Yesterday's sunshine had warmed up the air enough to make it warmer to sleep at night. But by 7 a.m., when we were waking up and getting out of our tents, we were met with a very cold wind from the lake. It was so cold that you could see your breath. Now this is closer to "Pukaskwa cold". But at least it wasn't raining.
    We hurried to get a fire started but we didn't have much wood left and what we did have was somewhat damp so it didn't throw much heat. Knowing that we would be warmer once we started moving, we had a quick breakfast and prepared to start the last leg of our hike. 

Mom left at 9:30 a.m. Carsten and I left at 9:40 a.m. and Heather, Devin and Jo-Jo left at about 11 a.m. The trail was easy going but we knew that we could expect a large steep downward climb of a hill we were told about by one of the other hikers who had passed by on one of the previous days. We were kind of dreading it. 

Carsten and I found many woodpecker holes in trees. Some of them were quite large. When we looked inside one of them we saw some dead bugs inside. I wondered why the wood peckers hadn't eaten those ones. 

We caught up with mom and told her how we had noticed that the map said there was a "Lookout overlooking Johnston Lake and Grand Lake" and how we thought it would be a good place to stop for a break. So we were aiming for that as a first goal before tackling the dreaded hill. 
   We figured that it must be one of those lookouts built from lumber with steps to climb up if it was tall enough to lookout over two separate lakes.  Yeah... not so much.  What we didn't know at the time was that this "lookout" the map indicated was nothing more than a rocky outcrop and that it was so over grown with trees that you couldn't even see one lake (even without leaves on the trees) let alone two lakes. As a matter of fact I think we were probably already at the so called "lookout" when we were discussing stopping at it. Of course we didn't know this at the time. 

So with happy thoughts of looking forward to going to the lookout we continued on. It wasn't too long before we got to the "dreaded hill" that we had to climb down. Now granted the hill was much steeper than any other part of the trail, however, we were amused to find that it was really nothing to dread at all. When we compared this downward climb to either the ones at Kilarney's La Cloche Trail or the ones on Algonquin's Highland Trail, this was a breeze. On the other trails you practically had to take your pack off and throw it down and follow after it to get down. This hill was steep enough that you wanted to try to hold on to the trees as you went, but you never felt the need to take off your pack to get down it. 

At the bottom of the hill the trail evened out and it was easy going once again. The sun was shining and the birds were singing. As we had predicted, the temperature was warming up and we were warm from moving. It was a beautiful day.  I managed to catch a photo of a Yellow-bellied Sap Sucker as she was looking for her lunch in a nearby tree. 

Off in the distance we could hear a chain saw humming. It got louder as we walked and soon we saw two of the park rangers cutting away the dead fall from the trail. This explained why we had encountered so much dead fall on our trail the past few days. We had just come a few days too early and they hadn't cleared the trails yet.
   Encountering the two rangers was fortuitous because we had just reached a point on the trail where it split into two different directions. We were still looking for that elusive "lookout" and since we hadn't found it we figured that we were way further back on the trail than we were according to our map. So we were able to ask the rangers where we were and where to find the lookout. That was when they told us that we had passed it and that it was overgrown. 
   They said that we could find a better lookout if we wanted to go up towards Berm Lake, but we politely declined and explained that we had been in that area three days ago and that we were now on our way out of the bush. We were too tired to add extra kilometers to our trip and we were ready to go home. 
They were kind enough to point us in the right direction to the end of the trail and we continued on our way.  

This part of the trail ran along side of Johnston Lake so we were able to see some nice scenery. It was a lovely part of the trail.

We made plans to stop to rest at the portage that was marked on the map. Hopefully it wasn't as elusive as the "lookout". Just before the trail intersects with the portage, there is a little wooden bridge that crosses over some water. 

When I looked over the edge of the bridge I saw some clutches of frogs eggs. I wondered what type of frogs they were. I suspect they were Spring Peepers but I had no way of really knowing. 

Finally we made it to the portage. And we were glad for it because we really needed a break. 

We took off our packs and found some logs to sit on. We had a drink and ate some snacks. It is amazing how much difference a little break with no pack on can make when you are hiking. It gives you a second wind when you are ready to go again and you feel like you can make it the whole way after all. It was good to be able to stretch and relax a bit. 

We took the opportunity to pull out the map and see where we were, how far we came and how much farther to go. We noticed on the map that there was an osprey nest and a heronry (heron nesting grounds) in the middle of Johnston Lake and we would be passing right by. We also noticed that there was a camping site for canoers along the edge of the lake by the osprey nest. So we decided that although we are already taking a break and won't really need another one, we would stop at that site to see if we can spot the osprey. 

While I had my pack off I took the opportunity to look around. I went down to the lake and enjoyed the stillness of the water. I watched a little squirrel run about the bottoms of the trees. It was the first squirrel I had seen this whole trip. 

I also saw some fiddle heads starting to sprout up from the ground.
    We had only been at the portage for a short while when Heather, Devin, Jo-Jo and Fable caught up to us. We told them of our plans to see the osprey nest and they liked that idea. 
    After a spell we got our packs back on and continued on our way. 

Just like our plans to find the "lookout", our plans to find the campsite for canoers was also thwarted.  The campsite was completely flooded out and there was no way we were getting anywhere near it without some large rubber boots on. But all was not lost. We figured we might be able to see it from the trail if the trail got close enough to the water's edge at any point. So we didn't give up. 

Along this part of the trail there were some very pretty spring flowers. I thought that the Round-lobed Hepatica flower was one of the prettiest I had seen this trip. I almost didn't see it at all if mom hadn't have pointed it out to me. It grows fairly low to the ground.

Once I realized there were flowers to be found, I kept my eyes open for more. I found a different version of the Hepatica flower, the white, Sharp-lobbed Hepatica peeking our from some dead leaves. 

And not far from that was the blue, Sharp-lobbed Hepatica. 

Finally we found a spot on the trail where you could see the osprey nest! And from where we stood we could see that there was a bird in the nest! 

But the more we looked, the more we realized that this bird does not really look like an osprey. It was too big and it was too white. Nope, this was not an osprey. This was a sea gull! Apparently osprey don't always use the same nest year after year. So the sea gull was being an opportunist and moved right in. That's not to say that the osprey won't come back (if not this year than maybe next year) so the sea gull could get evicted at any time. 

I also tried to look for the heronry while I was there. The only other time I saw a sign for a heronry was at Mashkinonje Park and it just looked like a bunch of dead trees. I spotted a bunch of dead trees at one end of the lake and I suppose that could have been it, but I don't really know for sure. We never saw any herons in the area. 

I did spot a little chipmunk though. First chipmunk sighting of the season for me. 

It wasn't long before we came to the bridge that we had crossed over on our way into the trail. We knew it wouldn't be much longer now before we were out. 

I took one long, last look at the lake and the beaver dam before we left. I almost wished that we could stay a few more days. Almost.

But the thought of a hot shower and a warm bed to sleep in called to me. That and the thought of the great tasting burger we would be eating at Burger King on the way home. There is something to be said for the amenities of civilization, but I know it won't be long before I am itching to get back out into the woods again on our next trip. 

It had been another cold night. It still wasn't "Pukaskwa Cold" but it was cold enough to make me wish I had opted for the heavier, warmer, sleeping bag. But I chose light weight over comfort and now I was paying the price. 
    There was a mist in the air but it wasn't raining. At least not yet. We didn't start a fire because we knew this was not a normal spot for camping and we didn't want to be responsible for a possible fire getting out of control with no one coming by to see to it. 

We packed up and got ready to leave. Mom had gotten up early and left ahead of us. She wanted to get a head start since she knew we would all eventually catch up to her. She left at about 8 a.m. Carsten and I left about an hour later with the rest of them following behind about 40 minutes after that. It was still Boulder Garden for quite some time in this section of the trail.

We picked out way around the boulders and over the dead fall. 

Even a Boulder Garden can be beautiful though. Some boulders were completely covered in ferns. It gave it an even more "garden" feel to it. 

There was still quite a bit of snow on the ground in places. It was a reminder that it was still spring time and that this was not the normal time to be backpacking and perhaps we were a little bit crazy. But if we were crazy, then we were not the only ones. We had been hiking for about 2 hours when we ran into a school group of about 20 kids. They had been camping out the past few nights  too. So if we were crazy then so were they. 
    One of the teachers who was with the kids told us that the 3rd and 4th site in the group of sites we were heading to (Stratton Lake section) was the best of the sites in that section. We warned them that they were about to enter the Boulder Garden. We chatted for a bit and then headed on. 

We were now in a section of the woods where the deer frequented. How did we know? There were deer droppings every where....and I mean everywhere!  Both on the trail and along side the trail. Mostly on the trail though.  It was a full kilometer or more of deer droppings about every 20 feet. (I actually started counting foot steps between piles after awhile because I was curious). It was still just me and Carsten together at this point. I was in front and he was behind me. So I acted as look out and was constantly saying "Don't step there" or "Deer Poop!" or "More poop!"  It was like we were traveling down the deer's personal bathroom. 

Eventually the trail of poop stopped and instead it became the trail of water. Most of the time we walked alongside of the trail at this point because it was too wet to walk on the trail.  It was about here that Heather, Devin and Jo-Jo  caught up to us and passed us. 

A few minutes later we stopped in our tracks.....
What had once been a very wet trail had now turned into a mini lake! Skirting along the side of the trail was now no longer an option. We had to go way off the beaten path to get around this flooded section of the trail. We could hear Heather up in the distance and we could hear mom too so we knew they had caught up with her. We knew they were probably talking about the amount of water they had just walked around. 

Carsten and I bush wacked our way towards the voices and it wasn't long before we caught up to the group. We had been hiking for about 2 hours and it had been raining most of the way. We were all ready for a break so we stopped along the waters edge where the trail splits off towards High Falls and made some coffee. 

As we ate our snacks and drank coffee we asked each other "why didn't the group of kids mention this large section of water we had to make our way around?"  And the couple the day before had only said "You might get your feet wet near High Falls".  That was a bit of an understatement.  Actually, we had managed to keep our feet fairly dry despite the amount of water around. I am pretty happy with how water resistant my hiking boots are. 
    We may have been sitting beside a giant puddle in the woods, but the birds were singing and it was still an enjoyable hike. 

When our break was over mom left before we did again to get a head start. Carsten and I were last to leave. There was one more really wet area to cross and then we were on our way up to higher ground where it was a bit more dry (except for the rain of course). 

Once again I marveled at how beautiful the spring trees could be with their white and beige leaves. 

The trail had even more dead fall on it.  There is an unusually high amount of dead fall on this trail. But none of it was too daunting. 

We came across a few more areas of water, but this time there were bridges over them. 

Carsten and I caught up to mom where the side trail begins for the next section of campsites on Stratton Lake. Heather, Devin and Jo-Jo had long since passed her and were probably already at the campsite. There are 5 campsites in this section and we were heading for either the 3rd or 4th one. At about this point the sun was finally starting to come out. 

We hadn't really looked at the map so we didn't know at first how far the first campsite was from all the others. So when we couldn't find the second campsite right away we got worried that we had gone the wrong way. We were also pretty tired by this point. So we stopped  for a rest for the second time and took out the map to figure out where we were.  

We followed a path that was right along the water's edge the whole way. Apparently this path is not one that is actually on the map. But it got us to where we needed to go. We found out later that Heather and Devin and Jo-Jo had followed the true path and didn't get a chance to see all the other campsites along the way like we did. 

If they had, they would have seen the neat chairs made from stones in the campsite just before ours (campsite # 3) .

But as neat as the chairs were, campsite # 4 actually had more room for all of our tents so we chose that one instead. It was about 1:30 p.m. when we got to our site. 

As we had predicted, Heather, Devin and Jo-Jo were already at our site and had a fire started. The tents weren't up yet, but they had already gotten water for the platypus (water filter system) and were relaxing. There was a nice big open space and a large log to sit on. We were so tired when we got there that we just dropped our packs and sat down. We didn't even set up our tents right away either. 

The site had a nice place to swim and if it had been warmer out I may have considered going in for a dip. 

I began to explore our campsite and came across a garter snake who was taking advantage of the sunshine and was sunning himself in the pine needles covering the ground. 

The sunshine was short lived though. About 20 minutes after we got there, the clouds rolled in and it began to rain again. 

We didn't have the tents up but luckily, mom had put up the tarp that goes over her tent. So, we quickly threw all of our gear under it to keep it dry. 

And Carsten, mom and I sat under the tarp with our gear and waited out the rain.

Meanwhile, Jo-Jo and Devin managed to get their tents up. We happened to have a couple of umbrellas with us so we used them to protect some of the gear. 

Just as we were starting to get cold and cranky, the sun came back out again. This time the rain stayed away and did not come back.  I took the opportunity to take a little walk to check out the next campsite over (campsite # 5) 

This campsite also had a make shift table. It wasn't as nice as the stone one from the previous day, but it was something. 

As I was walking back I hear what I thought was a bee flying very close to me. It sounded like a very large bee...like a bumble bee. I was surprised to find that it was not a bee, but was instead a humming bird. This humming bird was different than any humming bird I had seen before. It had no colours but was black and white. It had a white body, a black head and a black tail. 

It stopped for a moment and landed on a branch above me on a nearby tree. There it sat for a few moments while I stumbled with my camera to try to get a picture of it. All I could manage was a blurry blob of a picture before it flew away. From what I can tell from similar pictures on the internet, it was a Black-chinned humming bird. But, according to what I read, this humming bird was pretty far out of it's zone. It is usually sighted in western Canada and USA. Could be that I have misidentified it. 

 At any rate, I wondered what it could be eating since there wasn't much in the way of flowers or bugs at this time of year. But my mom pointed out that they will eat sap from trees. That made sense because there are a whole lot of woodpeckers in the area and there were many trees with Pileated Woodpecker holes with sap dripping from them. Most likely it was eating sap from the those trees. 

I brought back some more firewood from my walk and we made the fire large enough to cook supper on. 

I had Mr. Noodles with Corn Chips crumbled into it. 

Mom had the same but she also added some sun dried tomatoes to hers. 

After supper we finally got around to putting the tents up. 

Heather and I chose a nice little spot right down by the lake. 

Now that we had got all our stuff out from under mom's tarp she could finally put her tent up too. 

Carsten discovered a chain in a tree a little ways away from our site. He wondered what it was for. 

Then he discovered the sign. The chain was for hanging your food in the tree (or for tightrope walking, whichever you prefer). 

As dry as my shoes stayed through out today's travels, not everyone elses did. They took turns drying out their hiking boots around the fire. (I believe someone got their socks melted a little in this procedure). Speaking of socks...mom's neck was getting a bit cold so she fashioned a scarf out of a couple of clean socks and a safety pin. I guess watching episodes of McGyver all those years ago really paid off.

With our bellies full, and a warm fire to sit by and the sun still shining, we were all pretty content and enjoying the evening. We sat around the fire and played a game of Yahtzee. 

It was almost sad to watch what little sun we have seen the past few days sink into the horizon. 

But with all the clouds still hanging around it certainly did make for a beautiful sunset! The red clouds were spectacular and it was so bright it was almost like the clouds were on fire.

The lower the sun went, the pinker the clouds got. 

It was so bright that even the clouds that were far away from the sun had a hint of pink to them. 

Finally the sun set fully and dusk came over us. This evening sky had been the crown jewel on a beautiful day. 

We all sat around the fire and enjoyed each others company for awhile. We listened to the Barred Owl calling in the distance. 

The sky was clear and the moon was so bright and the stars had come out. It was not as chilly as the previous nights. We even saw our first couple of mosquitoes of the season. There were only two or three luckily. 
   At about 11 p.m. we put out the fire and went to bed. Tomorrow we would be heading home. But for now I was loving the sounds of the owl and the wind in the trees and just being out here in the woods. 

I woke up early both because I went to sleep much earlier than I do at home and because I was so cold. But mainly because I was cold. After camping in Pukaskwa Park 2 summers ago and getting extremely cold (below zero degrees) one night, Heather and I will now often compare cold nights to that one. We determined that although this night had been cold it was not "Pukaskwa cold", as we have now coined the term. 
   It had rained all night and it was still raining, Our tent was fairly dry and so was Mom's and Carsten's. But Jo-Jo's and Devin's tents were both soaked. We literally had to turn them over and pour water out of them when it came time to pack them up. We were sure hoping for some sun today so we could get things dried out.

We made a fire to keep warm and to cook breakfast on. Heather made us all some pancakes and we were happy to have a nice hot breakfast. 

We didn't boil the coffee water over the fire though. Everyone needed their coffee fix too badly to have to wait for too long for the water to boil. So instead Heather used the new portable camp stove she got for backpacking. It's a neat little thing really. It's very small and attaches to a small canister of fuel. Then you just light it and put your pot on top. There is a little metal handle that you turn to adjust your heat settings or turn it off. 

After breakfast we got packed up and ready to start our hike to the next camp. We put on our rain ponchos to try to keep us as dry as possible while we walked. We left our site at about 10 a.m. and started off.

But it wasn't just the wet from the rain we had to try to avoid. The trail was also full of large puddles that we had to work our way around.

Since it was so early in the season the fallen logs and dead fall had not been cleared away by the park staff yet, so we had many large logs that we had to climb over. 

There were even still places where there was snow on the ground. It was quite a varied landscape we traveled over. 

There may not have been much in the way of greenery, but there was still beauty in the white and beige, old leaves that still resiliently clung to branches despite having seen winter winds and spring rains.

And there were the wonders of the oddities of plants unknown, such as a mushroom that looked like an eyeball or an olive nested in the soft, wet, moss. 

We walked for about an hour and came to a place where the trail splits into two different directions. There were some fallen logs to sit on and we were due for a break so we decided to stop here and rest for a bit.

Even here, near the edge of the lake there was more beauty to be found. I discovered an old stump that was completely covered in a lima bean green moss that had tiny, little, red,flower-like fungi growing on top of that. Or perhaps it was just the blooms of that particular fungi. Either way, I thought that the colour combination, in contrast to all the greys and browns I had been seeing, was particularly pretty. 

The two directions you can go from here is right, towards Achray or left, towards Bucholtz Lake. Our course was to the left. After we were done having coffee, Devin, Jo-Jo, and Carsten went on ahead. 

Mom, Heather, and I were just about to follow behind them when a man and woman came hiking towards us from the direction we were heading. We stopped to chat for a bit and they warned us that we were going to be going into the "Boulder Gardens" and that there was room for only one small tent on the site we were going to spend the night at. We didn't worry too much about it and figured we will just have to figure out which one of us will be sleeping in the designated site and the rest of us will have to set up our tents in the bush near by the site. We will make it work somehow.  They also told us that where the trail splits towards High Falls (we wouldn't be getting there until the next day), our feet might get a bit wet there. We were grateful for the tips and we told them what to expect on their next leg of their journey too. We said goodbye and started on our way. 

Most of the trail was pretty straight forward with no major hills or dips. It was just lots of trees with old, dead leaves covering the ground.

We did have to climb over a few fallen trees and occasionally the trail markers were down, but it was not really a problem at all. 

Eventually we found the sign for our campsite. Looking around, we could already see why they call this area the Glacial Boulder Garden. There were boulders everywhere.

Carsten, Devin and Jo-Jo had made it to the site before we did and had already started a fire in an attempt to get their things dried out before night fall. Luckily the sun was peeking out for a brief visit so that helped somewhat too.

Someone had made a table by tying some logs to a tree and placing a slab of stone on top. It would make a great fish cleaning station or a place to prepare a meal. 

There was a nice place to swim and fable was enjoying herself in the water. She found a floating patch of grass and every time she went to stand on it, it started to sink. It was funny to watch her try to figure it out. 

The thunder box left a lot to be desired. You had to make your way around puddles to get to it and it was surrounded by water. It would make for wet feet and tripping hazards in the middle of the night, that's for sure. 

But this big ole spider had no issues with it and thought it would do her just fine. 

The site was cute and cozy.....for one or two people. But sure enough, there was not going to be room for any more than one tent here.

There was an attempt at a platform for a tent by way of some little logs lying on the ground and covered in dirt and pine needles but even that wasn't well made. Only a really small tent would fit here. 

Worse still, the couple we passed weren't kidding when they said there was no room. Everywhere you looked it was boulder, boulders, and more boulders. And many of those boulders had large puddles of water at the base of them. There was no way we were going to be able to get all of us anywhere near this site, let alone right on the site. Now what were we going to do? 

I knew we couldn't stay there and we had to figure something out before dark so I started to walk along the shoreline to see if I could find another place. Everyone else stayed behind because they were tired and wanted to dry their wet things out. 

Of course it had started to rain again. At least it was only a light drizzle. I walked and walked until eventually I came back onto the trail again. I followed that for awhile until I started to hear the sound of rushing water. 

I came to a bridge and decided that if I didn't find a place on the other side of this bridge I would just give up and go back and ask everyone else if they had thought of any other options.  By now they might be wondering where I was and why it was taking so long to get back. 
      By the grace of God, there on the other side of the bridge was a place that would do just fine for all of us to stay the night.
      We aren't really supposed to camp off of the designated sites unless it is an emergency, but we didn't really have a choice. So I suppose this sort of was an emergency. What we didn't understand was why the website did not say that this was such a small site. Nor did the person who did the reservations say anything to Heather about it when she booked this site. And even more puzzling was why the ranger at the office hadn't said anything about the size of the site when he knew how many tents we had. 
      By this time I had traveled about an extra 1/2 kilometer and now I had to turn around and travel that distance again to get back. 

When I got back to the others, we decided to make the journey to the new site. I took Heather, Fable, Carsten and mom with me while Devin and Jo-Jo stayed behind to look after the stuff that was still drying. I would go back for them once the new site was set up.
      We were almost to the new site when we spotted a couple with a dog taking a rest ever so close to where we planned to camp. I was worried at first that they had planned to camp where we wanted to camp. But then I realized that they were not actually on the site and they were just resting before carrying on their way. However, since they had a dog and we had Fable with us and Fable didn't have her leash on (it was back with Devin), Heather had to turn back with the dog. I didn't hear her say she was going back and when I turned around she was gone. 
      Confused, I turned back to go and find her. Instead I found Carsten and mom and I showed them where the site was. I let them begin to set up while I went back to get Heather, Devin, and Jo-Jo because they wouldn't know where to find us. So once more I traveled back to the other site. 

When I brought Heather, Devin, and Jo-Jo to the new campsite, Carsten and mom already had a fire going in the fire pit. It dawned on me that with all this back and forth walking between the sites,  I had probably walked an extra 2 and a half kilometers today. I was tired. 

We started looking around and deciding who's tent was going to go where. Carsten discovered an area surrounded by logs in a square shape that looks like it may have been a platform or campsite at one point. 

Much of the ground was covered in deer moss which made it soft to lie on. 

We had a nice view of the marsh from where we were and I was hoping that maybe we would see a moose in the evening or early morning. But we never did. 

We did, however, see a pair of Merganser ducks.

Devin, Jo-Jo, and Carsten put their tents in a slightly higher area, closer to the trail. 

And mom put up her tent below me and Heather, between two trees. 

Just as we finished putting up the tents the sun came back out for us. We had a bit of a wind too, so the tents and wet things dried out in no time. 

We all just relaxed for awhile and enjoyed the beauty of the area. I took a short nap because all that extra walking had worn me out. 

Later in the evening we ate supper over the fire and watched the sun go down over the lake. 

A couple of sea gulls came to roost for the night on some rocks out in the lake. 

We watched as a couple of Canada Geese flew in and landed near by. 

They got nervous with us being so close so they made their way out further into the marshy, grassy area in the middle of the lake. 

I borrowed my mm's binoculars because I saw something swimming but I couldn't make out what it was. It was probably a beaver or muskrat. By the time I got back to the water's edge with the binoculars it was gone. 

As twilight settled in, the Spring Peepers started up their chorus of song. They were so loud that the noise was piercing. You had to face away from the lake to make the noise a little less deafening. And in the background we could hear one lone Bullfrog singing his deep throated song of "Donk-a-Lonka, Donk-a-Lonka".

It was not a very dark night and the moon shone brightly through the trees, making silhouettes of the trees against the sky. A bat flew by on it's nightly rounds. We are willing to bet that later on in the season this place is probably swarming with mosquitoes. But right now we have not seen a single one. Must be hard for the bat to find a decent meal at this time of year.
​      I would have liked to have stayed up awhile longer and enjoy everything, but I was much to tired. 

We made an early night of it and went to bed around 9:30. It doesn't seem as cold tonight as it was last night, but it is still pretty chilly.  From my tent I can see the glow of Carsten's flashlight through his tent walls and it makes me think of a cartoon I watched as a kid called "Will-O-the-Wisp". I am loving the sights and the sounds and I am happy to be here on this beautiful night. 

Backpacking in the month of May was not my idea. It was my sister, Heather's idea. She convinced me that it was before blackfly and mosquito season and that on average there is nice, warm, sunny weather near the end of May. To be precise she said that we needed to go before May 19th because that is when she estimated the blackflies would emerge. I was hesitant to agree to go because I figured it would be cold at night and I also was aware that bears and their cubs are usually about at this time of year. But, in the end I agreed and the plans were made. In February Heather booked the sites and everything was set in motion. ​For the first time in his life my brother, Carsten, would be going backpacking with us. I went shopping with him before hand and got all the necessary equipment that he would need. I actually picked up some bear spray for the first time ever. I figured, why not. Better to be safe than sorry. 

So where do you go backpacking in May you might wonder? Most of the campgrounds are still closed before the May long weekend. We were headed to the Eastern Pine Trails which is located on the East side of Algonquin Park via the Sand Lake Gate. The entrance to the trail is just outside the Achray campground. Achray itself was still closed, but the hiking trails were open. This was the trail that Heather and I were supposed to hike last summer but were forced to go to Bon Echo instead due to forest fires. It wasn't forest fires we were concerned about at this time of year. Instead it was the opposite...flooding. We have had heavy rainfall this spring and many parts of the area have experienced flooding bad enough to close down sections of highway. The highways are open now, but who knows what we will find out on the trails.

My mother. my nephew Devin, and his friend Jo-Jo were also coming with us. Oh, and Devin's dog, Fable, was joining us too. We were a party of 6 (not including the dog). My mother and I hopped into Carsten's car and Heather, Devin, Jo-Jo and fable took another car. It was about a 3 hour drive to reach the park office at the sand Lake Gate.We arrived around 12:30 pm. 
We parked the cars and went in to finalize our registration and to pick up some maps. At the desk, the young man asked the usual questions such as "what is your license plate number? Phone number?", etc. As usual he asked "What colour are your tents?" So Heather starts rhyming off the colours "orange, orange, blue, green, grey....." That was when the young man interrupted and said " You are only supposed to have 3 tents per group".  We stood there looking at him for a moment before Heather stated that no where on the website does it say that and that when she phoned to reserve the sites (you can only reserve by phone for these particular sites 705-633-5572 ) that they never said a word to her about only being allowed to have 3 tents. The guy just said "sorry, I don't make the rules".  In the end, we just named off 3 colours of tents and he was content with that. However, we went in with all of our tents because all we had were very small tents and we couldn't fit multiple people and a dog in them (with the exception of Heather's tent which she was sharing with me already). We wondered if he had gotten the rules for regular camping and backcountry camping mixed up maybe, considering most parks allow up to 9 people in a group. I am sure most of those backpackers are not fitting 3 people in the tiny light weight tents required to backpack into the back country. Regardless, we were not turned away and we were allowed to head out on our trip with all the tents we had brought with us. 

From the gate to the head of the trail was still another 10 to 20 minute drive. I noticed as Carsten drove that there was still snow on the sides of the road in some areas. It was a cloudy day with a light rain, It was going to be a chilly trip, but I knew that once we started walking that we would be warm enough. 

We parked our cars in the parking lot with our permits displayed on the dashboard. Then we all geared up including wearing rain ponchos to keep us dry from the chilly rain that was still falling. 

Even Fable had to carry her own backpack. Hers was filled with her dog food and toys. 

We stopped to check the large posted map at the head of the trail before we began our hike. We had maps but they were packed away in our packs where they were safe from the rain. 

In the end, we missed our first turn right from the get-go and immediately went off course. We were supposed to go on the trail to the northern part of Berm Lake (red trail), but instead we ended up on the trail following the southern part of Berm Lake (purple trail). Weren't we off to a good start!  We didn't realize the mistake until we had gotten to our site, but it all worked out to our advantage. Turns out that the trail we took was shorter and we shaved off about a kilometer or more from our hike for the first day. We had inadvertently found a short cut. 

Mom and Carsten and I had started out ahead of the others. But after a few minutes my mom realized that she had forgotten her binoculars. I offered to run back to the car to get them for her. I passed Heather, Devin and Jo-Jo and by the time I caught back up to mom, they had already passed by and were way up ahead of us. We were OK with that though. We all had different paces that we liked to go at.

I had hoped that late spring would have brought more sunshine and flowers, but instead the landscape looked grey and bleak. The leaves were only just buds so there was not much green except for that of the pine trees. 

As we suspected, the water was pretty high. The first bridge we came to had water almost up to the top of it. The water was moving fairly quickly too. 

We had barely begun when my mom tripped over a rock and fell on the ground with her binoculars smacking into her chest between her and the ground. We could tell that it was very painful. For a few moments I thought that our trip would be ending before it even really began. But she pulled herself up, and after she took  a minute or two to catch her breath, she said that she wanted to carry on. So we continued on our way. I guess going back for those binoculars was not the best decision after all.  

As we crossed over another bridge through a little creek with old, dead grass around it I began to wonder if I would see any sort of beauty in the landscape. Perhaps we came just a bit too early in the year. I was starting to get a bit disappointed. 

So I started to look closer. And sure enough, signs of spring were emerging everywhere. I spotted a bunch of tiny white flowers with pale pink along the edges of its petals. This flower is called Creeping Mayflower (also known as Trailing Arbutus). I would never have seen these in the summer time. 

Further observation of the ground I was traveling over resulted in the discovery of some wintergreen berries. 

Although there were signs that a beaver was a round, I didn't actually see one. 

While we had been in the park office, the young man at the desk had spoken of a bad forest fire that had gone through here a number of years back. There were still signs of that fire all over the place. Some of the burnt wood had an artistic quality to them. One burnt stump I saw almost looked like it could have been made into a wooden bowl or something. 

There were even some interesting rocks. One in particular looked like there had been a streak of white stone running through some dark stone but had broken open and left the white streak exposed. It was like someone had glued a flat white stone onto another one. They looked nothing alike and it looked out of place. 

 At this time of year the pine trees looked almost like they had red berries on them, but it was just the red buds on the deciduous trees that were starting to open and become leaves.

Much of the hike on this day was along the waters edge. 

The view that began as grey and bleak became greener and more lovely to look at. The rain was mostly gone and I was now happy that I had come along on this hike.

Devin and Jo-Jo were quite a bit farther ahead of us. I could see them in the distance across the lake and we waved at each other. 

By the time we caught up to them at the campsite they had already begun to set up. We had our choice of 5 different sites and we chose the third one. There were supposed to be people on three other sites too, but we had not one else near us.

Devin and Jo-Jo each had their own orange tent, They put the two tents close to each other so that they could share a tarp over top of both.

Carsten's tent looked like some sort of space craft more than a tent. He said that when you lie down in it your face almost touches the roof. But he said it was comfortable enough.

Mom's tent is nothing more than mosquito netting with a tarp over it. This year we sewed a floor into it because last year she had an uninvited insect guest (large spider) that came in under the floor. The floor offers a little more protection from the wet ground as well. Surprisingly, she stayed pretty dry the whole trip in this set up. 

Heather and I shared a small blue tent. It was a new one and is smaller than the one we had last year. Less weight to carry and we still fit comfortably in it with our gear. 

Once the tents were set up we went to gather some wood for the fire. In the tree tops we could hear, and occasionally see, some woodpeckers. There were quite a few woodpeckers in the area. 

It took about an hour for everyone to cook and eat their supper because we each brought something different to eat. The rain had stopped and we were able to sit around and relax. 

After supper I went for a walk. I saw two birds on the lake that may have been loons (we could hear loon calls earlier) but they were a bit too far away to know for sure. When I got back we sat around the fire talking for awhile. Eventually it started raining again and so, when it was dark, we let the fire go out and we went to bed. It was nice to listen to the frogs peeping as we went to sleep. But the night was very chilly and I hoped that my sleeping bag was going to be warm enough.