Manigotagan River Trip 4: Sand River Falls to Poplar Falls

View Manigotagan 3 in a larger map

It wasn't till 1:00 in the morning that the storm let lose. I had been hearing distant thunder and seen the lighting. As the storm moved in I was almost relieved when I heard the first heavy drops of rain hit the tent. Thunder and lighting were nearly constant, but they seemed always at a distance. I did not go out to check, but I am pretty sure that the lightning was the cloud-to-cloud type. Except for the occasional gentle gust, there wasn't much wind. What worried me was the deluge-like rain that fell non-stop for at least an hour. I started to obsess about the canoe, which I had failed to secure to some trees. But it was about a meter above river level and the valley was not narrow. did I really need to worry? I ended up not braving the rain and dozed off, occasionally waking from another downpour. I awoke at 6:00 and my first look was to the canoe storage. It was still there, just as I had left it. I did notice that the water level was about 10 cm higher than the previous night and Sand River Rapids had an angrier ring to it. I said earlier that I am a one-cup-o-coffee guy, but this morning I made two.

Camping haute cuisine: spamwich or spamini?

James was hard to rouse. We had a fried spamwich (or spamini?). Funny how you wolf down things during a backcountry trip that you'd otherwise hardly consider. By 10:00 we were ready to shove off.



We set up our run along the left bank of the river and it went very well. The rocks below the rapids were mostly submerged and we left them on our right.



Then  followed by Joe Steele, Flour and Emma Janes Rapids separated by quiet stretches. We came across an old boiler, artifact of the days when mining and logging was common along the Manigotagan.

Old boiler, part of the alligator mining machine
and artifact of the Manigotagan's boom days

This rock ledge looks sort of like an alligator ...

Boiler Rapids (aka Rifle or Boulder Rapids) looked a little more intimidating but we felt we were ready. We went right down the middle, hit a couple of standing waves and took on a hand full of water. Bailing was in order. I was glad that 90% of our gear was secure in waterproof bags.



Onion Patch Rapids with its sharp right-angle and the pink granite was fun, too. By now, zipping through was routine.



Unfortunately, this was our last runnable rapids of the trip. Remaining were Old Woman Falls, Poplar Rapids and Poplar Falls.

Old Woman Falls is peculiar in that the shortest way to portage is across an island in the middle of the falls which also holds a campsite without toilets. In order to use the facilities, one would need to paddle to the campsite river right. I imagine this during a bout with girardia or food poisoning after eating some campy meat. We lifted our gear across and James, intending to assume the Little Mermaid pose over the falls river left had a close brush with death, or at least he felt so. While loading up post-portage, the canoe bounced happily in the outflow of the falls. We headed on for Poplar Rapids.

From the documentation I had, both the Wilson/Aykroyd book and the Manitoba Eco-Network write-up, I could not tell whether we would meet just Poplar Falls or both Poplar Falls and Poplar Rapids. The topo map was very clear that there were two rapids between us and the take-out. It turned out that the first was Poplar Rapids (not runnable, by us at least) and the second was Poplar Falls (definitely not runnable). At Poplar Falls we made camp, just off the portage trail, river right. For the first time no campfire wood but two benches and a table. The site was pretty overgrown but we found a nice site on top of the hill.

After pitching tents and doing the most necessary camp shores we hopped in the water. It was so great to cool off and feel clean. I even used the filter pump while in the water.

James, taking a dip above Poplar Falls

Supper was risotto Alfredo with salmon. James didn't think much of it but I ate every last bit. James was more fond of the s'mores. The flies drove us into the tent, stuffy in the heat. It sure felt like another storm but the night was quiet. No worries about a run-away canoe, either, it was tied to a tree off the portage trail, at least 50 m away from the water.