Site Details
Closest Access Point: Kiosk (access # 29)
Distance to Access Point: 25 KM (1.5 Days)
Difficulty of Travel From Access Point: Hard (Maple Creek is a beast)
Maintenance Level: Low
Date Visited: May 2023
Tillie’s lone site is a basic site on a low maintenance route and is more of a stopgap option than a destination. If you needed a place to stay for the night, and didn’t want to push on to nearby North Raven (which has four sites, all of which looked better than this one), it would do. Otherwise, I wouldn’t make this one a multi-day destination.
Terrain: There’s a slight rise from the shoreline to the fire pit and tent pads. Nothing challenging. This is a smaller site. Maybe 20 feet across at its widest. The terrain is easy to navigate, but the site is a bit overgrown.
Canoe Landing: The canoe landing looks pretty decent from the water, but the approach is very shallow. We grounded on the bottom before we made it to dry land. That said, this is an easy spot to load and unload.
Fire Pit: The pit is situated in the middle of the site, with a nice view out to Tillie. It’s a very basic pit to go with a very basic site.
Tent Sites: One thing I liked about Tillie was the way the tent pads are laid out. They’ve been cut out of the forest so that there are little clearings every few steps down the path where you can pitch your tent. For the most part, the two pads I saw had smaller footprints (they’re also not far from the thunderbox).
Swimmability: Accessing the water is easy, but the shoreline is pretty swampy. Wouldn’t be my first choice as a spot to swim.
Thunderbox: Down the same path that the tent pads are located. The box is in pretty decent shape and, despite its proximity to the site, feels a bit more private thanks to the nearby brush.
Accessories: There’s a nice set of log benches by the fire pit, and that’s it.
Views: This picture is cheating. It’s the view from the end of the portage to Maple Creek, not the campsite, but it gives you an idea of what you’re looking at on Tillie. The site itself is in the middle of a dense shoreline. There’s a good window cut out to the lake, but thick trees on either side of that window hem in the view a bit.
Notes: As I said off the top, this site is fine, but it wouldn’t be my first choice.
Related Trip Report: Birchcliffe, The Nip and Some Hills