Sunshine, calm winds and crazy wildlife on Longbow Lake
September 26, 2014
The weather was absolutely perfect for a last-minute solo canoe trip, 24 degrees celsius and sunny with very little wind. In fact, the weather for the past five days was nearly identical, with zero wind most of the week prior to Friday and temperatures far above normal.I wasn’t sure if my wife was okay with me leaving the family for the entire weekend, unplanned, so I accompanied her to drop off our daughters at school in the morning and then we agreed that I would leave for two nights of camping when we got home. By 10:15 am, I was packed up an on the road, arriving at Kearney Community Centre around 12:30. After picking up my camping permits, both nights at the same site on Longbow Lake, I was at the launch and out on the water by 1:00 pm.
The trip down the meandering Tim River was uneventful, and I didn’t see any wildlife to speak of. The river is slow-moving here and quite marshy. I saw one other canoeist, another solo middle-aged man, launching at the same time but he was heading north to Big Bob Lake, while I was heading east into Rosebary and then onto Longbow Lake.
I arrived at Longbow by 5:00 pm and checked out the campsite by the dam where the Tim River flows out of Longbow, but I wasn’t happy to see that it was right on the portage down to the river. I wouldn’t have any privacy and I didn’t want to worry about my gear while I was out exploring and fishing. Plus, I find waterfall campsites far too loud for anything longer than a short stop. Therefore, I ended up on the campsite east of the falls, which was a nice point of high land overlooking the narrows and oriented west to the setting sun.
By the time I set up camp, collected fire wood and boiled water for tea and rehydrating curried lentil soup, it was getting too late to explore much so I settled in and watched the sun set and the moon and stars emerge.
Just before dusk, I heard grunts and bellowing from some moose across the lake on the north side. They answered back when I called to them but never showed themselves on the shoreline. The sky was perfectly clear and the waxing moon was just a sliver and set beyond the trees to the west shortly after becoming visible, making for a dark night with lots of stars visible.
I didn’t sleep well. I never do the first night of camping since I’m awake all night listening for wildlife and I haven’t yet settled down into the natural environment. Because it's completely calm, I could hear every movement of the small animals, mostly mice, but there wasn’t much activity to speak of near camp. The moose at the narrows between Rosebary and Longbow got a little frisky in the middle of the night for a few minutes, but that was all.
[url=http://myselfreliance.com/longbow-lake-solo-canoe-trip-day-2/]Day 2 – Frisky Moose and Magnificent Trout…
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Antman wrote:
