An unexpected treat
The roads were much clearer on Saturday morning, yet the sky remained overcast. It was expected for another 5cm were to fall - nothing major, so we decided to try something a little more ambitious. We headed for the 4595m portage to Blackfox Lake. This trail starts just behind the Trailer Sanitary Station @ km 35.6.
Jeffrey near the trailhead of the Blackfox Lake portage
We arrived to find the turnoff ploughed in, with only enough room to park two vehicles. This added roughly another 200m to our journey, which was unexpected but posed no problem. We geared up and started from our car next to Highway#60. There was an old snowshoe/sled trail that we followed up to the trailhead. Someone had been through the area in the last week.
It was just after 11:00am that we came upon the marsh that is the beginnings of the portage. Years earlier I had scouted out the location and was warned of having to 'paddle' the beginnings of the trail(during the spring). However, all was frozen over and we were able to traverse across the ice. There was a new detour that had been cut and was signed, but we elected to take the more direct and level route. As we reached the end of the marsh crossing cracking ice could be heard, yet we all arrived safely on hard ground.
Grey Jay along the Blackfox Lake portage
As we started the trail proper, there were a few fallen trees that had to be circumvented, this wasn't a problem except the displaced falling snow was heavy and made for some frozen necks. The trail continued along through coniferous forest, the trail becoming very narrow at times. At one point we stopped to photograph a grey jay that was in a tree nearby, when we noticed some moose tracks in the snow, they wandered off into a clearing off of the portage. As we stood there and pondered what to do next, a long drawn-out wolf howl split the air! The sound pierced my soul, sending shivers down my spine and raising the hair on the back of my neck. Both Sean & Jeffrey were in awe as well (Sean had never heard wolves in The Park before). It sounded so close and to hear a howl at midday, we felt so privileged to have been witness to such a fantastic aural experience.
We wondered if maybe the wolf had sensed our presence? We decided to 'track' the moose, following their trail though the open forest. Going off trail, the snow was even deeper, however the moose tracks were easy to follow and there appeared to be many of them, at least five moose. In some cases we found flies in some of the tracks of the moose, they were still alive trying to fly out of the deep holes (That they had fallen into) that the hooves of the moose had made.
Next came huge melted depressions of snow, with some strands of fur and more flies. Some had clumps of fur. The moose had bedded down for a stretch of time. We moved along excitedly examining each depression. This was the best nature walk yet. We also found urine and scat piles along the trail. It seemed the moose had rested and we speculated that we might have possibly disturbed the moose and they had moved on? Better yet the moose had moved on and the wolves had caught their scent and were pursuing them?
Portage signage on Blackfox Lake
A black & white view of Blackfox Lake from the portage
I voiced my excitement exclaiming that if we were supplied and set-up to winter camp, we could have tracked the moose, maybe eventually catching up to the group. Maybe even seeing moose-wolf interaction. The possibilities seemed fantastic. We turned around at some point as we were going too far away from the portage and the moose trail we were following descended in a moose-like manner into a valley, to tricky for humans to follow.
We re-joined the trail crossing a marsh where I broke through ice, but managed not to get my boots wet. The trail crossed a second marsh via a boardwalk and then into some upland forest. Along this section of the trail were tracks of a wolf that went almost the rest of the way to the lake. By 3:00pm we reached the lake and we walked out onto the ice which was covered in a layer about 5 inches thick of fresh snow, below this was a layer of slush.
Sean & Jeffrey prepare for the long trek back to highway#60
We walked about halfway up the lake to within sight of the summer campsite and then decided that 3:45pm had come pretty fast and it was time to turn around. We headed back moving fast over our broken trail. We made the trek back to our car in just over 90 minutes, arriving in darkness back at the car at 5:30pm. We drove back to the motel in darkness, stopping in for some subs and suds as we settled into our motel rooms to watch more hockey on TV.
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