Cabin Lake Trail

Date - June 9, 2018
Length - 6.0 km
Elevation - 21 m
Time - 2 hours 43 minutes

AllTrails Map of Cabin Lake Trail w/ a short Trans-Canada addition

Cabin Lake Trail was the second trail we did on our Brereton Lake trip. It was a nice hike with a good variety in scenery as it goes up and down through a wetland. There are a few beaver dams in the area creating small lakes, and one that is a few hundred feet long you must walk across near the start of the trail.

The high area of the trail between the two marshlands is covered in beautiful flowers. Roslyn spent plenty of time taking pictures of the Lady Slippers and others in the area.

Cluster of Lady's Slippers, Manitoba Provincial flower

Not sure what these are, but they're pretty

A close up

Interesting looking flowers on the trail

Up close shot of a Lady Slipper

Near the end of the high land in the middle section of the trail, there's a very strategically placed beaver dam holding back quite a lot of water. The positioning of it was quite impressive.

Beaver dam along the top of a rock face

At the end of the Cabin Lake Trail section, there were probably a dozen or more boats all pulled up on the shore. We saw someone on one later on when we were at the Trans-Canada trail campsite. They mentioned that some of them boats were public use, but we weren't able to confirm that with anyone else.

From the end of Cabin Lake Trail we did a short section of the Trans-Canada trail out to a camp site. The section drops down and goes through the wetland area again. Its a short section, only about 50 feet, but there's plenty of opportunity to get your feet wet. After that its about a 0.5 km at most to the camp site. We didn't stay there, but there's probably room for 4-5 good tenting sites. All of them are on the bedrock that permeates the area, but there are plenty of rocks around to hold down the edges of your tent.

Panorama from the camping areas shore

In Roslyn's words:

Almost right when you start the trail you are presented with the largest obstacle of the trail, a boggy beaver dam. Although it may seem intimidating, it is not as bad as it look, but waterproof shoes would definitely be your friend. The trail as a whole is moderately difficult, with the forest to rock clearing landscape you would expect from the Whiteshell. The end of the trail offers a pretty view of the lake and a graveyard of boats from travelers past. Though some boats are sunk, some are in good working condition and look be used for communal recreation. Just remember to be courteous of others and respect this equipment. Having been told about a small extension of the trail (part of the trans canada trail) by a lovely couple on our way in, we decided to explore a bit more. This trail was much less defined but still easy enough to follow if you look for the bright tag flags. This trail extension leads to a lovely backcountry campsite. If you plant to come spend the night, be sure to bring a sleeping pad as you will be pitching your tent on rock. I recommend coming out to this camp if you are doing this trail as it is a much nicer resting point than the actual end of the Cabin Lake trail. We will definitely be coming back to this site for a quick overnight stay sometime in the future and I would highly recommend it to anyone wanting to try out backcountry camping for the first time but not wanting to hike out 13+ km on their first trip.

All in all it was a great 6 km.