In June each year, we can launch our boats from the Tranquille Wildlife Management area and paddle out into the flooded lands at the head of Kamloops Lake.   We have a 10km circuit that we can do, but each time a different channel is taken.   At the peak of the freshet, all the channels are connected, but as the water recedes, many of them are dead ends, requiring some back-paddling.  The area is full of birds.   This year we have spotted bald eagles, golden eagles, great blue herons, ducks, geese, marsh wrens, yellow-headed blackbirds, and a number of smaller birds.   The cottonwoods, willows, and dogwoods stand in deep water for a few weeks, but still seem to thrive.  Groups of trees/shrubs look like floating islands in the bays.

 

 

Past the last of these “islets” is the river, slow-moving as it runs into the lake.   The crossing is 1km to the far shore.   The channel mouth starts to the left of the gully ahead.   This image was probably taken in May before the area was fully flooded.

 

 

Any series of channels can be taken, but we usually paddle the one closest to the far shore and return back through the middle.   Views extend down the lake past Battle Bluff and up the river toward Mt. Paul.   Mount Mara overlooks Tranquille Bay and the rocky hills along the south shore rise steeply above the floodlands.

 

 

This is one of the yearly great wonders of the region and just a few of us venture out in our kayaks to experience the sights of this wet wilderness each June.