Allochris's ultimate buildup thread!!!

[Billhilly]

Hey Chris!
Good to see you again. Was wondering how your winter was going (gone!). You've covered some ground again. (Natasha (friend from Smithers) spent her Summer cooking at a camp out from Bell II, interesting to see it mentioned here again. She will have spent most of the winter based in Pemberton again). Always interesting to see your photos. Just jealous as usual. And you can add competent Toyota mechanic to your CV by now too!
So long gone to Saskachewan eh! That'll be a little different/flater?! Never dull huh?
Oh, don't want to hijack, but I have actually have a photo for you....well two, from two weeks ago. Looks like your kind of country.
Google Earth 43 42'38''S 170 05'03''E
Safe travels.

[allochris]

Ya, it would be nice to meet your friend someday. Does she cook at fire camps up there in the summer?

As for Saskachewan, let's just see how long I will be here with my new "job". I wouldn't say long gone as my partner still has 1 more year for her master in Victoria. My new job has lots of travel component in it so at least that is something I'm familiar with. And don't be jealous, cause I'm actually still sleeping in the camper at work parking lot lol.

About the mechanic/CV thing, maybe I'll just wait until my transmission goes...(cause I think that's pretty much the only part I haven't changed yet!)

Would love to come visit NZ one day! My old collegue is from there too! Would be amazing to hike in the mtns with sheepies grazing on the land....

[Billhilly]

To be honest, I can't remember who she was cooking for.
I see some more miles being clocked up between Victoria, and Saskachewan. Only one more year though.
Long story, but we managed to get away for thirteen days. Flew to Christchurch, rented a horrible white campervan, and did 2500k around the West and South of the South Island. Good times. Never been down there. But next time I want 4X4! The Southern Alps were pretty cool. You would both love Queenstown and all that was going on there.

[Petrolburner]

Just finished reading your thread, awesome!

[allochris]

So here it was, the famous May Long Weekend that I never had off from work since 2006 during tree-planting season. This year definitely feels like a jail break! I had 3 days, no destination, but I knew I wanted to check out the lakes & rivers in northern Saskatchewan. Throw in my kayak, overnight gear, bike, & food, off I went! Solo mission!

Route Map:

Day 1: Saskatoon to Prince Albert to Weyakwin Lake.
A very uneventful drive in the prairies along farm fields up half way between Prince Albert & Prince Albert National Park, then farm land suddenly disappeared & “REAL” boreal forest appears! Trees are all skinny & about 20-30m tall. Mix of 85% spruce forest.



From the paved Hwy 2 North, I instinct-ly hopped on the gravel road 916 West & Rock Lake Road North and ended up camping at a gravel pit near Weyakwin Lake.







That night around 11:30pm, I saw my first “real” northern lights show in the sky! It lasted so long I stood out freezing my butt for well over an hour taking pictures. Lacking a tripod, I struggled between shivering and keeping the camera leaning steady against a kayak paddle & a stick! Amazing!

[allochris]

Day 2: Weyakwin Lake to Lac La Ronge to Stanley Mission.

Slept in really late, got up at 10:30am, back-tracked, & drove north on the Hwy 2. I saw my first black bear in SK! It was about 2 years old, hanging out on the road side until it saw me & fled into the bush.

On my way to check out the Montreal River x-ing on the gravel road 165 West, an overheated GMC Blazer flagged me down. After donating a bottle of water into their expansion tank, I continued west to check out the river. It looked paddle-able! Not too small. Next time!.

Continued north on the paved Hwy 2 for another 52KM, I arrived in a pretty town Lac La Ronge. First Nations are the 99% of the people I see here. And of course, there is the North Mart, serving the northern First Nation communities as always!








Not satisfied enough, I continued further north on Hwy 2. 80km of dirt road later via 915 East, I finally ended up in Stanley Mission! The town houses a decent size First Nation community. It’s pretty here & it resembles Tuktoyatuk in a way or another (w/ the exception of the lack of dogs here). Young kids were playing everywhere in the street. Some were on foot, others were on bikes, and of course, doubling on quads.








Seeing the bright white Holy Trinity Anglican Church (Stanley Mission Provincial Historic Site) across the water, I decided to paddle across to check it out. On the way back, wind gust suddenly picked up & it was a struggle paddling against the wind & waves to ferry across the river.












I camped at the boat launch that night. Despite the chill factor (around 5°C), I took out the lawn chair and gladly enjoyed a book under the setting bright orange sun.

[allochris]

Day 3: Stanley Mission to Nipekamew Sand Cliffs to Narrow Hills Provincial Park to Saskatoon.

After my fail attempt to wake up in the middle of the night to look at northern lights, I got up earlier next morning to get some driving time in for the return trip to Saskatoon. I back tracked south to Lac La Ronge on Hwy 2, then took the gravel road 165 East. There is surprisingly lots of logging and tree-planting activities happening up here. I stopped by the Nipekamew Sand Cliffs. To my surprise, it was very un-impressive. The 1st cliff was nothing more than a 10m tall sandy river bank eroding into the river. However, this river looks paddlable...all the way to Lac La Ronge!






Continuing east on the gravel road 165, I saw another bear. It was far away but it was big! I couldn’t distinguish whether it was a brown bear or a grizzly, but it ran into the bush pretty fast!



Finally hitting the paved 916 South, I continued to Narrow Hills Provincial Parks. From there, I hopped on the gravel road 120 South, passed by Candle Lake (cottage country for Prince Albert / Saskatoon ppl), and took the paved 55 South back to Prince Albert then Saskatoon.

Overall:

Total: 1273KM (Dirt/Gravel: ~450KM)
Gas: $222 @ $1.259-$1.299/L
Gas Mileage: 13.41L/100km (16.91mpg)
Recon: Tons of lake paddling opportunities. But limited rivers paddling opportunities and ease of access for drop-in/take-out. Montreal River and Nipekamew River are potential routes. All others one are too small in size!!!

Priceless:
1) Northern Lights
2) Paddling across the Churchill River to the Stanley Mission Church
3) Tons of Bumpy Long dirt road
4) 2 bears + a possibly lynx sighting
5) A pair of passed out First Nation Grandpa & Grandma in the over-heated GMC Blazer backseat

[fisher205]

Chris,
Check out the Churchill River. I fly in fish it around Pine Island out of Otter Lake. Great Walleye fishing and huge Northerns. Friends are going next weekend, I ust couldn't swing it this year. The old Trading Post Fort Robinson in Lac LoRange is worth checking out.

Brad

[allochris]

All right, we did a nice road/canoe trip last long weekend in North-Eastern SK / Manitoba.

Here's what Cat wrote about our trip:

In our last e-mail we wrote to you about driving on the frozen Mackenzie River in the Northwest Territories at 100 km/hr. This time, we left our down jackets at home, packed our bug nets and sunscreen and paddled down (and up) the Sturgeon-Weir River at a modest 7 km/hr. This was definitely a nice pace to enjoy the beautiful scenery and diverse wildlife of northern Saskatchewan.



Our original plan was pretty ambitious: 50km paddling down the Sturgeon-Weir River (with 4 portages) starting at the Leaf Rapids + 35km paddling across Amisk Lake ending at Denare Beach, near Flin Flon MN in 3 days. Had the river actually had some current, this may have been doable, but after a late start on Saturday, and a stormy forecast for late Sunday/Monday, we decided to backtrack on the second day. Paddling upstream was not difficult and we had a strong wind in our favour most of the way. Our travel distance ended up at about 36km (nice leisure pace ).

It was nice to simplify our trip and take it easy because visiting northern Saskatchewan by canoe is a completely different experience for me (Cat) who has spent most of her life in BC's mountainous landscapes. The sky is open, and the forests are super dense, mostly spruce, poplar, and bushes. The water is marshy and home to a lot of creatures including lots of bugs which means that the fish and waterfowl are fat and plentiful. Most exciting of all, there are pelicans here! Cat had no idea there were pelicans in this part of the world. They're big, majestic birds and we encountered a group of about 150 hanging out at the Scoop Rapids. The Scoop Rapid is a class 4 rapid with a big hole at the end. The pelicans spend their time in the rapids catching fish and letting the current and back eddies take them around in circles. In addition to the pelicans, we also saw big beavers who would watch us for a few moments then disappear under the water with a big Splash! of their tails. We were surprised to encounter a lot of bald eagles, perched in the trees watching us as we floated past. We also saw ducks, loons, and lots of other water fowl that we couldn't name. Some of the birds still had small babies, and one species of bird-babies run on top of the water when they're scared. It's really funny to watch them scurrying across the water with mom/dad swimming and flying circles around them to round them up.

Our paddling was good. This was Cat's first canoe-camping trip, and Chris' first in about 6 years. Chris steered most of the time, and we even managed to run the Leaf Rapids (class 2) in an empty canoe (after portaging our gear), which was an exhilarating ride. Cat got some nice air over the waves, in the front of the canoe!

We camped in a sunny exposed spot hoping for a breeze to keep the bugs away. The sunset was glorious purple and red. And as soon as the light was gone, black clouds of mosquitoes came out and decided to show us what they're truly capable of. With the impending storm, we both helped feed/breed quite a few mosquitoes in the time it took us to hang our food bag and make a dash for the protection of our tent.

The next day was hotter than the first and we slowly paddled up stream to the truck. A dip in the water was so tempting, but we saw too many big fat leeches swimming around so we settled for dunking our hats. Cat tried steering and we spent about an hour zigzagging up the stream. Finally we switched back and settled into a nice rhythm and paddled back. We had a good long swim near the Leaf Rapids later in the day where the current had a stronger flow, and then we paddled the final 2km back to the truck.

That night we drove past Flin Flon and camped on Simonhouse Lake in Grass River Provincial Park. The next day it poured torrents and we were glad to be driving and not canoeing, as we drove down through the Pas, across to Nipawin, and then down to Saskatoon.



Hugs to all of you!

Cat and Chris

[allochris]

ah ha@!
We r back!
Bringing this thread alive!
We r in Smithers cooking a feast for the next week + packing up the camper right now...
We'll leave tomorrow/Sunday for another ski adventure alaska bound!!!
Duration: 22 days!
Destination: Unknown! (But whereever the powder is good!!!)
Starting mileage: 417042km
Excitment: Super!!!