Paddle Your Family Canoe
By
Tim McKillop

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               It’s funny how many excuses you can come make to delay the undertaking of a family canoe trip. Surrounded by maps and equipment, I began to sweat as a swirl of “what ifs” escaped my mind. I looked at my checklist which was definitely unbalanced. The negative side of my ledger had a longer, more frightening tally than did the positive side. Faced with this though, I suddenly began to realize that the few positive items would be more lasting and more meaningful than any negative items leading to nagging doubts. From family members and friends I expected to see unconditional, excited support. I was way off base. The looks I received seemed to signal that I should indeed be questioning my sanity.

            We had canoed the French River several times as a family but those experiences were far different than what we were planning now. These trips were a great way to introduce the family to canoeing. They were more vacations planned for enjoyment than deep escapes into the wilderness and they helped develop a real passion for canoeing in our family. Each day consisted of short paddles of 10 to 15 kilometres with lots of breaks for swimming, fishing and exploring. Most important, there was no portaging!  One night even included a gourmet dinner at a resort near one of the campsites. The owner brought a pontoon boat to pick us up for dinner and delivered us back to our tents in time for bed!

            Our family was ready for something more challenging. We began to plan a canoe trip into the wilderness of northwestern Ontario. Quetico Provincial Park, one of the most famous canoe destinations in the world, became our goal. The park’s primitive forest is a landscape of rugged Canadian Shield stretching nearly a 100 kilometres from east to west and 70 kilometres from north to south. A vast network of interconnected waterways weaves its way through a landscape of pine and spruce forests. Outside of a small campground on the park’s eastern edge, the only access is by water. There are no roads and strict regulations have been put in place to preserve the park’s wild condition. The park was created in 1913 and is home to a great diversity of flora and fauna including moose, bear, wolves, loons, bald eagles, black spruce, red pine and lady slipper orchids.

Our group for this trip included three adults, two children and one middle aged dog. My wife and I were excited about the opportunity to take this small group into a wilderness that was part of our own backyard. We consulted fellow canoeists who had traveled the area and purchased A Paddler’s Guide to Canoeing Quetico Provincial Park in the hope of gathering as much information as we could. We looked for route features that would satisfy everyone’s interests. One of the most unique draws to this area is the large concentration of rock paintings scattered throughout the park. There are approximately 30 known pictographs and we choose our route in part based on an opportunity to view four displays of pictographs in Quetico Park’s well known ‘gallery’.

We decided on The Northern Lakes Route.  Labelled as four days long and seventy-five kilometres in length this seemed an achievable target for our group. We included three extra days in case of bad weather and an extra night or two at campsites where we may want to linger a little longer. Along this route the wind comes mainly from the west making paddling easier and providing some good opportunities for sailing. We always enjoyed sailing our canoe and this helped us begin to feel good about our choice. Another guidebook we came across stated that “…this is the easiest route you can do without staying at the same campsite and doing small day trips.”  All indications were that this would be a good way to introduce ourselves to wilderness canoeing.

A 17’ Haida canoe and a borrowed kayak were our modes of transportation. My wife and I have plenty of experience but the other adult in our group and the two boys were novices.  We wanted to make sure that the groups were set up to have a strong paddler as their leader. Even with healthy active boys in the group there is no guarantee of continuous paddling. As a matter of fact they spent much of their time on top of the gear piles soaking up the late summer sun.

            Our trip took place the first week of August 2007. We arrived at Beaverhouse Lake after a 400m hike from the parking lot. With the canoe and kayak fully loaded we set off.  Full of excitement (and a little trepidation) we dipped our paddles into the lake and immediately I realized this trip was meant to be. The lake was calm and the sun shone down from the western sky. The first stop was at the Beaverhouse Lake Ranger Station to purchase our permits and get a cold drink of water from a local spring.

At the end of Beaverhouse Lake, a short portage led us up and around a series of rapids on the Quetico River. We passed through a grassy meadow that was once headquarters to a local logging operation where all that remains today is the rusted out carcass of an antique automobile hidden among the trees. We were warned to keep an eye out for ticks in this area and did find a couple after a tick check. An exploding deer population has led to an increase in deer ticks in the western end of the park. This is the species that carries lyme disease and proper prevention can save a lot of future suffering.

With the canoe and kayak loaded up once again, a Goldeneye hen and her two chicks led us into Quetico Lake to begin our search for pictographs. Bearing left and following the north shore of this beautiful lake we found the rock paintings quite easily, just a few feet above the water along the steep granite shoreline. There was a beautiful campsite at the end of the Quetico Lake “gallery”.  We spent two quiet nights here without seeing another soul but just before dusk we were serenaded with the haunting cries of loons each night.

            From Quetico Lake we paddled up McAlpine Creek taking a break from the open water paddling that dominates this route. The western end of the creek is very shallow and rimmed with tall grasses and sedges. The area is littered with stumps and snags left over from logging operations and beavers have contributed two sizeable obstacles to this waterway as well. Everyone in our group had a good laugh as we struggled to wrestle and maneuver our boats over the two dams, trying desperately not to fall through or off the structures.

The first of two portages we encountered that day climbed up a steep rocky trail to Kasakokwog Lake. An old log dam and lumbering sluice located at the top of a series of rapids offer further reminders of the parks history.

There are some fantastic campsites at the eastern end of Kasakokwog Lake and we spent the night there. Our group enjoyed swimming, reading and nature  photography. There are also some good fishing spots in this area where walleye and bass provided us with several hours of entertainment. Metres from our campsite the boys experienced their first success smallmouth bass fishing which they still remember to this day. Our evening was capped by a spectacular northern sunset followed by a night sky overrun with stars. The kids made up names for the constellations they saw as the adults finished cleaning up and doused the fire. There was snoring coming from both tents before our heads hit the pillows

The third day’s paddle included the McAlpine portage which is the longest portage on this route. Park staff refer to it as “the Garden Walk” because the portage follows an old logging road approximately 1.2 kilometres long moving over gently rolling terrain. Our group made the portage in three stages and by the time we were done, the view of Canal Lake was one extremely welcome sight! After this arduous walk we were in desperate need of an early day and luckily found that nights’ campsite directly across from the portage landing. After a quick swim and an easy supper, everyone in the group nodded off to a well deserved sleep.

            The following morning, we checked our map for the day’s route and were alarmed to see that it did not show our location at Canal Lake connecting through to Batchewaung Bay as it should. Our guidebook did not mention another portage so we frantically checked our GPS which showed a way through. We were beginning to worry. There was no way we wanted to take the Garden Walk again! We frantically scanned the distant shore looking for any way out but could not see one.

As panic began to set in, a group of three paddlers, out for a week of fishing, emerged from the forest. With a sigh of relief we loaded up the boats and headed into Batchewaung Bay. We warned them of the portage they were about to undertake as they assured us the paddling ahead was easy. Looking back I don’t know if this was fair trade. At least we offered the group some good fishing spots we had found!

            After a short time on the water we began to notice more traffic. The campsites were more developed and for the first time the area began to feel like a provincial park. A large number of canoe routes meet here but even here we encountered a pair of loons that would swim up to our boats and call. These actions set off a round of imitation calls from us which, the loons ignored until one of the boys took out a loon flute. The couple responded to the flute and enthralled us all. We camped that night in Pickerel Narrows but had some difficulty finding an unoccupied site because of the number of canoeists in this stretch of the park.

            Pickerel Lake is the largest section of open water paddling on this trip and we got caught in a gale trying to cross it. The lake can be dangerous when stirred up and the whitecaps had us seeking shelter in amongst the islands. Once we were safely nestled in the islands, we had the wind at our backs and sailed our way through a large burned over area that was very sparse but provided us with our first taste of wild blueberries. We were a day early and stumbled across a beautiful island campsite across from the Pines hiking trail where we spent another two nights.

            The last day of our trip led to the public campground at French Lake. We encountered a growing stream of traffic on the water as we neared the area where paddlers can take day trips and a hiking trail provides access to the water’s edge. We paddled through old growth forests of red pine as a very picturesque river led us into French Lake and our car.

             Canoeing is the perfect family vacation. What began as a series of unknowns turned into a trip that has generated a lifetime of memories.  There are a few crucial points to keep in mind when planning a family trip into the wilderness. It is important to gear the trip aroung the younger members of your group. Make sure you the rout you choose has lots of variety – rapids, waterfalls, pictographs, streams and the chance for photography are great ways to prevent boredom. Gear the meals around the kids and try to involve them in all camp activities. Take time to explore the areas and answer any questions your children may have. You can receive a deep sense of satisfaction when you graduate to paddling your family canoe and, like me, any anxiety you may feel will fade away with your first paddle stroke.

copyright 2009 Tim McKillup  http://www.canoestories.com/McKillup/family canoe trip.htm

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