My First Trip into the Wilderness | Bowron Lakes
My First Trip into the Wilderness
Guest Blog | By Larry MacDonald
For my first wilderness experience, I felt intimidated given I am a type C personality (a very detail-oriented individual who likes to be involved in things that are controlled and stable). This was so far out of my comfort zone. I had done a number of camping trips, but I was never more than a 20-minute drive to the store. My son (14 at the time) and I decided in 1985 we were going to canoe the Bowron Lakes. I made lists of what we needed, and it was long. More than we could carry so we peeled back what we could do without.
I bought a canoe, and we took some lessons at Pitt Lake in early spring. Part of the lesson was to tip over the canoe then right it and get back in. The water was freezing cold and I thought we were going to get hypothermia, but we survived.
Later in the spring, we did a trial run for 2 nights to make sure we had everything we needed. That trial run allowed us to lighten our pack by another 15 pounds. Now we are ready.
It was a full day drive up to Bowron Lake. The first thing we did was to take our canoe over the long uphill portage about 2km. There were places along the trail that you could stop that and rest your canoe against a stand. On my trip in 2018, some of those stands were still there, but they allow wheels on the trail now and they are not used. We dropped our canoe at Kirby Lake, returned to the car, and set up camp for the night.
The next morning after breakfast we set out. I was glad we carried the canoe over that first portage the day before. On the trail, we met a couple of Americans who thought they had a great plan. They carried their packs to the halfway point and then returned for their canoe, then they would do the second half. Not a bad plan except they should have taken the canoe first not their packs. While they returned for their canoe, bears got into their packs and destroyed or took all of their supplies. So not 1 hour into the 6-day trip they had to quit and return to the lodge with nothing but badly torn packs. I never saw them again; I hope they were able to resupply and start over much wiser. Thank God, one lesson I did not have to learn the hard way.
We made camp that first night at Wolverine Bay on Isaac Lake. We met another father and son, Gord and Tim from Port Coquitlam. We traveled with them for the rest of the trip and later Gord and I did some trips together. We had never met before that day, but we had connections we did not know about until later.
All of the campsites now have steel boxes to store your packs, but then there were bear caches for your packs. It consisted of two poles strung between two trees. You climb a ladder stored your packs for the night on the poles.
I will fast forward to camp 3, past a couple of moose (plural?) swimming across our path, past a bear and her cubs at the edge of the lake, past water so clear you can see the bottom at least 20 feet down.
At the end of Isaac Lake, we camped just before the only part of the circuit that has rapids. They are not beyond most people’s ability to navigate (well except for my second trip, to be discussed later). We decided to take our packs over the portage and canoe through the rapids in case we overturned. We made it through dry and picked up our packs on the other side.
Our next camp was on Lanezi Lake at a campsite with a sandy beach, you would think we were in Florida. This was our first chance to take a bath and trust me we needed it. At this camp, we met up with Steward from Christ Church New Zealand. He was traveling solo in a kayak. Our group of 4 became 5.
The next camp, second from last is my favorite camp on this trip. Sandy Lake is fed from a number of glaciers and we had an extremely cold creek running right by our campsite. The one luxury I had in my pack was two bottles of beer. We place the beer in the creek so it would be cold by dinner time. We also had one package of jello. We mixed that up and placed it in the creek as well. Dinner was “boil in a bag” actually that was every dinner, but this dinner was special. After our usual main course, my son and I enjoyed jello for dessert. You have no idea how great jello tastes after 5 days. But the best was yet to come. My son and I sat by the fire and had our first beer together. I am not saying it was his first beer, it was the first beer he and I had together out in the middle of nowhere. Something that I will treasure until my last days. This became a tradition I have kept up on Bowron trips 2 and 3.
Our last night was spent in a patrol cabin at the head of Bowron Lake. This is the first time we have slept inside. The group of 5 met a family Dennis and Murial from Fruitvale BC. Our last day was uneventful and we arrived back at our starting point. We said our goodbyes to our travel mates and head for home.
Just one last memory I want to share. My son and I stopped in Quesnel for a meal. Remember we have not had a bath since Lanezi Lake, and we have not had meat for 6 days. My son and I sat in this café stinking to high heavens. We both ordered the cheeseburger and fries. When our meal arrived, I can clearly recall making pig sounds as we devoured the first real piece of meat in a week along with fries and catchup. I do not recall a burger tasting any better. I wonder what others in the café thought about to roughiens smelling up the place make strange noises, but I am sure it is a common occurrence.
A long story, but it is one of many very great memories I have of trips to the middle of nowhere.
