July 22-24 Little Tupper Lake

On Friday July 22nd we headed to Little Tupper Lake for a camping trip. We launched our boats at the William C. Whitney Wilderness Area in the town of Long Lake, NY. (1 1/2 hour north of Warrensburg)  New York State acquired this property from the Whitney family in 1997 and it became open to the public in 1998. Little Tupper Lake is approximately 1 mile across and 6 miles long. Motors are not allowed on the lake. There are no fees to use the facility. Camping is on designated campsites on a first come, first serve basis. The sites are barely visible from the water and have quite some distance between them.

 After we were welcomed by a Park Ranger and given the rules of the area, we packed our kayaks and headed out.  From the launch area you can see the Whitney home across the lake, This weekend we kayaked and camped with Doug & Cindy, Gary & Sharon & Arvin. The shallowness of the lake and the prevailing winds will often result in large waves. For this reason, we used our spray skirts to keep water out of our boats. We were in the middle of a heat wave, so the temperature was hot! Tim, Gary & I wore bandanas to keep the sweat from running down our faces and to protect the guys from the sun. The waves were larger than we would have liked, so we paddled close to shore.

Ranger gives us the Rules

We paddled about 2 miles to get to our sites. Because our group would end up with 9 of us, we had to get 2 sites. There is a maximum of 8 campers on the campsites. Gary, Sharon & Arvin set up camp on site #4. They would be joined by Sharon's daughter Jessica, her husband Rich and their son Cade. Doug, Cindy, Tim & I were on site # 6. Our site was really nice. Our tents were up on a hill overlooking the lake. We had plenty of room and a beautiful view of the lake. 

Our kayaks

We spent the rest of Friday afternoon setting up our campsite and swimming. Gary, Sharon & Arvin came over for chili & cornbread for dinner. As we sat around talking before dinner we were attacked by flies! They weren't black flies, they were more like HOUSE flies! They really bite too! In spite of the the hot temperature, we ended up putting on long pants to keep them from biting. But that wasn't enough. I had to resort to extreme measures to cover my ankles. Bug spray didn't keep them away, so I used... bandanas!

Bandana Bug Protection

Cindy's Chili & Cornbread!

 When I was swimming, I went around the rocks where we had parked our boats and discovered that we had a nice sandy area. Doug named it "Nancy's Beach".

After dinner I went down and sat on the rocks by the shore while Tim paddled out farther in the lake to purify some water. While he was gone, a beaver swam up to a little cove near where I was sitting. It saw me move, slapped it's tail at me and went under water. When it surfaced again it went back into the cove to chew on some leaves that were on a limb laying in the water. It was fun to watch it swim and eat.

Tim purifies our water

The beaver swims away (upper left)

 On Saturday morning we got up and got moving so we could paddle farther down the Lake. Tim's back was killing him. Between already being sore and then sleeping on the ground... he was hurting. After we had breakfast we started out. There were some waves on the water, so we put our spray skirts on. We hadn't paddled very far when I felt a fly biting my legs! I had trapped one under my cover. I had to stop and open the cover to let him out. Once he was gone, I could enjoy the paddle.

We like to check other campsites as we go around the Lake. One site had some interesting brick columns. It makes you wonder what they were once a part of.

3 Brick columns

We made a rest stop at a nice sandy beach area. There were wild blueberries growing on the shore that we made a snack of. We took a swim and relaxed. Once we finished swimming we got back in our boats and decided to head back. The paddle was going to be a little tougher since the wind and waves had picked up. We decided to head straight across the Lake rather than follow the shore. The paddle back was a little tougher than the paddle out. We parked our boats at "Nancy's Beach" and went back up to camp. A little later we went down for a swim.

Swimming out at the Blueberry beach

Wild Blueberries

Beach grasses

In the evening we had our dinner and a nice "little" fire before going to bed for the night. The loons weren't as loud during the night as they had been on Friday night,

Doug makes a small fire

 Sunday morning we were up early to start breaking down camp before breakfast, Gary was going to grill some rolls and SPAM for a nice breakfast sandwich. We made the sandwices and topped them off with some Cheez Whiz for a tasty treat.

Gary grills breakfast

Time to dish up

We had a pretty easy paddle back to the launch. The waves weren't too big, so we cut straight across the lake again. It was a great trip. We would like to go back for a day trip to paddle the other end of the Lake.

Sunday morning sunrise

Nance & Tim