Grand Campment Bay on Lake Timiskaming, looking south down the old trade route.      Photo & maps: Brian Back

Length:  3.6 km

Difficulty: easy

Time: four hours (to walk the length and return)

Trail condition:  clear and easy to follow 

Location:  Between Rabbit Lake Road and Lake Timiskaming, east of Hwy 11

HIKING TRAIL

Grand Campment Bay

Pine vistas, deep valleys and the fjord-like Lake Timiskaming are found along the 500-foot descent from the upland of Temagami to the old trade highway of the Ottawa Valley. The west trailhead starts in red pine, white pine, fir, white spruce and white birch and enters the moister lowland forest near Lake Timiskaming of ash, cedar, maple and yellow birch. The Lake Timiskaming trailhead has a beach.

Grand Campment Bay, where the eastern trailhead is located, was a brigade stop on the old trade route between James Bay and the St. Lawrence. This trail is very isolated and when you get to Lake Timiskaming you will likely not have seen or heard anyone. This is a unique trail in Temagami.

   Access/location map

   INDEX:  Hiking trail maps

See update

 

HISTORY

The trail was originally opened by Hap Wilson in 1996. Portions follow remnants of a logging road that predates 1977. The only real trace of logging is an old bridge near the trail's peak elevation (shown on map above). The valleys may have been originally logged in the square-timber days of the 1800s. 

Members of Nastawgan Trails re-cleared the trail in 2002. 

The trailhead off Rabbit Lake Road starts in a clear-cut, which was carved out of the Owain

Lake old-growth forest in 1997. Sixty-two environmentalists were arrested here in the fall of 1996, blockading the logging of the old red and white pine. A note for logging observers, nothing has been done to restore the forest despite public assurances to the contrary.

Grand Campment Bay is one of the few campsites along this rugged stretch of Lake Timiskaming. So it was a logical stop for fur brigades coming off the Long Sault Rapids at the bottom of the lake. 

   Home   Rupert Battle   Rupert River   Temagami   Che-Mun

    Forum   Crees   Camps   Canoes   Keewaydin Way   Search   About   Contact Us

Maps and information herein are not intended for navigational use, and are not represented to be correct in every respect. 
All pages intended for reference use only, and all pages are subject to change with new information and without notice. 
The author/publisher accepts no responsibility or liability for use of the information on these pages. 
Wilderness travel and canoeing possess inherent risk. 
 It is the sole responsibility of the paddler and outdoor traveler to determine whether he/she is qualified for these activities.
Copyright © 2000-2014 Brian Back.  All rights reserved.
We do not endorse and are not responsible for the content of any linked document on an external site.