West Canada Lake Wilderness - Day 179

  This was going to be a long day if I made my goal because all the miles were on trail, and all in the West Canada Lake Wilderness. It rained in the night. Actually, it rained the previous night as well. Other than having to pack up a wet tent, the worst part was that all the shrubbery and ferns were holding water, so I got pretty wet hiking in the morning. My camera got pretty damp too. It wasn't happy about that. It did recover, but I had to use the phone to get most of these pictures, and it takes forever to transfer and integrate them into my filing system. (That's part of the reason it has so long to continue the catch-up posts.)

This picture gives a good sense of what the morning was like.

But the day cleared, and I was glad because there was just one beautiful scene after another. This is Brooktrout Lake.

I had been noticing on the map that the trail seemed to go right across South Lake. I assumed that was a slight error in the mapping. Nope! The bridge looks iffy, but it was fine. This was another surreal, fantasy moment.

Then the trail crossed West Canada Creek. This is a stunning bit of scenery. It reminded me of the Agamok on the Kekekabic Trail in Minnesota.

Here is the view from the bridge.

My goal for the night was Pillsbury Lake. There was a shelter there (I prefer to sleep in my tent, but that meant there would be a clearing), but it was a Saturday, so it might already be taken. I made it to Pillsbury Lake, and the site was free! I have since learned that you aren't supposed to tent near a lean-to. But there was no one else there to care. Well, except for a million blackflies. That night was the very worst of the hike with those little horrors.

I have to show you my food cache for this night. I'm pretty proud of how high and how isolated I got it. Maybe I used a skyhook. (old joke) Seriously, that little orange bag looks like it's just floating up there!

I met two backpackers on this section. They were the only other backpackers I saw in the entire Adirondacks.

Miles today: 11.8. Total miles so far: 2274.9.

See Wolf Creek