Lake Ladoga

“ The Finns have a simple rule. To them all fish over five pounds in weight are "Lochi," salmon (German, Lachs; Russian, Lososino) . Now there are plenty of salmon in the Neva, and therefore in Lake Ladoga also; and the reader might suppose that, since the Voksa flows into the Ladoga, there may be salmon in the Voksa just as well as in Ladoga itself. So there may, in the lower parts of the river, but between Ladoga and Saima Lakes there is a barrier, known as the Imatra Falls, which must surely be an insurmountable obstacle to the most enterprising of salmon. ”

“ The interior of the country is almost filled with lakes, irregularly shaped, and making travelling by land exceedingly tedious, as one must wind his way far around these arms and branches. There is one lake, Saima, two hundred miles wide, in which there are a thousand and more of islands. The largest is called Amasara, or mother-island; on this island there are seventy-seven lakes, and in these lakes fifty islands. This great lake is connected with Lake Ladoga, in Russia, and, by a canal here at Wyborg, with the Gulf of Finland. ”

“ Besides, in many parts it is very near communicating with the Baltic Sea; it has even a real one with the gulph of Finland, for, by ascending the river Onega, we come to a lake of the same name; from this lake Onega there are two rivers of communication with the lake Ladoga; this last communicates by a large arm with the gulph of Finland; and there are many parts in Swedish Lapland, the waters of which run almost indifferently either into the White Sea, or the gulphs of Bothnia and Finland ”

“ These canals are navigated annually by thousands of vessels and rafts. The lake is also connected by water with the White Sea, and is ice-free on the average for 191 days in the year, from May to October, The most interesting of its numerous islets are Valaam and Konevetz, both occupied by monasteries, the former being among the most popular places of pilgrimage in Russia. The chief towns on the lake are the famous fortress of Schlüsselburg, at the entrance to the Neva and Novaya Ladoga, at the mouth of the Volkhov. ”

“ Yes, truly, even this barren land possesses beauty and loveliness. One who has travelled through a night such as this will never forget the impression left on his mind by so splendid a scene, and will cease to wonder at the attachment of the barbarian serfs to their isolated villages.
The next day we reached Ladinapol, an insignificant place. The extensive lake of Ladoga not being sufficiently frozen to make it safe for us to cross it in our sledges, we continued our route by the post-road. We passed the small river Swere, and soon came to the town of Ladoga on the Volkof ”

“ Gentlemen bet wagers on it, ladies chatter about it, peasants quarrel over it; every person is interested concerning it, and, when it is first seen to move, pleasure is expressed on every face.
The breaking up of the ice of the Neva is by no means so magnificent a spectacle as that of the Volga or the Northern Dwina, although the whole of the frozen masses from the lake of Ladoga descend by its stream. ”

“ We climb higher and higher up regularly curved lake terraces; the view widens out the nearer we approach the summit, where the Ladakis are waiting for us with a fire. The southern basin of the 29 Dangra-yum-tso was clearly visible as a bluish sabre-blade, and the valley of the Targo-tsangpo widens out like a trumpet to the broad plain beside the shore. It was the easier to trace the course of the river to the neighbourhood of the lake because it was marked all along by white glistening ice flakes and dark spots where bushes grow. ”

“ The lake at Saratoga is the most picturesque feature of the region, and would alone make the fortune of any other watering-place. It is always a surprise to the stranger, who has bowled along the broad drive of five miles through a pleasing but not striking landscape, to come suddenly, when he alights at the hotel, upon what seems to be a “fault,” a sunken valley, and to look down a precipitous, grassy, tree-planted slope upon a lake sparkling at the bottom and reflecting the enclosing steep shores. It is like an aqua-marine gem countersunk in the green landscape. ”

“ After leaving the White Horse Canyon he goes down the river to the head of Lake Labarge, a distance of 14 miles. He can sit down and steer with the current, as he is going down the stream all the way. It is for this reason that in returning from the diggings he should take another route, of which he will get full particulars before leaving Dawson; therefore I do not take the time to give a full description of the return trip via the Yukon to St. Michael. He now goes through Lake Labarge—for 31 miles—till he strikes the Lewes River, this taking him down to Hootalinqua. ”

“ The man who loves the breath of the storm and the glow of excitement will loose his boat from Tallac when the clouds swing down the canyon and speed forth borne, as it were, on the wings of the waves toward the distant foot of the Lake—past the black water wall where the waves of Emerald Bay sweep into Tahoe, through the frothy waters where the wind shifts and whips around Rubicon Point, over the white caps of Meek's Bay until by skillful maneuvering the jutting cape is weathered and quieter water is found in McKinney Bay. ”

“ Muhamed Isa, in his thick grey winter suit and with his pipe in his mouth, moves about, and is guiding the caravan up between the hills when we overtake him. We ascend to the summit of a hill. A white line appears, and below it a bluish-green stripe which gradually increases in dimensions. After a few minutes we have the salt lake we have been looking for immediately below us, for the hills slope steeply to the southern shore. Now the Ladakis commence one of their finest march songs in soft, melting tones ”

“ It seems that Labarge had got up as far as the Pelly before he received his recall; he had heard something of a large lake some distance further up the river, and afterwards spoke of it to some traders and miners who called it after him.
"After leaving Lake Labarge the river, for a distance of about five miles, preserves a generally uniform width and an easy current of about four miles per hour. It then makes a short turn round a low gravel point, and flows in exactly the opposite of its general course for a mile when it again turns sharply to its general direction. ”

“ The wind blows almost constantly down this lake, and in a high wind it gets very rough. The miners complain of much detention owing to this cause, and certainly I cannot complain of a lack of wind while I was on the lake. This lake was named after one Mike Labarge, who was engaged by the Western Union Telegraph Company, exploring the river and adjacent country for the purpose of connecting Europe and America by telegraph through British Columbia, and Alaska, and across Behring Strait to Asia, and thence to Europe. ”

“ The fishy wealth of the Lagoon is amazing. Silvery shapes leap in air by tens and twenties, and passing shoals leave wakes in every direction. Boats at anchor, boats adrift, boats under full sail, multiply as one runs northward; and out of the horizon spring groves of poles crossed by poles aslant, masts and yards of invisible hulls moored by invisible islets, whose sandy levels are all but awash. There must be hundreds of craft plying on Lake Burullos, and its fisher-folk are legion—men of blond colouring, active and somewhat silent, with the refined facial type common to old inbred races. ”

“ All the lax gayety of Saratoga palls on the appetite; even the magnificent shores of Lake George, though stirring your spirit to an insensible wonder and love, do not cheat you into a trance that lingers. In vain the sun blazons every isle, and lights every shaded cove, and at evening stretches the Black Mountain in giant slumber on the waters. ”

“ The next three days of our life were spent on the water—first cruising down the Victoria Nile till it flows into Chioga, and then traversing the smooth, limpid expanses of that lake. Every evening we landed at camps prepared by the Busoga chiefs, pitched our tents, lighted our fires, and erected our mosquito-houses, while dusk drew on, and thunderstorms—frequent at this season of the year—wheeled in vivid splendour about the dark horizon. All through the hot hours of the day one lay at the bottom of massive canoes, sheltered from the sun by an improvised roof of rushes and wet grass. ”

“ Our camp at Lake Darlot was rather pleasantly situated on rising ground by the side of the blow; behind us, sheer cliffs of conglomerate, worn and weathered into queer little caves, the floors of which were covered inches deep by the droppings of bats and small wallabies; and, stretching away to the South, an open plain enclosed in an endless sea of scrub. Every morning we witnessed the strange phenomenon of a lake appearing in the sky to the South, miles away, above the scrub, a lake surrounded by steep white cliffs. ”

“ There is here good camping, and pasturage seems abundant, but horses do not like it and should therefore be hobbled to prevent straying. The lake was stocked with Loch Leven trout in 1911 and with rainbow, eastern brook, black spotted and steelhead in 1917, 1918 and 1919, but fishing is only fair. Crossing the meadows at the outlet our trail joins the Tioga Road, which follows the western margin of the lake to the Tenaya Lake Lodge, about one and a half miles distant, where good accommodations will be found. ”

“ The views from Fallen Leaf Lodge are varied and beautiful, one in particular being especially enchanting. Over the Terminal moraine, across the hidden face of Lake Tahoe, the eye falls upon the mountains in Nevada, on the far-away eastern side. In the soft light of evening they look like fairy mountains, not real rocky masses of gigantic, rugged substance, but something painted upon the horizon with delicate fingers, and in tints and shades to correspond, for they look tenderer and sweeter, gentler and lovelier than anything man could conceive or execute. ”

“ G. Bounds, the man in charge, crossed the divide over the Chilkat Pass, followed the shore of Lake Arkell and, keeping to the east of Dalton's trail, reached the Yukon just below the Rink Rapids. Here the cattle were slaughtered and the meat floated down on a raft to Cudahy, where it retailed at $1 a pound.
"It is proposed to establish a winter road somewhere across the country travelled over by Dalton and Bounds. The Yukon cannot be followed, the ice being too much broken, so that any winter road will have to be overland. ”

“ For one long day our little palpitating launch, towing its flotilla of canoes, plashed through this curious region, at times winding through a glade in the papyrus forest scarcely a dozen yards across, then presently emerging into wide flood, stopping often to clear our propeller from tangles of accumulating greenery. The middle of the lake unrolls large expanses of placid water. The banks and reeds recede into the distance, and the whole universe becomes a vast encircling blue globe of sky and water, rimmed round its middle by a thin band of vivid green. ”

“ They accompanied us down to the shore, when we put off on our voyage westwards. Into a large lagoon of the shore, brown and dirty owing to the numerous gulls and wild geese which here wallow in the mud, a brook from Gurla Mandatta runs, and now discharges 37.8 cubic feet of water in a second. All the way along runs a rubbish heap, the continuation of the pebble terrace on which 156 Tugu-gompa stands. The lake bed consists sometimes of sand, sometimes of detritus—offshoots of the detritus cone of Gurla Mandatta. Large collections of weeds form dark patches. ”

“ Look, the canoe is moving slowly toward the center of the lake, but it stays back as much as the wind will let it and keeps beckoning to us. A few more long, swift strokes, Tayoga, and we're beside it."
"Aye, Dagaeoga, and we must be careful how we climb into it. It is no light task to board a canoe in the middle of a lake. Since Tododaho would not let it be overturned, when we fell out of it, we must not overturn it ourselves when we get back into it, else we lose all our arms, ammunition and other supplies." ”

“ The changes which a lapse of nearly two thousand years may be supposed to have occasioned on the northern coast of Africa, are fully sufficient to have reduced the river Lathon to the spring which now flows into the Lake of Bengazi.
The lake itself is salt, and in the summer is nearly dry; while the small stream in question takes its rise within a few yards of the lake, and running along a channel of inconsiderable breadth, bordered with reeds and rushes, might be mistaken by a common observer for an inroad of the lake into the sandy soil which bounds it. ”

“ Many other peaks and domes with eternal snow rise over this sea of tumbled waves, but, after all, the finest sight is the lake itself, which charms and fascinates the spectator by its intense ultramarine hue, a couple of shades deeper and stronger than turquoise. When one first comes to the saddle of the pass and this wealth of colouring strikes the retina, one can scarcely restrain an exclamation of astonishment and admiration. We look down straight on the lake, and its southern shore is just below us. ”

“ For the Viking and the near Viking; for the man and the woman who, for the very exhilaration of it, seek the bracing air and the snow-clad forests, Lake Tahoe is as charming in winter as in summer, and far grander. There is the same water—in morning placid, in afternoon foam-flecked, on days of storm tempestuous. The Lake never freezes; not even a film of ice fringes its edge. Sunny skies and warm noons and the Lake's own restlessness prevent. Emerald Bay alone is sometimes closed with ice, but more often it is as open as the outer Lake. ”