Buck Pond Kayaking in Upstate New York

Labor Day is the first Monday of September. Labor day is a holiday in the U.S. to recognize labor movement. Since the Labor Day is always Monday, it will be a 3-day weekend. It is kind of the last good opportunity for summer outing for many people. 

Usually we plan something big trip in summer, sometimes including Labor Day weekend, however this year we didn't have a big summer trip due to COVID-19 pandemic. A little disappointing, so we wanted to plan something for labor day weekend. Of course anytime we can go hiking and backpacking without reservation in New Hampshire, but this time we wanted to have "something" for sure. So we looked up campground reservation over labor day weekend. The only one campground is available for booking on labor day weekend in the entire New England. The only one campground. Wow. We booked it. 

Buckpond campground is located in upstate New York. It is actually very close to Canada. When I searched it on the internet, it seems that the campground is popular not only Americans but also Canadians, especially from Quebec residents. This summer in 2020, US-Canada border is closed for traveling. That seems to be a reason it is less people this year. 

On Saturday before going to the campground we hike up to McKenzie Mountain near the campground. It is nice to hike in upstate New York which has more lakes around, compared to the White Mountain area in New Hampshire. 

Nice Forest

The first 2 miles are relatively flat in the nice forest. On a sunny day, sunlight came through between the trees. I really like sunlight arrived on the dirt. It made the forest more welcoming and warm. The last mile and a half was steep, but good workout. From the summit there are a number of lakes could be seen. Great place to stay for a couple of days to kayak. 

From the top

In the evening we arrived at our campsite and started fun: cooking over the fire. This time we cooked asparagus with lemon, sausages and bell pepper with lemon. Asparagus was an experimental dish and it was not really good, but sausages and lemons were delicious! After we got full, we went to the beach of the lake. It is 3 minute walk from our campsite. 

The evening lake is extremely calm and beautiful. The shadow of mountains are pretty. Oh wow. We discussed the plan that next evening we would paddle here in the evening. Somehow a lot of lakes get calm in the evening with much less winds. It is a great opportunity to paddle at sunset if you don't need to go home after paddling: we had to walk just 3 minutes there!

Looking at the lake in the evening

And........we paddled in the evening at sunset on the next day. It was super peaceful. Evening orange light reflect on the lake. It was very pretty. The trees at the shore also shined orange by receiving orange light and it was reflected on the lake surface. Wow. It was time sensitive and beautiful. Definitely evening kayaking is the highlight of this camping trip!  
After we enjoyed a lot with kayaking, we went back to the campsite and had fun with fire more. 

One downside of our site was the site across the road from our site was noisy. There were 4 people there. It looked like they were friends. 2 Indian guys (from their accents) and a Chinese female and an Indian female. They drank a lot and chatting so loud. It was annoying for people like us to enjoy peaceful night. Quiet time for the campground was 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. Mr.N was planning to tell them once it gets 10 p.m. to be quiet. Luckily they got quiet at 9:50 p.m., but this is one of the cons of car camping. You never know your neighbors are loud or quiet. Of course there are pros: you can cook over the campfire, you can bring a lot of futon and comfy pillow, and as much as jackets. In contrast, in the remote backpacking, it WILL be extremely quiet, but can't be super luxury with nice pillow. 

Mother with fish

Mother giving baby fish

On the third day we paddled again. The highlight of the paddle was a loon and her baby. Although the body size of the baby is identical with mother, the fur color was still brown, which is baby color. The mom is sometimes dive into water and then she found fish. The baby was big enough to learn to dive into water but couldn't find any fish. Every time the baby got out of water, he just cried a lot. It sounded like he was whining to mother that he couldn't catch fish. Then mother with fish swam to baby and gave it to him. The baby looked like satisfied.