On Thursday after breakfast we headed out on the lake for an adventure to explore a unique aspect of Lake of the Woods. During World War II there were six German prisoner of war camps on the lake, most are close to us so we went over to POW (Prisoner of War) Bay to see what remains of this camp and the logging operation that was on place between 1941-1944.
POW Bay
The answer is “not much”! After 70 years the fast growing deciduous trees have reclaimed the shoreline and there is no easily visible evidence that a multi-building camp housing 100-125 men ever existed in this location. The bay is quite shallow and there were lots of weeds as we approached the shore and there was a strong on-shore wind as well. As we got closer it became clear that if might be quite difficult to get the boat out of the weeds if we landed, so with discretion being the better part of valour, we headed back out into open water. It was a hot day and lots of deer flies etc. so an investigation of the camp area will be left for another day.
Apparently, the foundational outlines of several buildings and other artifacts can be found in the area. Perhaps on a cooler day in the fall we’ll make a return trip.
Six POW logging camps in Ontario
German Prisoner of War (POW) Camps
Little left of POW camps that dotted Northern Ontario
New post on my blog: Boating Adventure http://t.co/4C5YIMSrUG