3 NIGHTS ALONE IN THE WOODS - Solo Summer Camp

Hey guys how you doing? It's an exciting morning. I drove a few hours to a new spot. I've never been here before and I've done some research and talked to some people. Turns out I can do a canoe trip here. So I got a map. I'm gonna be out here for a few nights. I'm not really too sure. The beauty about this place is I don't have to tell anybody where I am. I don't have to reserve campsites or lakes. I can stay on them for as long as I want. I can take as long as I want. I can bust through it if I want to. So yeah it's all up in the air. I might do two separate camps might be three four who knows my fishing rod are supposed to be splake brook trout and Lakers here so I'm hoping to hook into a couple of those guys have some fish meals have some time by myself have some big long portage is some rest time so here we are at the top end of flak lake at the lodge and we're starting off here we're gonna paddle southwest to our first portage so I'll go into the route with much more detail later on but right now I got to get on that water and get over to my first portage i forgot how responsive and quick this boat is i haven't paddled this one much this year i've been paddling my adirondack uh swift pack boat but uh yeah people have been asking me why i haven't been using this one and just the simple fact that like my other one is proven um i can get the the yoke on and off easier it has a different yoke system this one has a screw-in yoke into the into the gunnels the other one just pops on and so it's quicker but i do like this one it's like it's very nimble it's quick i feel confident in it it's very very stable and i haven't used it i want to use it spending some good solo time oh you know what why am i not fishing why am i not trolling in here this is a big lake this is just the access lake we'll fish in this all the time for lakers and whatnot so control that cc shot behind us and see what happens if we catch one it's just going back but who doesn't want to catch a fish man it's a nice day it's a huge break and relief from the this very sunny hot days we've been having as of late a fighter hello he's a champ dude this guy is not giving up little bass got him in the corner i'm happy with that i came upon that fallen tree there and i took one cast i got him he's going back in it's too early i gotta portage almost two kilometers to get uh into the first lake that i'm potentially camping at so there's no way i'm bringing them with me but i got them on a deep diver deep diver just casting it right into the uh to the fallen tree cool it's a good sign again there's not gonna be bass on those back lakes people people boat into this lake and have there's a couple cottages and that lodge i started on and stuff so like it's obvious that there's bass in here people like to put bass into lakes where they're not originally from even if this really was originally here they're not back in there i know that i wish they were because then i could almost guarantee myself some fish the trout this year at this time of year are going to be down deep right it's hot it's summertime today is an exception where it's not very hot so maybe maybe i'll get into the brookies today i think Astonish Lake the first one that i might be able to camp in is stock of brookies like uh stacked stacked with brookies not stocked um and i might camp there it's it's 10 30 now i've just been poking my way along this long lake still in the same lake there's a little fire tower uh trail if the fire tower is still there if i can access it i might go hike up it bring you guys with me again i like this i like being at my own leisure and not having a commitment even when i'm by myself sometimes in other parks like Killarney or Algonquin or something like that you still have to go where you say you're gonna go you still have to get to the campsite or at least the lake that you say you're gonna be at right right here yeah friggin Dante's Peak here in the foreground pretty epic check okay well all right well I found the trailhead old Baldy five clicks says it's steep and uneven and all sorts of fun stuff you know what seeing is how it's like not even 11 o'clock in the morning it's only about really a two kilometer or broken up two kilometers of portaging to get into that astonish Um I think I might might do this. I pull over go do this hike So I'll bring my camera with me bring a little bit of food. Maybe I'll have lunch up there But yeah, sounds like sounds like a plan smashing a Clif Bar. I'm so glad it's cool out. Sounds like there's a stream rapids or a waterfall or something to my left here. So this is the trail that I'm on you can tell that it's not often walked Relatively grown over but there are these markers on the trees, which is helpful so that's nice and they look relatively new funky lusher so believe it or not this tree in front of me is a birch tree it's actually a yellow birch it's really old and they get these big plates the bark they're still super flammable it just changes the way it looks completely a lot of times it gets this little pinkish hue on it hope that'll show up but yeah right there that one too the mosquitoes have seemed to find me found me the mosquitoes have seemed to found me the mosquitoes have seemed to have found me mosquitoes found me stay here oh blueberries sweet one at least those the third one's junky tasty there's not too many it's pretty early i'm surprised maybe these ones just got some sun all right this lookout's here so tasty that's all it is up here the whole ground cover is blueberry oh nice wow okay this is worth it the hawk screaming in the distance pretty awesome guys pretty epic i was starting to second guess my decision to come up here but um yeah i'm happy I did sit down for a little bit and have something to drink and some jerky and some blueberries Now that is a big old bear poop full of berries See how the berries are see all the berries in there. That's black bear poop for sure no doubt in my mind You couldn't convince me otherwise sharing bears berries sharing bears berries anyways I am somebody sent me Chad sent me a Clip of two bears grunting at each other and stuff, and it sounded just like what that mysterious noise was on my last trip so probably gonna vote for bear on that one i worked up a sweat i've got this breeze on the lake trying to cool me off my shirt off and paddle across and get that first portage first real portage i'm happy to see that there are portage signs here i wasn't sure because it's like uh it's a non-operating park slash crown land area that's the whole reason for the freedom so i didn't expect there to be signs but that is a huge bonus for me this is what i was talking about with the yoke it's not a big deal my other yoke would have been on and it adds up but it's not it's really again not a big deal we're done my backpack has my camera and my tripod in it now and it also has this life jacket weighted down to the back so she's pretty heavy let's see how it goes i've not been able to single carry this boat very well before but i think it's because i always left the seat up this time i tucked the seat down so yeah this is heavy all right here we go as you can see I don't have my backpack on. I'm pretty disappointed in myself. I couldn't single carry that almost 500 meter portage. There's a few things I can think of. My backpack is way too heavy. It could be where I put this paddle is still obstructing where my backpack goes and it's knocking off back and forth. I just heard it at first. It could be that I'm just not used to it yet and it could be all three of those things. So I'm sweating buckets. It's almost 1 in the afternoon I I'm a quarter of the way done for today so I still have like an 850 and over a thousand meter portage to go and if I have to double carry all those it's gonna take a while it's gonna take a lot of energy out of me I really I'm gonna try and get my boat portage which is just a short paddle across this lake okay I may have spoken too soon about the portage signs I've been paddling around trying to find it I can't find a sign at all I can't really find any evidence of it but my gps and my my map is telling me it's right here the problem is we're about this thick and muck that i can't even step in because i'll just sink right down i won't be able to continue to walk it's like quicksand um so i'm on this little patch of land i'm gonna have to like skateboard my way over uh hopefully to the portage i'm gonna pick my way along yeah i can't step in it honestly it's multiple feet of just just muck this isn't even that late in the year like i know it's summertime but holy smokes did i make it i made it now to find out if this is actually the portage or not portage where are you okay i don't see anything cut and i don't see any signs of a sign what the heck Is this it? It's gotta be it, okay Well, go back to the canoe, grab the map and try to uh see if I'm just like running right perpendicular to it or not because I don't don't know what to do here, this is, this is where it says the portage is for sure. Look at this, not even a resemblance of a trail and just uphill, uphill and rock, I cannot find anything resembling a trail. Now my GPS here, it's telling me that I'm directly on it, I'm on the right route and everything, it says the exact route I'm doing it says I'm half, I'm smack dab in the middle of the trail, there's absolutely nothing that indicates a trail, like nothing. I can't bushwhack up all through there, like it's just too, too thick and too high, too much elevation. I gotta find this real trail, I just, it might not exist anymore. I don't to not even have any resemblance of a trail though, is it's very strange, yeah this ain't it man, big old rock, big old cliff, this is not the way I'm feeling defeated, bummed out big time, I don't get it, the lake is tiny, my GPS is telling me exactly where to be. My map is telling me exactly where to be. I'm there. I was over it five times. Even where the portage is, where it says it is on here, it doesn't make any sense. It's like right in the middle of a marsh next to like a huge huge outcropping. Normally they would go around all that stuff and you just walk a little bit farther instead of going up all that incline. It doesn't make sense. Not too bad. I only got one foot wet so far. That's a plus. I'm sure I'll be very wet by the end of the day. Okay, so success. I found it. It just goes to show you that The GPS is off and the map, well the map is whatever, it's relative, but the GPS, I was on that line. I was nowhere near the trail. I got out, I struggled back to my canoe, got in the canoe, came down like 50 yards, and there's the trail. And I see the portage going up into it, so I have to remember that, that my GPS isn't directly on spot. But anyway, I burned a lot of energy doing that, so I'm eating a little sandwich, have some peanut M&M's somewhere, and then try and single carry this 850. Wish me luck. Okay, I don't know man. I can't get this canoe to balance properly with this backpack on Thought it was because of the seat, but it doesn't seem like it is. I have to hold the nose up with my paddle Anyway, we'll make do Well, I'm on the big last portage of the day 1000 meter. I can't single carry I have to leave my boat here. I i uh i think it's topping out like it's the top of my backpack it's hitting the seat still regardless just because of the way that that boat is i don't i don't ever remember having good luck single carrying that boat and even when i'm when i'm carrying it with no backpack on it still wants to tip forward a bit so and i can't adjust that's another thing i don't like about not having the adjustable yoke because i can't put it forward or backward to adjust for being off balance so it looks like i'm gonna be double carrying this this whole trip don't get me wrong i did test it at home to try and see if it worked everything was fine at home but i didn't have my food bag in the in the backpack when i was doing because it was in my fridge and that's it's a big chunk of it so i imagine it's not the weight but i imagine this the bulk of it like the height it grows in height and uh and now it's topping out my my green canoe is fine with my orange bag i haven't tried it with this bag i think it could be the bag too as you know i've had that orange bag for years and years i've used that single carry no problem um but that bag got broke and gave out now it's a new bag so it could even while it's supposed to be the same bag it could even be that the dimensions are off and uh the frame is higher i don't know but it's not working believe me this isn't even that much of a uh incline of a portage not too much elevation on this one and i can't carry it it's not it's not the weight it just keeps pushing down nose keeps pushing down i have to i can't fight it the whole time it's no good so anyways last portage of the day excited to get to camp try to catch some brook trout relax a bit oh man i cannot tell you how happy i am to be on this lake sun just came out i'm super grateful it was out it was away all day too because i did a lot of work today it's five o'clock now busting my butt to get in here so let's go find a camp and if i knew that i had to double carry if i knew i had to double carry and everything i wouldn't have done that first hike up the uh the Lookout Trail there but anyways we're at camp we're at the lake within good good time anyways five o'clock plenty time to find firewood and cut up cut it up and you know the whole camp thing let's go find camp got a deep diver on just trolling i'm in no rush to get to the camp oh can see it actually there's the camp there i think there might be a couple camps on my map it shows one but i think there might be a couple camps on here because this is now crown land for sure and people would have just made camps left and right so you know what i'm seeing is um i do remember hearing in the research for this trip that there's a lodge on 10 Mile Lake which is down a few lakes south of me and they keep up the portage trails and they put up the signs and stuff i completely forgot someone had said that so that's why they're there they're not Ontario parks signs some of the portages are orange it's not the same as Ontario Parks but anyways they are maintained and uh and marked which is a definite plus for a non-operating slash crown land part i'm gonna troll around the lake look for any campsites i can find pick the best one and uh yeah hope you get a fish on man we have fish for dinner tonight that'd be great i was told there's good brook trout in here so we'll switch it up if this uh little deep diver doesn't work his home sweet home glad to be here awesome site so I've already circumvented the lake I look for all the campsites there's only two and this one far blows away the other one the other one is rudimentary compared to this one so I think I'll put my tent back up in here I gotta get something to eat while I'm doing that a little snack and then get food 'cause I'm starving 6:30 this site has a little bit of firewood already but I noticed as I was paddling around the lake all the deadfall sticking out of the lake like the old cedar uh stuff is it's all cut so finding wood like for firewood the finding wood might not be the easiest thing here that's okay I'll certainly get by no fish either I I caught all right I fished the whole way I uh I cast along the deadfall and I and I trolled the whole way back and I had no luck whatsoever not bite there's a couple different spoons I used a jig and I used deep diver no Lakers on this like just brookies but I heard it's supposed to be pretty decent for brook trout I've given up thinking I'm gonna have one for supper tonight happy but I'll still get out and fish after I just had to take five minutes to sit down here I've been going all day you notice things when you sit down take it all in I saw a mouse run by let's go just across the trail that way so I'll have to make sure I really do keep up on the food diligence can't leave anything laying around. Those guys are more of what I'm worried about than bears to be honest with you for food. My ursack, my Kevlar bag with me. So I will tie that real tight at the top so he can't scurry down in there and nibble my goods. I also noticed that there's no wind at all. The bugs have died down. This is a good spot on this peninsula for the bugs. Pretty exposed for a thunderstorm which we are supposed to get. Again we're supposed to get Wednesday but maybe it'll happened tomorrow seeing as how uh the weather has changed it wasn't supposed to be like this today at all like i've been saying it's nice man it's nice being out here i'm so blessed i'm so lucky to be able to do this listen i only drove like two hours from home i decided i wanted to do it a couple days ago my wife's totally cool with it this is my job i'm able to come out here you got because you guys you guys watch this stuff support me i'm able to make this my job throughout the summer coming canoe camp whenever i want to you know that was part of the the reason to move up north was so i didn't have to travel so far um to do videos and stuff like that and and it's been doing good it's been it's exactly what it is but i haven't really explored new areas too much and this is definitely a new area i love it i'm so stoked on this area near the Mississauga Provincial Park off to the west of it and some crown land Blind River-ish provincial park but if anybody's from around it's it's certainly a place to check out there's no one here I couldn't so I tried to book I knew I wanted to go do a big trip I tried to book a trip in Killarney to mimic uh the trip that Ken Kyle and Doug and I did like I don't know man five six years ago right it was a pretty good trip but I was so green then and and I really didn't know much and I wanted to go replicate that so I booked I figured it out whatever and I called the book you couldn't get anything in Killarney there's no way to even connect the route right now because it's so booked up right so like the lakes that you have to book to stay on would be so far away from each other because those are the only ones open i looked on the online on the map online it was all red like two or three lakes had green that's a big part um there's no one here there's no one here at all you know what i mean if i can get into some fish this will be perfect so i'm gonna take it take it at my own pace gonna do what i want to do i have uh i ate some granola and jerky and M&M peanuts when i got here but i do have something new i've never had before Happy Yak Express Mandarin Beef and Rice so it's pretty good for you got it at sale it's 16 bucks for this one because it's like good quality or whatever but uh yeah we'll cook that up in a little bit i'm gonna get the tent probably set up now maybe go get some firewood i just had to sit here i just had to take five you know i mean it's a nice day man it's been so hot lately it's been so hot lately. Alright, I'll go back with you guys shortly here. We'll probably set up the tent. Let's set up the tent. That is a good pitch. Nice and flat. Nice and tight. I'm good. Pretty happy with that outfit. It really starts to come down. Take these storm ones, pull them out even farther, peg them down, but probably not going to need to do that. Quick, I want a few of those to get in. Uh oh. Alright. That looks great. Gotta get these boots off. My feet are soaking wet and I can feel them starting to like blister up trying to go lightweight on this trip so about the I brought the old neoprenes for camp shoes like I do sometimes mosquitoes are back unfortunately I'm gonna get some bug spray going get a little fire going oh pruney is the day is oh yeah holy smokes let these guys air out for a minute before I put on the neoprene good thing is it's pretty warm weather and I assume the rest the week is going to be way hotter than today so being wet is not that big of an issue to take care of them i do have band-aids and whatnot but try to keep them from getting too messed up my feet normally don't do too bad but i think with these thicker socks last couple trips i wore these thicker socks and i've been having problems so they'll have to go back to thinner we're lucky to have a good pile of firewood here imagine it's been rained on for a while well it'll still burn It might not be the greatest to start the fire with that's not too bad actually But we got this one nice piece of dry driftwood. So we'll cut this up, too. I Only have my Silky saw this trip For tools and I have a new Deering Sammy Puuko I'll show it later on but it's really really a slick knife made by John Jonathan Deering check him out on Instagram Deering Knives this stuff is bone dry here whenever you see me putting the sawn wood up to my mouth like this pressing against my lips to feel for moisture your lips are much more sensitive to it you can't feel any in that one and any of these i can't believe how much it's cooled down honestly i like i'd be swimming normally right now i'm sure some of you are asking yourselves self why does joe have a plastic bottle a plastic disposable throwaway water bottle well for this reason and in case my filter fails as i'm sure you guys can appreciate it's hard to really get anything these days unless you're ordering it online and i don't really want to do that too much but my other filter is gone my wife and i went on a little canoe trip the other day and she misplaced it this is my old one it has a hole in it already and the filter is super slow so i'm concerned that it might slow down on this trip or not work or what if i lose it so i brought drops as well uh Aquamira type or aqua yeah Aquamira type drops um but i need a container to put them So I can I can put them in this and this is lightweight I'll carry this around empty So that's that's my reason for having that as opposed to like analogy where it's much heavier And I don't really need it for drinking so this says for um it's French mode to employ Express or Express preparation add boiling water mix well seal bag and let stand for 15 to 18 minutes stir once or twice then it says mode to employ optimal or optimal preparation combine the cold water and the contents of the bag simmer two minutes on low heat stirring often cover remove from heat and let stand for 10 to 12 minutes stirring once or twice so that's what we're gonna try to do you don't cook these in the bag I don't think maybe you do but I'm not going to cook it in my pot here oh it's foil maybe you can no I'm sure you can actually oh no you have to cook it you have to cook it that's what they're saying so for the fast okay that's what it is so for the fast like uh mode to employ express you just put boiling water right in here but there's no point man this looks good like for real like there's actual um big chunks of beef real vegetables smells delicious actually pretty excited on this so no oh cool little baby asian baby corn too nice no uh no packet no throwaway pack it no all right perfect right happy yak so we're gonna add to add the 350 mil 375 mil that's about 375 of cold water nice and soupy that looks really good i can't i can't believe that how good that looks happy yak man if this tastes as good as this as this looks i'm gonna be doing all right sixteen dollar a meal all right well i think because it says to simmer it first for a couple minutes let's just use the bush buddy right now we'll get the fire rocking after but um let's just get the bush buddy going and then do a little nice uh small fire and simmer simmer simmer simmer all right i'm just gonna let that settle down a little bit and we'll throw it on for a couple minutes all right it's time it's time it's mandarin right from beast time beast went up pretty easily was not rehydrated got a bean got a green bean there's like a citrus like an overall orange taste i guess mandarin the beef doesn't rehydrate properly this fire is picking up some heat surprise surprise I'm gonna get to eat this up and try to get out and fish for too long it's just after 8 now imagine right now is about the golden hour 8 to 9 maybe well would you believe that I'm not having any luck fishing I have circumvented the lake this side of it at least this set up fishing all shallow getting snagged like crazy fishing along the shore but it's all still too it's all too shallow getting snagged like crazy so I guess I will troll on the way back switch it out now I guess I found the portage for tomorrow it's just over there don't know maybe I'll put a paddle tail on a soft like soft swim bait type thing on get it down just keep paddling around the lake it's very nice out it's nine o'clock now seems to be a little bit of pink in the sky but the clouds are just taking it over like crazy this is a good setup I gotta get some trout on this trip guys I gotta for my own well-being. This is my lake decent held back in let's go over there it looks like it's super dark more so than the camera is showing go over there there and this is super