Day 3: Pinetree Lake to Rock Lake via Rock Creek
We knew that our last day would present some challenges, including over 5 km of portaging on mostly low maintenance routes. There was also the uncertainty regarding how easily Rock Creek could be paddled, particularly this late into the season. Version 6 of Jeff's Map also indicated that some bushwhacking would be required to get from Rock Creek to Gordon Lake.

We packed up and had breakfast in the dark, and were on the water shortly after sunrise at 7:22 AM. The overnight temperatures had dropped the last two nights, and the leaves finally started to approach their peak colour by our final morning. We reached Rose Lake in less than an hour and had launched onto Fork Lake around 9:00 AM. There was a group camping on the island campsite, which also looked like a great spot to go for a future trip. The portages between Pinetree Lake and Fork Lake were also in fairly good condition. 

The first section of Rock Creek was very scenic and relatively navigable. We could tell that the 320m and 40m portages do not see much traffic, and we wondered what condition the bushwhack portage would be in once we reached it downstream. Travel became more difficult after the 40m portage, with several beaver dams, boulders, and deep, soft mud slowing our progress. In fact, it took us about 20 minutes to travel only 200m at one section. We began to worry that getting to the Gordon Lake portage would take hours. Luckily, the creek was much easier to paddle further downstream and we began making better progress again.

After 4 hours of travel from our campsite on Pinetree, we reached the portage out of Rock Creek to Gordon Lake. The entrance was difficult to find, and when we landed on shore, I found the portage sign on the ground. I did my best to reattach it before we started on the bushwhack portage. The first 20-30m was fine, but the trail was soon completely overgrown. I looked at my map on my watch, and concluded that the actual portage entrance must have been 10-20m further west than the route we took. Sure enough, we made our way to the west and soon found a better than expected portage trail. This was a very interesting portage, with lots of moss-covered rock that made footing somewhat challenging. The trail had been flagged with pink tape which was another nice surprise.

The clouds had rolled in and the winds had picked up considerably by the time we put our canoe in at Gordon Lake. The 1490m portage from Gordon to Rock Lake is part of the Booth's Rock Trail, and it was busy with people getting a glimpse of the fall colours. The path is obviously well-worn, and we powered through it in less than 25 minutes. The chop was up significantly by the time we reached Rock Lake, and we decided that my friend would stay with our gear at the Booth's Rock Trail parking lot while I walked back to get my vehicle at the access point.

Photo 11: Near-peak colours on Pinetree Lake.


Photo 12: View of the western most section of Pinetree Lake, looking north.


Photo 13: Perfect morning on Rose Lake.


Photo 14: Rock Creek beginning to narrow and become more challenging.


Photo 15: In my element on Rock Creek.


Photo 16: Portage sign from Rock Creek to Gordon Lake.


Photo 17: Rock Lake was moody by the time we reached it around 1:30 PM, about 5 hours of travel from our campsite on Pinetree Lake.


Summary:
This was a unique trip in that it had a very remote feel even though we departed from a busy access point (#9 Rock Lake), and camped on access point lakes both nights (#13 Galeairy and #12 Pinetree). It also gave us a good variety of large lakes, small lakes, and low maintenance portages. 

Other than the group camped on Fork Lake, we did not see any other people from noon on our first day until we reached our last portage from Gordon to Rock.The section from Mud Bay to Gordon Lake is one of the prettier I have been through in the park. Rock Creek had some challenging sections, but overall, I can't see why this route is not more frequently travelled.

I would highly recommend this route to any intermediate paddlers and above. I suggest doing it in the direction we did for the following reasons: (1) Almost no portaging on day 1 allows you to bring more fresh food for the first day and be rid of the food weight for the heavier portaging required on days 2 and 3; (2) You are going downstream on Rock Creek; (3) This direction allows you to break up the daily travel roughly equally, with nice lakes to camp on each night.

Last edited by Bampot (11/27/2024 8:25 am)

Peek wrote:

Really nice report, Bampot. I've eyed this loop a few times in the past and this report is quite encouraging - beautiful area, beautiful photos! Nice adventure man.

Thanks! This route would likely be classified as moderate difficulty overall. Compared to some of the routes you have written about in your trip reports, this one would be no problem for you. In fact, you may even decide to keep going down Rock Creek instead of taking the portage to Gordon Lake. There are some rapids just downstream from the portage. If you can bushwhack around those, the rest of Rock Creek could be possible and it would significantly reduce the amount of portaging required.

Thank you for your trip report! This loop has moved up on the to-do list after reading your captivating report. Appreciate the photos and was great to learn about your bushwhack experience going from Rock Creek to Gordon.

Looks like a bunch of us were hovering over this section of the map! Thanks for posting the report and the excellent photos... added to my list too!