Elk Island National Park - Beaver Pond Trail

We missed a weekly hike after our trip to Cooking Lake earlier this month – my runner’s knee flared up and I wasn’t confident that it was feeling well enough to risk another hike. Both Mom and I suffered for not getting out into nature – by the end of that week, both of us were feeling out of sorts and depression was sinking in. Fortunately, despite an already busy weekend, we managed to get out this past Saturday morning for a final trip out to Elk Island National Park.

We wanted to finish the group of trails we had originally planned on doing this summer within the park – you might remember we had to bail on our previous attempt at the Beaver Pond trail due to hordes of mosquitos. Not a single mosquito this time! It helped that it was very windy and chilly out (we both wore hoodies/coats and even brought gloves and toques just in case!). Autumn has definitely arrived.

Beaver Pond trail is fairly easy with only minimal hills; with a distance of approx. 2.5 miles it took us just over an hour. You get some wonderful views of the ponds/sloughs/marsh areas and there is definitely beaver activity! We didn’t see any active wildlife other than some ducks and we heard a few geese getting ready to fly south for the winter. Similar to the other trails in the park, the pathways are not very wide – basically enough room to walk single file with an occasional wider spot to walk side by side. Personally I love it because it makes you feel closer to nature and like you’re definitely in the wild.

We saw a number of people on the trail this time around – maybe Saturdays are busier? However we also took time before the hike to do the Bison Loop and saw A TON of bison. There was also a number of solo bison hanging out in number of spots along the road so we ended up starting our hike later than usual.

That’s likely it for us in terms of hikes to Elk Island this year. As our pass has expired we have to pay the daily rate and that could start to get expensive so the last few we’ll do this week will be in some of the Provincial Parks or recreation areas. Still lovely and plenty of nature to hang out with!

 

Cooking Lake-Blackfoot Provincial Recreation Area

This week's installment of my weekly hike series takes us to Cooking Lake-Blackfoot Provincial Recreation Area. We opted to start at the Islet Lake staging area. Note that this PRA has 4 different staging areas or entrances: Central, Islet, Waskehegan, and Blackfoot. All the trails however are interconnected and you can travel all over thru a plethora of combinations.

As with most of the trails we've visited this summer, the trails are wide and very well maintained. Mosquitos were at a minimum although we did get a few bites each by the time we finished up.

We strted on the High Line trail, crossed over towards the lake on the Middle trail and then back to the staging area via the Lost Lakes trail. All total we hiked about 5KM. A bit longer than we originally had planned but a lovely walk nonetheless.

Very little wildlife (other than a few loud kayakers. There were plenty of times where we stopped and realized we hadn't heard any birds or chipmunks for quite a while.

Not much in the way of berries along the path we took either - no raspberries to be found, nor any bear berries. However, I did come across these luscious looking gems which made me think of the choke cherries we used to eat when we'd roam the woods as kids. Mmmm, choke cherries.... 

I'm guessing the reason we didn't see many berries was because, as the signs warned us when we entered, we were in bear country.

A bit of wetlands along the way but mainly forest (at least along the trails we took).

Mind you, the view at the end is certainly worth the wait (despite the blue green algae).