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Total Distance: 44 km
Total Distance: 44 km
Duration: 3 days
Duration: 3 days
No. of Portages: 7
No. of Portages: 7
Total Port. Distance: 2 kilometers (Less if running rapids)
Total Port. Distance: 2 kilometers (Less if running rapids)
Level of Difficulty: Advanced -- The section of the Black River between Black Lake and Bridge Rapids is inundated with logjams and sweepers due to the March 2025 Ice Storm. There are also rapids en route that have no portages. Basic whitewater skills are needed.
Level of Difficulty: Advanced -- The section of the Black River between Black Lake and Bridge Rapids is inundated with logjams and sweepers due to the March 2025 Ice Storm. There are also rapids en route that have no portages. Basic whitewater skills are needed.
Maps provided courtesy of Toporama which contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Canada. I have marked my route in blue.
Every year, I do a pre-summer boot-camp type of trip to get myself in shape for some longer summer trips later in the season. This was it for me on the first weekend of June in 2025.
Approximately ten years earlier, Brad and Leah from Explore the Backcountry posted a short video on their YouTube channel of an early spring trip down the upper portion of the Black River in the Haliburton Highlands, and then looping back to their vehicle through South Jean Creek. At the time, they described it as a "lost" route but found it to be viable with a little hard work and tenacity. They also described it as scenic and full of wildlife, just the kind of trip that appeals to me -- off the beaten track and rewarding in a Type II fun sort of way.
In early May of 2024, I had completed the Black Lake Loop and camped at a site on Black Lake where I could spot the Black River heading south out of the lake. It was a pretty area, and my interest was piqued to further explore what was down that river.
Likewise, ten or eleven years earlier, the first version of Jeff's Algonquin Map was released, and on it, this loop trip from the Haliburton Highland Water Trails area, down the Black River, and back up South Jean Creek was marked with portages and campsites. So, between Brad and Leah's recommendation in their video, my own natural curiosity to further extend my previous year's exploration of the area, and being armed with Jeff's Map, I decided I would try heading down the Black River.
If only I had known what lay in store for me.
On the last weekend of March 2025, a massive ice storm hit Central Ontario. My hometown of Peterborough got hit hard. Our family home was without power for 24 hours or so, but some people in the area didn't have power for the better part of a week. Trees were down all over the city, and it took a solid two months for crews to clean up the mess. It was the worst ice storm to hit the province since the big one in '98.
A little over a month after the storm, on the first weekend of May, I did a weekend trip in Algonquin, just north of Haliburton. It was the first weekend after ice out, and I had been expecting to find a lot of downed trees on the portages due to the ice storm. However, what I found was just the normal amount of early spring deadfall. This factored into my decision to try the Black River. I thought if Algonquin didn't have a lot of downed trees from the ice storm, then the Haliburton area, just to the south, might be similar.
I was wrong...
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