Day 9 - Neville Lake to Makami Lake ( 14 km)

Maps provided courtesy of Toporama which contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Canada. I have marked my route in blue and portages in red. 

When I awoke to boil water for our coffee on Day 9, the gorgeous weather from the previous evening was still with us. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. 

We assessed our location and situation while eating breakfast. Surprisingly, we had one bar of cell service at that campsite, and a check on the VIA website revealed that our train was about 4 hours behind schedule on its journey from Vancouver. If the train were to continue at that pace, it would arrive in Gogama at 4 AM two days later. That gave us two full travelling days to reach Gogama which was about 44 kilometres away -- easily attainable in normal conditions. We could arrive in town at the end of Day 10, check into a motel near the station to get some sleep, and wake up in the wee hours of the following morning to catch our train. 

We consulted our maps to plan the remaining two days. Unfortunately, campsite locations would make the last two days of the trip somewhat unbalanced. While researching the trip I learnt that the last remaining established campsite before Gogama was on Makami Lake. That was only 14 kilometres away from our current location on Neville Lake. If we stayed there that evening, we would have to paddle a distance of 30 kilometres on Day 10 from Makami Lake to reach Gogama. That is not an unreasonable ask by any means; however, the journey would be hampered by what the weather forecast for Day 10 was predicting. It was showing rain and strong winds with a chance of a thunderstorm. This was rotten luck because we knew we would have some time on the large waters of Minisinakwa Lake to reach Gogama. A late arrival there in heavy winds and stormy weather could be dicey. 

We had a simple choice: either take what the route and Mother Nature would hand us and have a long day on Day 10, or go further downriver and bush camp somewhere on the lower Makami River to reach Gogama earlier in the day. This could possibly allow us to avoid stronger late-afternoon winds. After some discussion, we decided on the former. Bush camping at the height of mosquito season was not appealing. Besides, we weren't entirely sure what the lower Makami  River topography would offer us. It might have swampy banks for the majority of the distance and a viable spot to camp may not even exist. Furthermore, we would be paddling downstream on a river. The lower Makami had no major rapids or falls that I was aware of, so we wouldn't be slowed by portaging or scouting. In fact, the high water levels would probably give us a nice push in the current and help us knock off the kilometres easily. We would just have to get up early on Day 10 and get downriver as quickly as possible. Besides, we hadn't had a single poor campsite on the trip thus far. Why ruin a perfect record with a nasty bush camp on our last night?!?  

That decision allowed us some leisure time on the morning of Day 9. We enjoyed an extra coffee or two and aired out some of our belongings in the morning sun while enjoying the views of the lake. 

I snapped a photo of our temporary island home upon our embarrassingly late departure at almost 11:30 AM. 

We made our way south on Neville Lake and rounded a headland on the eastern shore to re-enter the Somme River and its final drop to reach Mesomikenda Lake. 

We found the take-out marked with a large portage sign at the top of a rocky chute. It looked to be a mandatory portage and it ended up being a lot more work for us than we had anticipated. 

To start, it was hard work just to access the take-out and get our gear ashore due to recently fallen trees blocking the way. 

Secondly, the last half of the portage was inundated with deadfall. Much of the deadfall was still green; a recent storm hitting the area must have led to some mayhem there. We were forced to drop our gear, pull out our saw, and go to work. We ended up removing a couple of medium-sized trees that were crossing the path and removing the branches on a couple of larger ones to allow canoeists to go under or over the impediments. 

We spent over a half an hour on that portage, far longer than we expected for a 180-meter carry. I snapped a quick shot of the base of the rocky chute behind us as we paddled out into Mesomikenda Lake. 

Immediately, we realized we had emerged from the wilderness and had returned to cottage country. There was a bowrider bobbing in the far reaches of the West Arm of Mesomikenda blaring music. A young couple were diving into the waters off the boat and taking a dip to cool off in the heat of the sun. They hadn't noticed us until we were quite close to them. They must have been a little shocked to see a red canoe seemingly pop out of nowhere on a shoreline that had nothing but trees. I'm fairly positive that they thought they were all alone in a hidden back bay of a fairly unpopulated lake. We were just grateful that they had clothes on! It would have been rather awkward, otherwise. 

We trolled the length of the West Arm with no luck and gave up when the bay grew wider and approached the main part of the lake that we had to cross. 

We needed to cross Mesomikenda Lake to the northeast to access the Makami River which would carry us to Gogama. It was a scenic crossing. The sky was dotted with fluffy cumulus clouds and some dramatic hills rose on the northern horizon.  A tree-studded island filled the channel heading north. Thankfully, there was only a light breeze making the crossing easy. 

On the eastern shore were some esker-like cliffs of sand. A collection of fishing boats was concentrated off an island at the mouth of the outlet to the Makami River. We thought about joining them to cast a line at an obvious hotspot but we didn't want to cramp their style. 

We made our way into the outlet bay and saw a berm and a hydroelectric dam ahead of us, marking the start of the Makami River. 

There was a portage sign tacked to a tree to the left of the dam next to a large warning sign with some ominous images on it. We took out on the large boulder there and rested a bit while we ate some lunch wraps.  

While we were relaxing, a summer resident of Gogama wandered over to chat with us. He was there with his friends and family members exploring the dam area and had arrived on some ATVs. 

After finishing lunch and saying goodbye to our new friends, we portaged across the rocky berm and made our way down to the put-in where we could see the Makami River make another rocky drop across a small bay at the base of the dam. If one could ignore the massive warning signs all over the place, the view downriver was very scenic. 

Out in the small bay, we turned to get a look at the hydroelectric entity that we had just bypassed. 

We paddled for two minutes before taking out again on the right. There was a small ledge at the top of the rapids there. The rest of the run was quite rocky and the last drop at the bottom also looked a little dicey. The portage was wide, well-used, and clear, so we made use of it. 

After putting in, we fished for a while at the base of the rapids, but there were a lot of rocks to get snagged on. This happened to me while we were in a bit of a current. My rod bent back in a hurry and the immediate tension on the rod snapped the rod in two before I could even flip my bail to release the tension. In one fell swoop, my fishing opportunities vanished. Doh! Lesson to be learnt? Don't fish in shallow waters while drifting downriver! At least it happened on the second-last day of the trip and I had already gotten a good amount of fishing in during the trip up to that point.  

The shoreline of the pool at the base of those rapids was rocky and dramatic. It was a beautiful area. However, we didn't linger because the lovely cumulus clouds that we enjoyed earlier in the day were now thickening into greyness. That, coupled with the high level of humidity, boded rain. We wanted to get set up on a site before any wetness arrived. 

We continued northeast and the rocky shoreline gave way to swampy lowlands as the river widened and became more shallow. We noticed a couple of old hunting blinds along the southern bank. 

It was nearing 4 PM and the river widened further and eventually became Makami Lake. We began looking for a viable campsite to call it a day. My research indicated that a site existed at the far northeastern edge of the lake, however, we came across a well-established site on the southern shore about halfway down the lake on one of the few rocky points in an otherwise bushy area. We immediately agreed to make camp there to take advantage of the lovely rocky shelf and southwestern view from the site. 

While setting up camp, the grey clouds blew away and the sun emerged once again. On the bright side, it wasn't going to rain; however, for the remainder of the afternoon, we were inundated with horse and stable flies. The weather had become astonishingly hot and humid, so we attempted to remain cool by jumping into the lake at half-hour intervals.  We attempted to air out our sleeping bags and dry off sweaty clothes in the afternoon sun, but the humidity certainly wasn't helping with that. 

At the back of the site was a rocky cliff overlooking a small bay that existed behind the rocky point that we were camped on. Someone had built a firepit up there, as well. There was a clearing near that cliff which would hold a number of tents for a large group. It was a pretty amazing site! 

With the frequent swims keeping us cool, we enjoyed sitting in our chairs at the rocky edge of the lake, sipping on the remainder of our whiskey on our last wilderness evening of the trip. Somewhere in that span, we rehydrated some spaghetti to eat and cooked it over our camp stove. It was too bloody hot for a fire.  

A family of loons kept us company by paddling about in circles not far from shore. Something larger was also keeping us company across the lake on the opposite shore. We could intermittently hear it crashing about in the bush to the west of us. Although not terribly concerned about it, we kept an eyebrow raised in that general direction, hoping the source of the noise was alces in nature rather than ursine. The noises subsided and whatever the creature was, it moved on. 

When the sun found its way behind the tree line across the lake, the air cooled to a bearable level but was still hot by nighttime standards. There was little wind and we knew the mosquitos would soon be out in force at those temperatures. We planned for an early start the following day, so we retired to our shelters in the waning light of the day just after 9 PM ahead of the emerging hordes.