the mathiest projects I've ever undertaken, and somehow I got that knot done.  In my mind, it was going to be smooth and round and edges would be undetectable.  It didn't work out that way, but I like it all the same.  I came up with a bunch of fake lake names, and drew the map on the paddle.  For example, Boot Lake is there, named after Boot Lake, but shaped like Italy.  The whole paddle is like that.  There's a lake on the grip in the shape of a palm holding the paddle.  

This is a project of momentum, and I lost momentum.  My original plan was I would post no photos until it was completed but maybe posting these will shame me back into action.  What remains is printing on all the lake names, doing the legend, little comments about historical "facts" and general notes.  A painstaking activity, my print is bad, but I worked out all the fonts from the old maps and bought the paint-marker-pens to do the job, so with a steady hand a

Beautiful canoe!

I like the unknown of what campsite I'll end up with when I go to a lake.  it leaves a bit of...I'm not sure of the right word....adventure?...to a day.  Kind of a randomness that I enjoy.  Having said that, my wife and I got completely boned on Booth Lake in September, some people must have been off permit, and we traversed the lake for 2 hours looking for an open site but there were none, and we had to stay on a portage, which really.....we were lucky, it wasn't a bad place to put a tent, but still....incredibly annoying.  I like to think site specific reservations would reduce the number of off permit campers, but in those cases when it does happen, you'd know for sure whom it is.  I guess that's good, but it could lead to some pretty heated wilderness arguments.

two stories come to mind. 

One was, many years ago, I lived in a small neighborhood in a rural community.  Two girls show up at my front door (late teens, early 20's),  I think they were pollsters or maybe they were selling something, I really don't recall, but my scam radar went off super-loud in my head.  The story was that the guy who was supposed to pick them up from this neighborhood hadn't shown up, could they use my phone.  I offered to call for them. They provided the number, I got the phone and dialed up, fully expecting scam.  I was convinced I was being set up, and I'm sure my body language conveyed that.  Whoever answered the phone said that the driver had been involved in a car accident, so somebody else was coming to pick up the girls, and was 45 minutes away.  I relayed that bit of news to the two young ladies, with a hint of I-don't-believe-the-story in my voice.  But the reaction of the girls was so pure and stunned and worried for the guy that I immediately knew the girls were telling the truth.

The substitute driver was about 45 minutes away, I had an appointment and had to leave, so I couldn't really offer them help and they said they'd just go out and wait for him.  A few minutes later I drove past the girls, they were waiting on the corner of the secondary road and the road that lead into our neighborhood....the rain was just starting and they were unprepared.  I felt lower than dirt, and cynical.  You just never know.  The shakiest story can be straight as an arrow.

The other one was also in the 90's, when I took my one and only canoe trip with dad.  We got out at the Magnetawan access point, and encountered two Polish couples.  They'd taken a trip from Rain and exited a few days later here, thinking they could walk from one access point to the other.  Nope.  Could I drive the guys over to get their car.  I looked at dad, he says "Its your car".  That day it was pretty clear right off the bat their story was true.  Gave

If I'm just out for a paddle near home, I'll usually just stick the key in a zippered pants pocket.  When I'm taking a longer paddle, or on a canoe trip, I stick the key on a small platform at the top of the spring above the front tire.  It it bowl-shaped, so the key cradles in there and can't be seen.  It is protected from weather, but yeah, an ambitious person could find the key and have at it.  Still, the motivations for breaking in are two:  1) they want the car (160K miles on the 2013 RAV4, there are better targets in the lot,)  2) smash and grab....ok, my wallet is in there, if you dig around you'll find it I guess, but the presence or absence of the key is immaterial to that.  If the key isn't handy a rock is.  If it were a smash and grab situation, I would imagine they'd do it in the dead of night and go through as many cars as they could until an alarm went off.

Also, if I took the key with me, I know I'd be checking for it regularly.  Is it still where I put it?  Is it still where I put it?  Is it still where I put it?  I kind of like cutting myself off from it entirely. 

Glad to help; hope it helped!

131 people have looked at this post, one book got claimed, the others didn't, so I'll withdraw the remaining two.

We're packing things up to move a few miles down the road and things are happening pretty fast, so...

So - the post is closed.  Thanks for looking!

Hi - these are freebies.  I'm in Buffalo, I'll mail them to you in the US or Canada, don't worry about reimbursing the postage....ok, if guilt wracks your soul you can reimburse the postage but really don't sweat it.

1) "the 8th revision of the Checklist and seasonal status of the birds of algonquin park."  I have checked off 13 birds in the booklet. 2018.
2) "algonquin provincial park management plan."  It is about 75 pages long, very cool book from 1998, and has a large zoning Map in an envelope glued to the back cover.  This is a real A-Z book on the park.
3) "fishing in algonquin park." I paid the princely sum of $1.50 in 1985.  The park used to have these interesting booklets on a variety of topics, kind of a series - mammals, amphibians, trees, and of course this one on fish.