Plenty Of Partridge

 We got up at 6:30 a.m. and it was drizzling rain. So much for trying to make it off the trails before the rain started. 

I had slept well despite hearing an animal in the night again. I figure it was a raccoon because I could hear the chittering noise it makes and I could hear the scratching of bark as it moved up and down the tree. At first I was worried that it would get into our food that was hanging in a tree a little ways away. But then I thought to myself, that if that happened, we were leaving in the morning anyways. So it wouldn't be the end of the world.

All was well, nothing had gotten into the food in the middle of the night.  Carsten said that he had a visitor at his tent too. He thought it was a mouse or a mole or something. 

We ate a cold breakfast because we didn't want to build a fire. So, we were packed up and on the trail by 8 a.m. We started our up hill climb and it was not long before we reached the real site # 1. As we reached the top of the hill I noticed a female partridge just standing, unmoving, by the rocky fire pit. 

The reason why she didn't move was because she was waiting for her babies to follow her up to the top of the rock. 

We didn't want to disturb them, so instead of exploring more of the site, we stuck to the trail and continued on our way. 

For the first little while Carsten was leading the way. Since the trail was so badly maintained and the under brush was thick enough that you sometimes couldn't see the path, it meant that all the water on the plants would soak his pant legs. It wasn't even raining all that hard and yet the water from the plants soaked him so much that the water dripped down into his boots so that his boots were all wet inside too. 

Later on, I took the lead and the same thing happened to me. It was like we had both walked into a lake up to our thighs and then started walking the trail. We were completely soaked. The water in my boots was squishing and sloshing as I walked. We blame the poorly kept trail. If the vegetation had been trimmed back the water would not have been able to so easily reach our pant legs. I can only imagine what it would have been like if it had been raining hard. To top it all off, the mosquitoes were starting to get bad. 

I am not sure how far we walked. Maybe a couple of kilometers? It's hard to know for sure. But, eventually we arrived at the look out. It was a beautiful spot and it had a fire pit where people could stop and have lunch. 

This spot was one of the most rewarding of the trip. The view was spectacular. This spot is worth going to on just a day trip; even if you go just this far and then turn around and go back. 

I walked to the edge of the cliff and looked down. It felt amazing to see all of God's land rolling out below me. The mist on the trees in the distance gave it an even more mystical appearance. 

We rested for a bit but eventually we had to get going again. We noticed a trail sign with the km marking on it on a tree at the look out. However, there were no numbers on it, so we had no idea how many kilometers we had left to go. But we knew we still had a long way to go yet. 

We went just a little further down the trail when we came across a second look out area. The view was pretty here too, but not as nice as the spot we had just come from. I thought about how anyone coming from the opposite direction we were coming from might mistake this spot as the look out. Then I thought what a shame it would be if they were only coming this far and then turning around to go back. They would miss out on the real view that was only just a little further down the trail. I was happy that we got to see it all. 

We had to cross over more dead fall that should have been cleared away. 

At some points you couldn't even cross over or under the dead fall. You had to go off trail and go around it. We had been hoping that as we got closer to the parts of the trail that we figured may be used more often, that there would be better maintenance, but apparently not. 

There were quite a few open areas of pretty, moss covered rock. Some of the rocks were perfect for stopping to take a rest on. 

On one of our breaks I spotted a Virginia Tiger Moth caterpillar as it crawled away in the opposite direction. 

In some places the moss was orange and peach coloured. 

Even some of the log bridges were covered in moss. 

And one log bridge couldn't decide if it wanted to be a horizontal log bridge or a vertical log bridge. So it was both. 

Eventually we came across the 5 km trial sign. So we know that the look out had been more than 5 km from the start of the trail (if I had to guess, I would say it's about 7km from the start of the trail).

After this point the trail started to become a little more user friendly. There wasn't as much over grown under brush and there were more and more rocky outcrops. 

We came to one very nice, open, rocky area that had a fire pit on it. You could tell that people use this spot as a resting area and a place to have lunch. We could see the lake from the top of this rock but there was no path and no easy way to get to the lake from here. Now we could see why the family we had met the day before were not able to get any water. The trail really didn't reach any of the shores at any point. You could probably climb down this rock and reach the water but there was no guarantee that you would be able to get back up again. By this point, Carsten was running low on water and I had drank more than I usually do on a backpacking trip of this distance too. 

We spotted the 3 km sign not long after this. We were happy to know that we were a little over halfway to our destination. 

We came to a log bridge that had a stream running under it. The moment we took our first step out onto the logs we were met with a swarm. At first I thought one of us may have stepped on a bee hive or something. But luckily that wasn't the case. Instead it was a swarm of Deer Flies!! I couldn't believe what I was seeing. There were about 60 or 70 of them all over the place! It may not have been bees but it wasn't much better. 

I had never seen anything like it. There were about 30 to 35 deer flies all around Carsten and another 30 to 35 around me. We moved as quickly as we could across the bridge and headed into the forested area of the trail. The farther we went the fewer deer flies followed us. 

But then Carsten pointed something out. That stream we just crossed over with all the deer flies may have been our last chance to get any water. We sat down for a moment. There were still about 10 deer flies around each of us now. We decided that one of us would have to go back to get some water. I told him that I would do it.

So we took off our packs, I grabbed the water container and I headed back to the deer fly infested bridge. Oddly enough, when I got there, there was no new swarm of deer flies that I had been expecting to find. In fact, I was now down to about only 5 following me. I was confused by this but took it for the win. 

I brought the water back to Carsten and we sat down and waited while it filtered. As we waited we talked and joked about the deer flies. We laughed that the deer flies were probably waiting by the water hole like a crocodile would, knowing that an animal would have to come by for water at some point and then they would pounce! And we just happened to be that animal. Maybe they are smarter than we think they are. 

By now we were getting tired. More tired than we should have been. But the extra weight of all that water in our boots and in our clothes was making it uncomfortable and slow going. 

So when we saw the sign for 2km we cheered up a bit. Not long now, right? But then a thought occurred to me. What if the 2km was only 2km until this trail met up with the other trail? That would mean that we would have 2km plus part of the other trail to hike which could possibly be an additional 2km for a total of 4 km. 
​We had no real way of knowing. All we could do was just keep going. 

We only hiked about another half a kilometer when we came to the "You Are Here" sign that showed we had reached the part of the trail that intersects with the other trails. That meant that we had only about a kilometer and a half to go. That made us very happy. 

We studied the map for a moment or two. We had a decision to make. We could go right or we could go left. Both directions would bring us to the exit. But which direction was shorter? We figured that going left was the shorter route. Besides, going right would bring us to the look out tower. So that would mean more hills to climb. So, we opted to go left. 

We turned around to go down the left leg of the trail and that's when we noticed an old moss covered thunder box sitting right on the side of the trail. Carsten and I laughed. It was so mossy and run down that no one would ever use it. Plus it was right out in the open with zero privacy. It was right where the trails joined up so there was bound to be plenty of foot traffic walking right by you if you tried to use it. No wonder it was in disrepair. Even in an emergency, you would be more likely to try to find a place in the bush somewhere than to try to use that thing. I found it strange that they didn't have one at some of the actual campsites on the trail, but they did have one right here at the junction. 

We were now on Echo Pond Trail. We had hardly gone far, when to our amazement, there was our mom sitting at the side of the trail waiting for us! We could hardly believe it! 

She had come with an empty pack and offered to take some of our stuff for us so that we could lighten our load. She also had brought snacks and cold water for us. Plus she had the car waiting for us in the parking lot. She is the best mom ever! She is always thinking of others and how to help them, and I love her to pieces. 

I asked her how she knew which leg of the trail we would take (because we could have gone right instead of left at the sign) and she said that she just figured we would go the shortest way and that this seemed to be the shortest. I asked her how long she had been waiting there. She had started the trail about an hour before we met up with her and hadn't really been sitting there too long. Maybe half an hour or so. 

The three of us walked together for a bit and exchanged stories about how our last couple of days had been. Mom told us about a partridge and a rabbit that had been visiting her every day at the campsite. 
​ 
Mom and I were slower to walk and were enjoying the scenery. The path was now easy going and we stopped often to take pictures. Carsten was eager to get to the end of the trail so that he could finally change out of his wet boots. So, he walked on ahead without us. 

We had just gotten past the 1 km marker when mom and I saw some movement in the bush. Over to our right were a couple of partridge. Bot does this park have a whole lot of partridge! I think this had to have been my 7th or 8th time seeing them on this trip so far. There were 2 of them but they didn't want to be seen like the others had. So they hurried off further into the trees, making it harder for us to see them. 

We also noticed a pretty little Northern Azure butterfly. It was difficult to get a picture of it because it didn't want to sit still.

The trail took us along the shoreline of a lake. I had hoped to see some turtles, but I didn't see any. I did see some beautiful white water lilies though. 

At long last we got to the parking lot. It was about 1:30 pm and the sky was grey. We were expecting more rain anytime soon. 

We got to site 205 where mom had already been camping for the past few days. So her tent was already up. Carsten and I quickly put up our tents before it started to rain. The ground was tough clay and was difficult to get pegs into. I chose to put up my larger, orange, tent that I brought along specifically to use on the main camp ground.   

It had more room to stand up in to get changed, and I was able to set up a chair in there so that I could sit and read a book at night if I wanted to. It was so nice to get into some dry clothes. I had to wear my beach shoes because my boots were completely soaked and would not be dry any time soon. 

After getting into dry clothes, we sat at the picnic table for awhile and ate lunch. While we were doing that, some staff members came and took down the post that holds our permits. They said that they were replacing them with new ones. They didn't come back that day so now we had no place to put our permits. 

While mom and Carsten rested, I took the car and explored the park for a bit. First stop was the office to let them know that we were back. Second stop was the park store. The store was nice inside and the staff greeted me the instant I walked in the door, asking me if I needed anything.  I purchased a sticker to put in my little park passport book, as well as a couple other odds and ends.  

The next place I went was down to the day beach to see what it was like. I parked the car in the parking lot and walked down a wide path that opened up to a grassy area. Here I found a circle of benches around a firepit. 

Just beyond the fire pit was the day beach. It was a beautiful, long, sandy beach. There were a good number of picnic tables and there was room for plenty of people.  But with the weather the way it was, there weren't many people there at that moment. 

Back up on the grassy area there was a children's playground. It had a jungle gym, some swings, some baby swings, and some metal rings to climb and swing on. 

The day beach and the campground beach connect up with each other if you want to walk from one to the other along a large access way that follows the shoreline. Eventually it brings you to the pet access area that they just newly added. 

Well, it wasn't so much as they added a new section as it was that they took an existing section and zoned it as the pet exercise area. But there is nothing wrong with that. It means a nice sandy beach for the dogs, and picnic tables for their human companions. 

When it started to rain, I decided to head back. After all, I didn't have another pair of dry shoes and I didn't want to risk getting these ones soaked too. 

When I got back, I found that mom and Carsten had put up a tarp over one of the picnic tables. We hadn't brought a dining tent with us.  Now we were able to play a few games of Qwirkle at the table. 

When it was supper time we decided to take a drive to the near by town of Cartier and eat dinner at a restaurant. We found a place called the Pine Grove Restaurant and ordered our food as take out. Then we sat outside under a shelter at a wooden picnic table. The lady who owned the restaurant was super friendly and the food was wonderful. The wooden picnic table had 4 sides of benches instead of just two. My mom told the owner that she liked the table and the lady said that "Teddy built it". So kudos to Teddy!  You did a great job on the table! 

When we got back from dinner we decided to dry some of our clothes in the laundry room of the comfort station. Carsten had no dry clothes to sleep in and mom had a couple things that were wet too. Plus the mosquitoes were terrible at this point so it was a good excuse to get inside and away from them. So we gathered up our loonies and quarters and put on a load. I thought that it would take two cycles to dry everything, but it only took one. So the clothes were dried rather quickly.

The comfort station itself was not overly big. It was well lit and had stairs leading up to it. When it rained real hard there was a bit of flooding on the top of the stairs because one of the eaves troughs needed fixing. 

Inside, the stalls were stainless steel. My mom had told me that the staff had washed the bathrooms earlier in the day but that they had used a dirty, smelly mop and that the water they were using was not clean. She said that they could really do with new mops. The floor of the bathroom and the musty smell in there confirmed what she had told me. The bathroom didn't really feel clean to me. That's the problem with stainless steel. It leaves streaks and water marks. So the doors and walls looked streaky. 

When the laundry was done and folded I carried it down the road to the campsite. As I walked I could see the shape of some sort of bird on the road. It was starting to get dark so it was just a dark blob at first. 

As I got closer, I realized that it was the partridge that mom said had been visiting the campsite. Sure enough as I followed it down the road, it turned into our campsite and continued on past the fire place and then into the bush. 

The rain was starting to fall again and the mosquitoes were relentless. Even in the rain they just kept coming. So that made the decision to go into our tents and go to bed an easy one. It had been a long day and we were ready to get some rest. 

​I had enjoyed the backpacking trip but next time, I think I will make a point to go in August when we aren't in the height of bug season.