We spent three days in Algonquin Park, walking different trails every day. We saw lots and lots of wildlife, much of it unfamiliar to my European friends. Twice we stopped by the side of the road where moose conveniently presented themselves for photo opportunities. My friends had described to me an animal they saw on the way to the park, asking if it was a moose. I said it sounded like a deer because moose look like very badly designed horses. Once they saw a moose, they understood my meaning and decided that the previous sighting had been a deer.

One form of wildlife that wasn’t so pleasing was the blackflies. We have blackflies in New Hampshire as well, but the ones at Algonquin Park were by far more numerous and more vicious than here at home. In fact, I decided that in comparison, NH blackflies are pacifist vegetarians. It was crazy making. And itchy. And lumpy. But not fatal.

We took a walk that featured beaver ponds…

There’s a beaver lodge in this pond that’s of a size that can been easily seen from atop a close-by hill top.

And seen even better . . .

. . . from lake level.

That afternoon’s walk was the “Spruce Bog” walk –

where, protected more against bugs than weather, we walked the boardwalk through/over the bog.

Except for Chico, who loves, loves, loves to wade and slipped into the rather mucky water when I wasn’t paying close attention to him.

This made him into a two-tone dog.

Nothing that didn’t wash off in the lake when we got back to our campground. Christina is a dog lover and she sat in the back seat with Chico, even though he was so muddy. I offered to let her drive and sit back there myself, but she said, “It’s a camping trip, if you don’t get a little dirty, where’s the fun?”