Whitney Lake and Chicken Hill Lake

In late August, we had the chance to paddle and swim at Whitney Lake, in the Whitney Lakes Provincial Park, and then scouted out Chicken Hill Lake, just NE of St. Paul.

Whitney Lake

Whitney Lake is a circle-shaped lake, about 1.5km in diameter. The best access is through the day-use area at the Whitney Lake Campground. The signage coming from the west is pretty good. The signage coming from the east is less helpful and the entry-way is just a nondescript gate that is easy to overshoot. Once inside the park, follow the signs along the winding road to the boat launch.

There is a boat launch where you can drop beside the water and park. It has a concrete ramp (that could use some repair) and a dock as well as room on the side for a beach launch. The nicer access, though, is off the main beach.

This requires a carry of about 50 meters to the water. There are pit toilets, a playground, a marked swimming area, picnic tables, and a picnic shelter here. Overall, this park could use both some renovations and a larger cleaning budget. The beach had a noticeable amount of garbage on it (old inflatables, shoes, cans--really unusual for a provincial park). Camping at Ross Lake would be the better option.

The water was super clean and the swimming area had a nice sandy bottom. We went left (west) off the beach and follow the shoreline around. It took us about an hour and we travelled about 4km. It was 34C that day and we were bushed by the end.

Despite being the slow season, the bird watching was good with an osprey, four cranes, and 40 pelicans passing overhead.

I wouldn't say this was the most interesting paddle in the world, but no complaints. After we got back, my wife took a swim and said the water was lovely.

Chicken Hill Lake

In scoping out this trip, one of the possible back-up lakes I noticed was Chicken Hill Lake, just NE of St Paul. The lake runs NW-SE and is about 5km long and maybe 400m wide. We drove out in the evening to have a look around. There is a small campground in the north end with a boat launch.

The lake has dropped appreciably since the launch was installed and the cement blocks are now located well inland of the lake edge. I am standing on the end of the cement launch in the photo below. Beyond that, it is just sand to the water.

There is a floating dock and there were people out on the water the evening we were there.

The water quality looked pretty low to me so we decided to take a pass. This might just be an August thing?

Given the number of lakes in the region, I probably wouldn't bother to go back here.

Ross Lake and Laurier Lake, Whitney Lakes Provincial Park

In late August, we visited Whitney Lakes Provincial Park. We had the chance to paddle Ross Lake and scout Laurier Lake.

Ross Lake

Ross Lake is one of the four lakes in the park and a lovely paddle.

There are a couple of places you can put in. We decided to use the boat launch on the western shore. There was a nice cement ramp and a dock, pit toilets, and parking nearby. There was also a loaner life jacket station here.

The water was super clean and try was a snap.

The water level is higher than it once was and there is a fringe of dead trees around the lake shore that makes getting out tricky. We went left (north) off the launch and paddled the perimeter of the lake.

This is pretty representative of the shoreline. It was crazy calm the morning we were there and there were a few other paddlers out but no motorized boats.

We went around the small island in the north end of the lake. I was able to render aid to another boat.

This part of the lake was a bit weedier than the southern basin and there were a lot of fish jumping.

The eastern side of the island has a narrower passage.

There are two beaches in the campground that you could launch from. The main beach is on the SE corner and includes a playground, toilets, and swimming area.

There is also a smaller beach on the southern shore, where we've gone swimming in the past.

There is a day use area on the SW corner but this is set about 5m above the lake and has no easy water access (???).

Overall, this was a spectacular paddle on a lovely lake. It took us about an hour to around the perimeter and, if you can only put in at one lake in this park, Ross is the lake to go to.

Laurier Lake

Just north of Ross lake is Laurier Lake. Laurier is the largest lake in the park. We took a drive to two launch points on the south shore to see what they were like with the thought of perhaps paddling to the north end and trying to portage into Borden Lake.

There is a boat launch at Bluebird Beach, but the water there was in the midst of a blue-green algae bloom.

We then went up to the day-use area jus to the west of it. Again, there is a boat launch.

And again with the algae. Maybe next time!

Google suggests it may also be possible to get into Borden Lake on the west end off Township Road 564, but we didn't have a chance to suss that out this trip.