Frontenac Family Canoe Trip

Friday 21 - Sunday 23 August 2009

 Background

I joined the YCCC last spring to get in some whitewater day trips away from my usual life as the father of a 3 and 6 year old.  However, as a family, we  have been lucky enough to get in 4 trips already this season.  Our third trip took place on Aug. 21st in Frontenac Park.  I posted  the trip on the calendar to get some other families to join us, but unfortunately we had no takers.  The club is interested  in offering more family involvement, so I’m looking to give you the flavour of our experience in hope that others will join us next time.

The Itinerary

Aug 21 - Take Friday off from work and hit the park at a reasonable time.  The park is 2 hours away.  Entry point to the park was Big Salmon Lake.  3.5 hours in, with 2 easy portages.  Camp on site 13A.

Aug 22 - 2.5 hours of work (paddling and portaging) to get into Little Clear Lake.  Camp on Site 9D.

Aug 23 -  2 hour trip, with 1 portage, to get back to the van.  Back home for dinnertime.

Day 1

One final check for the weather.  There were reports of tornados in southwestern Ontario and around Toronto, and storm warnings up the 401 east of Toronto, but at 9 a.m. the weather report said the storm had passed.  We drove through hard rain until the park gate, and then the sky was clear the remainder of the weekend.

We hit the water at 2:00.  Frontenac has nice easy portages.  Here are  my kids having a snack at the end of the first portage.  The kids are sitting on my secret tripping weapon: the hockey bags.  The bag on the left has a nice Big Agnes family tent, four thermarests and sleeping bags.  The bag on the right has all the remaining camp toys.  All food goes in the barrel.

After another little portage we found ourselves on Big Clear Lake.  This is a really clean beautiful lake with craggy rock all along the edges.  You are at the edge of the park and you don’t really feel like you’re totally getting away from it all, since there are cottages and farms across the far side of the lake.  At night you see many lights across the lake.  13D is the biggest pod in the bunch, and the site is terrific for swimming.  This lake has a rocky bottom and all the 13 pod sites are great for swimming.

The site has a nice big rock, which is really nice for kids to fish from, if you don’t mind prying the sunfish off the hook every 2 minutes.

We bring some fishing rods, one with a hook and one with a cork and a washer.  The 6 year old doesn’t bring any toys and the 3 year old brings one toy truck or car.  Note the picture below, the kids make entertainment with what is at the site.

Day 2

As we went up the waterway back into the park we realized the water is super clear with lots of cliffs dropping down at least 20 feet down in the water.  The dark objects in the water beside the boat are fish swimming.  This would be a great place to have a snorkel and fins.  You could play for hours.

Below is a picture of some more cliffs.  If you are a daredevil there are some great places to jump into the water.  Spectacular scenery.

After  a total of  two 700m (give or take) portages of a moderate difficulty level, we came out to Little Clear Lake.  This lake was clear enough, but the bottom was mucky and it wasn’t really good to swim in.  The campsite on the far north side of pod 9 was really nice. It had a huge firepit area that could seat 15 people.  Unfortunately, while the park allows 6 people per site, the tent pad only holds a 4 man tent.

Day 3

We don’t like to have too long of a final day, so we planned for a 1km portage and an hour (or so) of paddling to return to the van. 

We’ve found it best to have one parent to do the campsite work and one to keep kids occupied. The picture below is a good example of some entertainment for the kids.  Note the cool beach house and the classic parking for the McDonalds Happy Meal Car.

We returned to Ottawa on the curvy paved roads to make the trip fun in our van and to stretch our legs in Perth.  There is about 20Km of roller coaster ‘woo’ driving to get to a major highway.  If you get the speed right the kids say ‘woo’ on every corner and rise.  Too fast and you’ll find yourself launching into the ditch.  The trip back to town on the dirt roads through Westport is also a good adventure, but you’ll probably need to wash your car and canoe straps.

The  System and  Lessons Learned

Bigger portages require a system.  More bags equal much more time on long portages since you need to walk back and forth.

You probably want to have a parent stay with the kids during the portages.  Don’t expect the kids to walk back to get a second load, and have a snack and some swimsuits ready for the far end of the portages.  One parent looks after  the  kids and one parent schleps the stuff.  

Keep lifejackets on to protect kids from rocks and tree roots.

Get a big  boat.  Not only do longer boats have extra carrying capacity and space in the middle to walk around, they also have 2 inches of extra width on the bow seat.  If you are in the bow, expect to have someone want to sit beside you while paddling.

Leave extra time on your agenda for mishaps and meltdowns.  If kids go into high maintenance mode, the stern may end up paddling solo.

Water and snacks are important for everyone.  If kids start acting funny, give them food and water. If you as a parent are getting short of temper, you probably forgot to drink or eat.  To avoid having to pump water all the time, we now carry one of the water bottles with a built in water filter.