Paddling Rainbow Lake

We had our traditional Memorial Day paddle and picnic today with a great group of friends.  The paddle was on Rainbow Lake, which is good to do early in the season before all the motor boats arrive.  We put in off Clark Wardner Road at the west end of the lake.  There is a small parking lot on the left not too far up the road from Jones Pond Road.  And there is a trail right across from it that goes to the lake.  But there is a shorter trail back down the road closer to Jones Pond Road and that is where we put in.  That narrow section of the lake is full of floating bogs with neat vegetation.  There was lots of bog rosemary blooming (Andromeda glaucophylla in the Ericaceae), but I had a hard time getting a decent photo since the wind kept blowing my boat around.

We paddled up the flow then stopped for lunch at the campsite just as we were heading back into the lake. I did my usual wandering around in the woods and found lots of lady slipper orchids, including one where a bee was about to enter the flower.

This is the view from the lunch spot.

Then on to the take-out on Kushaqua Mud Pond Road where we had spotted the cars.  We paddled a total of seven miles.

Lady Slipper Orchid Hike

A bunch of us went to the Hayes Brook Trail this morning to see the lady slipper orchids (Cypripedium Acaule in the Orchidaceae).  We had to go a week earlier than we have done in the past because the blooms were earlier.  And of course I could not resist taking photos.  This bunch has 14 blooms.

 

And this one also has a seed pod from last year.

 

There were also bunchberry flowers (Cornus canadensis in the Cornaceae).

And More Wildflowers

You might note a theme of my postings this spring.  I'm trying to get back to learning and recording local wildflowers.  I'm posting a better photo of the Clintonia on the driveway.  Then there are forget-me-nots (Myosotis scorpioides in the Boraginaceae) that I'm seeing on our property for the first time, lots of Maianthemum canadense (Liliaceae) blooming, and the bloom of dolls-eyes (or White Baneberry, Actaea pachypoda in the Ranunculaceae) that I always notice once they are fruiting.

More Adirondack Wildflowers

Many wildflowers are early this year.  The lady slippers are so early, the group walk to see them at Hayes Brook has been moved up by a week.  There are many just opening in our woods.  And right now everything is covered with pollen, presumably from the hemlocks.  We also have Clinton borealis (Liliaceae) which I hadn't seen on the property before.  This one is at the head of the driveway.  There is lots of Wild Sarsaparilla (Aralia nudicaulis in the Araliaceae) and the ones by the lake are already blooming.  And the starflowers have started to bloom (Trientalis borealis in the Primulaceae).

Paddling the Rollins/Floodwood Loop

We did a variation on an old favorite today.  We paddled with friends so were able to do a two-ended paddle, putting in on Rollins Pond and taking out at the end of Fish Creek where we had spotted a car.  Before starting out I got a good photo of Viburnum alnifolium in the Caprifoliaceae, also known as Hobblebush.

I also took this photo that must be a Vaccinium of some sort, or at least in the Ericaceae.  These plants line the stream in spots.

Paddling Cedar River

Paddling the Cedar River is always an adventure.  Twelve of us put in above Wakely Dam and paddled a couple miles down the flow.  Then the fun begins.  It is always a challenge to find the correct passage through the labyrinth of streams into the main body of the river.  This is a screen shot from my GPS.  It makes it look as though we are paddling through a nice open lake when instead it is a tangle of plants and beaver dams.  The arm off to the left shows the first place we tried to get through without success.  Then we retraced our steps and tried again.  After struggling over a large beaver dam, we found ourselves in the nice, winding river.

The first place we could have taken out for lunch was occupied, so we paddled on to the lean-to.  The squiggles at the bottom of the map indicate my walking around the area on shore where I found lots of trout lilies in bloom.

I always feel Placid Boatworks should use our group in their advertisements.

The clouds came in in the afternoon as we paddled back down the river.

Then back over the beaver dam.  The entire paddle was about 10 miles.

Red Elderberry

I found a new plant along our driveway, a Red Elderberry (Sambucus pubens in the Caprifoliaceae).  The plant looks like a Common Elderberry, except the flower and fruit clusters are elongated instead of flat-topped.

Paddling Stoney Creek Ponds

We did our first paddle with the group today, putting in at the northern Stoney Creek Pond and paddling through the ponds and out Ampersand Brook until we stopped at a beaver dam that was a bit too high to pull over.  Then back out the brook and down to the Raquette River to Axton landing.  Since there was a car shuttle involved, the boats sat for a while before we got on the water.  

Back in the Adirondacks

 We finally made it back to the Adirondacks yesterday.  We made an early morning trip to Price Chopper in Lake Placid this morning, the first in-person shopping here since the pandemic started.  There were very few people around so we felt very safe.  

We were interested to see the progress being made ripping up the railroad tracks between Tupper Lake and Lake Placid to make way for a walking/biking path.  This is the view of the "tracks" between Saranac Lake and Raybrook.  While they have made a lot of progress removing the rails, they clearly have a lot of work left to do.

Then I of course had to explore our woods for wildflowers. There seem to be more painted trilliums each year.  

And we have lots of red ones as well.  

The only other thing I saw blooming were tiny white violets.

I took a new photo of our camp with its current deck.  Hopefully we will have a new, larger deck before too many more weeks.