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canoebase.com:
Wilderness Canoe Tripping
Wells Gray Provincial Park, Aug 17-24, 2002 --
Clearwater/Azure Lakes Trip Report
Comments: <hank@canoebase.com>
Four of us, John Snively, Alison Elliot, and Laurie and Hank Hays, headed from our homes near Portland, Oregon up into Central British Columbia's Wells Gray Provincial Park in mid August for a week-long canoeing getaway. The drive is about 550 miles one way from Portland Oregon, an easy long day in John's Ford Explorer. We had two canoes on the roof, and food and gear for a week. Tighter restrictions crossing the Canadian border from the US since the 9/11/02 event didn't bother us. We had our tents up in one of the campgrounds at the southern end of Clearwater Lake well before dark.
We're in the western portion of this large Provincial Park where three long, skinny, glacially carved lakes at about 2230 feet above sea level, surrounded by four to nine thousand foot mountains (with some snow), are the main features. Other lakes to the east and west, still in the park, also offer good canoeing and canoe camping experiences.
Clearwater Lake and Azure Lake are the two we spent time on this trip. We cheated a bit and gave ourselves extra time by paying for a water taxi, a motor boat shuttle to the other end of Azure Lake, so we could just paddle our way slowly back to the launch site. Motor boats are allowed on these two lakes, but there have never been enough when I've been there that they're obnoxious. The power boaters we had contact with were all invariably friendly and polite. I hope that trend continues.
Clearwater Lake is about 15 miles long and runs north and south. Azure Lake is east and west, also about 15 miles long, and connected to the north end of Clearwater Lake by a mile long river section from the east that the motor boat shuttle can navigate. Two hours on the boat and we were dropped off at the Rainbow Falls Campground just short of the east end of Azure mid morning on Sunday the 18th. There were a couple of other canoes there already, and also at least two power boats. Several campsites were left, though, and we chose one. To the right is a picture taken from in front of our tents looking west along the length of Azure Lake. Click on any image to see a bigger version, usually with some accompanying text for more info as to what you're viewing.
The main attraction of this campsite is the short hike to Rainbow Falls, a cascade maybe 40 feet high on Angus Horne Creek coming into the lake from the southeast. There is a very narrow canyon above the falls containing many more falls. We hiked up it maybe a half mile, quitting before we got on top where the gradient eases up. The trail is steep and not well marked after the first few hundred yards. There are no easy views of the creek so we turned back to camp. John and Alison fished at the creek mouth without much luck. Caught one small rainbow right away, but tossed it back, expecting more. Not even any more bites. We heard later that no one was getting many fish on the lake though. Other couples and small groups came in and I think the campground was full that night. There was a short rainy and windy spell about midnight.
The next morning we paddled up to the end of the lake where the Azure River flows in. We paddled on up the river maybe a mile, having to get out and walk the boats up a short stretch not far from the lake because of shallow, fast current. The Azure is very dirty water, snow fields and glaciers put a lot of silt in the stream. We saw lots of moose, deer, bird, and bear tracks in the fresh mud along shore. There's a picture to the right of a string of bear tracks with some human ones along side. Back to camp for a late lunch and John and Alison tried fishing, again unsuccessfully. A hike later in the afternoon, after a short sprinkle. We just walked up the moraine left by the glacier that deepened the valley back in the latter stage of the last ice age. Steep, but fairly open forest. Mature hemlock and cedar (climax forest) growing on soft moss and lichen.
We packed everything up and headed down the lake the next morning. Crossed the lake to the north shore in a bit of wind so stopped and took a break and ate a snack at the first spot we could after crossing. Farther down the lake we looked at Garnet Falls, then pushed on to a lunch stop at the next campground. It was full of tents but no one was there, we think the people were a group we saw day tripping to see Rainbow Falls. We used a picnic table and the outhouse, then on to our own next campsite at the outlet end of the lake. There were a couple other boats already at Indianpoint campground, but John's favorite site was empty so we took it. Not a lot of room, but it's a pretty spot. To the left there's a picture of Alison next to her tent out on the end of the narrow point.
We all took showers or quick baths. We used stove heated water to fill a solar shower hung from a tree back in the woods. Afterwards John and Alison paddled a couple hundred yards for some fishing where the lake turns into a river again. Several strikes, but only one rainbow brought to shore. Richard and Michelle, a Canadian couple from a suburb of Vancouver we had befriended at Rainbow Campground, showed up and stayed the night. A fun couple with lots of stories.
I got up as the sun was just starting up the next morning. Richard was just pushing off to fish some before they left to head on towards their final campsite. A little later I snapped a digital picture of him trolling solo in their wood canvas canoe. That's it above and to the right.
After breakfast Richard and Michelle started packing gear while the rest of us headed across the lake to the portage trail between Clearwater and Azure. The river can easily be run downstream between the two lakes, but the current is fast enough that paddling is usually very difficult coming upstream, so most people utilize the easy half mile long portage trail. It turns out that it's even easier now as the marshy spots have recently been bridged with a boardwalk (with stairs!) and some trail widening has taken place in narrow spots. That picture to the left is of Alison and Laurie walking ahead of me on the wide boardwalk.
We waited at the Clearwater Lake end of the portage until Richard and Michelle paddled by, then walked back to our own boats. John and Alison decided to try and fish again at the outlet, and Laurie and I joined them several minutes later, after stopping for a few things in camp on the way by. We just sat on the beach and pestered them with fishing jokes while they reeled in fish. They were biting finally. You can click up a bigger picture of Alison with a short stringer of rainbow trout from that one to the right that shows just her fish. We watched a loon family fishing and getting a few, too. Fish for dinner that evening for all.
John and Alison tried fishing early the next morning again, but not much action. Only one small one, which they released. We packed our gear after breakfast to move on, and then tried fishing on the river again after leaving the lake. One decent sized rainbow for the effort in working the mile or so of river.
We stopped at the trailhead for the hike to Hobson Lake, another long, skinny, north-south lake to the north of Clearwater Lake, and walked maybe the first mile of the trail. It hasn't been used recently as the footbridge over Lickskillet Creek (love that name!) was washed out a few years ago. It's an eight mile hike (one way) and we hadn't planned on going all the way, anyway. Back to the boats and on out into Clearwater Lake. We headed for Archer Campground on the west shore, stopping and looking at a couple other camps on the way. Archer was full, so we paddled across the lake and ended up in the last available site at Huckleberry Campground. There's a picture to the left of the canoes of some of the other groups pulled up on the beach.
The campsite next to us contained two couples from Calgary, Alberta, who were testing their new strip cedar canoes (shown in the picture above).
Pretty things, but people take too good care of them in my opinion (I *use* my boats). We had a fairly pretty sunset for our only night in this campground. Up and packed the boats after breakfast and slowly paddled down the lake, checking out campsites on the east shore as we went. There's a picture looking west at Alison and John on the still waters of Clearwater Lake early that morning. Few people in most of the other campgrounds we looked at, though there were more canoes visible at some across the lake. I guess we just chose the popular ones, this trip. We talked for a while with the roving ranger in a power boat at one campground. He updated us with recent happenings and changes in the Park.
We had planned to spend one more night on this lake but now decided to head for the car instead and do some sight seeing in other areas of the Park for the rest of the afternoon. We stopped for another break at Cariboo Campground shortly before reaching the boat ramp and I took a picture looking north along most of the length of Clearwater Lake from there (picture to the left). Packed the car, loaded the boats, had a late lunch at a picnic site just down the road, and then spent the afternoon looking at rapids and scenic waterfalls on a couple rivers in the Park before heading on to a campsite in another Park two hours closer to home. No trouble with the border crossing again the next day (we had our passports with us, which helped), but a traffic accident on the Freeway between Seattle and Portland caused an almost three hour delay getting home. Our welcome back to wonderful civilization!
The Photo Gallery Page has all the pictures taken on the trip in gallery format.
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