We canoe on Lac Sorcier

Lac du Sorcier

One of the lakes in Mastigouche wildlife reserve is called le Sorcier, or the wizard. Legend has it that there was a wizard on the big island in the lake that would make strange sounds and prevent people from sleeping around the lake. 

It makes me wonder if this is why the campsite is past a small island at the far end of the lake. You can't hear what goes on there from other parts of the lake. Before we went canoeing we also went to explore the camping called Le Sorcier. We figured out there was one spot we'd really like to get, and from what I can see it's almost always reserved. No kidding, it's a lone spot at the end of this campsite, and you can get your canoe directly into the water from there. Most of the other spots at Sorcier you have to portage your canoe down a really steep incline. You might as well bring it to the boat launch across the bay where we put our canoe in the water. 

Lac du Sorcier

After exploring the campground at le sorcier, we took off in Canoe it was around 12:30. We paddled for about an hour and landed on a big rock on one side of the lake to have a picnic and to bake a bit in the sun. My companion had been cold earlier in the day and he enjoyed baking.  From the rock we saw what looked like a beach across the lake. 

Walking on the beach of Lac du Sorcier

I didn't figure it was all the way across the lake. It was, but we paddled it anyways. Along the top of the lake there is a long area with a sandy beach. I'm figuring it's probably not that visible some of the time if the water is higher, but this year the water levels are low, it's very dry, so this year there's a nice beach. 

We hung out at the beach for about an hour and a half. We swam a bit, we walked along the beach and saw all sorts of animal tracks. We saw at least 1 hoofed animal, deer, or caribou. TOo small to be a moose. We also saw dog tracks, so wolf, or coyote, large cat tracks, which I don't think was a Lynx so maybe cougar or bobcat, and something either racoonish or beaverish as tracks.  My buddy also saw a grass snake but could not find it to show me. We also saw some frogs and lots of dragonflies. 

The point where the beach was on top of Lac du Sorcier

The lake of course has a pair of loons which were swimming with their baby.  We also saw some other form of duck, we saw one red tailed hawk too I think. The lake was quite peaceful. Despite the fact it was construction holiday we only saw a total of 8 people on the lake. 6 in Kayaks and 2 in a canoe. That was it. 

Ironically it was more quiet then Lac Vert! Less people! At some point sitting in the middle of lac sorcier, just letting the waves carry us, all I could hear was the breathing of my friend. I could not hear another sound. No human sounds, no animal sounds. Just a touch of wind in the distance in the trees.

Lac du Sorcier

By the time we got back to our car it was 7:30 pm. We figure we paddled about 5 hours total. We didn't see the extremities of the lake either. Maybe another time.