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Quick report out on our trip before I write up the official version:
Good time had by all, though we returned a little battered & bruised. Low water for sure. Should have been there as soon as possible following ice out on Kesagami (and tried to leave earlier but a work thing prevented us from doing so). So - UKR - about what we expected + great weather and very few bugs. Up Newnham Bay battling some fierce north winds. Crossing K Lake went fine - a bit windy and choppy. Port into Partridge was as expected - squishy and muddy. Upper river was shallow and boney and then became a bit more paddle-able. Decent paddling past the lakes, more headwinds. Then, where the best ww should have been, we spent 2.5-3 days dragging boats through rock gardens with ankle deep water, and over shale shoals that chewed the bottoms of our boats like a cheese grater, then over all the ledges getting around Bear Island (left channel). Past Bear Island it was largely paddle-able again - a few more long shoals to drag over. Two junky buggy riverside raised shelf campsites, but the rest were good. Windbound for an afternoon as we pulled out into the Bay and couldn't make any headway. Second attempt left us sitting in the sand for 7 hours waiting for the tide to come back and float us out. But that cold north wind kept the bugs away... and had us all teeth a-chattering. When the tide came in, we zipped across to the west shore of the Moose for a lovely last night, and then up to the train without incident. As usual, there were copious quantities of whatever makes we hedonists happy, and though we went 3 days longer than our Plan C, we did not go hungry, thirsty, or get low. Put-in on Sat May 27, take out / train out on Monday June 12 - so 17 river days if you count the train day (which is mostly just waiting for the thing to leave), with no layover days - which would have helped - the dragging was pretty physically taxing. Cochrane to Maine was a 16 hour marathon drive, and Tom is just now pulling into his place in Virginia, having left here about 14 hours ago - that's a long solo. Some fish caught, croquet played, & stories swapped. Very remote feeling - virtually no sign of human passage or presence. Big fires were way south of us, and north wind was driving all the smoke south, so we only knew about it bc someone mentioned it in a garmin post. One custom-made double-blade and a stainless steel plate were lost in a tragic tidal dish-washing accident. Film at 11.
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"There is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats." - WATER RAT, The Wind in the Willows
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