Long Lake, North Access

In mid July, I drove up to Long Lake, just south of Athabasca and west of Highway 2. I'd previously paddled here out of the Forfar Recreation Park on the southeastern shore. This time I want to try the Long Lake Campground operated by the county of Athabasca on the northern end of the lake.

The campground is small with three sites, fire pits, and tables plus a very dark pit toilet. The boat launch is steep but you can unload right at the edge of the water and park 30 feet back. The launch is sandy and shallow but quickly transition into weeds. The water was pretty clean, although maybe not as nice as Narrow Lake, immediately to the north.

The northern half of Long Lake is pretty shallow and has speed limits for power boats. 

The bottom half of the lake is deeper and has more boats. On the eastern shore is the Forfar Recreation Park campground, which has a day-use beach and boat launch. This was nicely kept and there is a fee for use. 

The rest of lake is basically this: a mix of aspen and fir. The western shore was a bit sandier than the eastern but neither was particularly notable.

There were a lot of loons on the lake. I saw at east four different pairs as I worked my way down and they were loud.

I also saw a moose browsing in the weeds along the shoreline. She seemed mostly disinterested in me (I was a long way out) and eventually moved off into the trees.

Overall, a nice enough lake. I hear it gets busy with boats on the weekend and there were a lot of boats on the campers-only beach just north of the public beach at Forfar. I was there early on a week day and only saw one boat on the water. I'm not sure I'd go back--it was almost two hours each way and there are a lot of nice lakes within a two-hour drive. But, if I was in the area, I might take it in or go back to Narrow Lake.