Although there have been few comments to Sunday 18 May blog, I have
had some email queries.
Where is Minesing and what is a swamp.
It is a "9 Mile Portage" or 15km west of Barrie, just west of Highway #26/#28.
We may all have seen swamps on TV and the act of "seeing is critical.
From a canoe the view is poor, from a kayak almost impossible! The
Minesing Wetlands are flat - whether flooded in April, "OK" on May 18,
or low water in summer-fall. And bare in mind that the Nottawasaga drops
300m in 120km but is flat in its midsection, the swamp, something
I can only dream about! On Saturday, it was difficult to know where we
were going without a guide to help. Richard did a great job with patience
and humour.
We took Willow Creek from #28 put-in some 7K down stream to the "lake".
The creek was usually 4-5m wide with low banks and low grasses so from
a canoe we could "see" fairly well. Still it would be possible to go wrong
at places - how wrong I do not know. The lunch break came at the end of
our Willow Creek section
The "lake" is filled with floating mats of green and narrow water ways
that loop back and forth in frustratingly short distances so that a
"crow flight" of 3km is easily 5-7k if one paddles the open water. The
mats are floating as we discovered when we had to get around a fallen
tree. (Some trees can take a brief stand in water in Spring.)
After the Willow and its black water joins the Nottawasaga with its
muddy brown water, the course is that of a river - mostly, there were
some flooded sections where we paddled through the trees around log jams.
The birds in the May 18 blog are turkey vultures - maybe so named because
they appear like turkeys when they roost in trees. I took some pictures of
swans - maybe trumpeter, difficult to tell.
The animal in the tree is a porcupine - the first I have seen since 1991.
