Stuck in the BOG: Rediscovering a Lost Canoe Route

The White Lake Wilderness area has been on my radar ever since moving to Nova Scotia. The appeal was the proximity to the city, the amount of lakes and the overall lack of information. Having a weekend in September, Dave and I head out on a route that loops through the lakes north of Admiral Lake. The trip would be approximately two days and include 22 unmarked portages that we had very little information on or even knew existed. We're at Eel Pond which is the access point going into the White Lake Wilderness area. Tonight we're gonna head to Salmon River Lake and then from there we're gonna head to Admiral Lake and do a loop through the wilderness area. Hey everybody, I'm on the first portage between Eel Pond and Little Eel Pond and it's very apparent that nobody's walked it in a very long time. All right we're back on track. After that bushwhack we found this trail. It's probably about dinner time now. We'll get to our site as the sun sets and get a nice fire going. Oh baby, made it before sundown. You guys saw that. That was a burp trout. Instead of the average oatmeal we are doing burrito wraps. Pre-fried beans, hash, eggs, and cheese. Not too bad, not too bad. This morning we camped out last night on Salmon River Lake. Today we're going to take a series of portages. First one being pretty good up to Admiral Lake and then through there we're hoping to find an old old set of portage trails that leads us through Spider Lake, Pine Lake and Red Lake and eventually tomorrow bringing us back down to Admiral Lake effectively making it a loop and rediscovering an old portage trail while we're at it. It should be an adventure. So we've come to the north end of Admiral Lake and we're currently looking for a portage into Wildcat Lake and we know it's somewhere here but now the trick is finding it and it's worth finding it because it's pretty ugly bushwhack through there so we'll take I'll give it a drag abs. The trails are here they're just not marked but they are where they should be. They're not in the worst shape either considering they're not used that often. At the end of all these portages there's all these stash boats that look like they're from the 1950s. Some of them have a wooden base. We're thinking that this next lake we're gonna set up camp and just relax for the rest of the day. Maybe go for a swim, do some fishing, have a grand old time. Spider Lake! We are on Spider Lake. No campsites here so it's a make your own style. We found an island. Yeah Spider Lake! We found an island that has a cool chill zone but we don't know if there's a area for our tents so if we can figure out a place for the tents this would be awesome. We're trying something new at the campsite tonight. We are cooking, I don't even know what you call this, it's like a brie. It's pretty much five pounds of brie cheese, onion, pear, walnuts, a little fig jam. Oh we got some walnuts in there. Can't do this with the camera. We just had ourselves a hearty breakfast and now we're going to continue onwards to finish the loop. We have about 10 portage to do today so yeah another fun day, a lot of portaging. We're looking for the portage leading to Sparrow Lake from Red Lake. We're looking for anything that resembles human. Oh old cut log here which is a good sign. How did you get there? Now onto the slog. We just did the bushwhack there but that's not it. Now we have to go through this still water which is more of a bog because the trail just ends. So this is going to be a new phase of this portage. I see a deep water channel. One, two, three. I wonder if we go closer to the shore if it'll be a little more sturdy. Or more water to float in seems to be more of a path. Yeah. One, two, three. One, two, one, two, three. Getting deeper. Oh so this way. I think we're through. There's a big opening there. That must be the lake. I hope so. That'd be nice. Oh yeah this is it. This is what it's all about. Nice. The trails on the side of the loop are a little harder to find. Not as much maintenance. Hopefully it gets easier the closer we get to Admiral. But these are tough. White Lake Wilderness Area.