Ontario's Woodland Caribou Provincial Park - A Different World for Canoe Travelers

The Story of a Solo Canoe Trip Through Ontario's Woodland Caribou Provincial Park
By James Hegyi

CHAPTER 8
Voices in the Wilderness

The morning weather is clear but windy, and I have to pull hard to get to the Hansen Lake portage. My stock of trail food is gone, so I tip up the canoe for a wind break and cook another batch of pancakes for breakfast. The shores of this lake were wiped clean by the '87 fire. Rock and short green brush are all that's left, save for a few blackened tree trunks poking up here or there.

Now another odd thing happens. Throughout this trip, especially in the days when I saw no people, I would often imagine that I heard voices. The impression would last only a few seconds, then I would realize that it was only the natural sounds of the forest being filtered through my urban dweller ears. I've lived too long in a world where voices are everywhere. In my job I have to talk to people all day. The radio in the car, the television in my house, my wife and daughter on the telephone - all these voices drift into my consciousness all day long. The mind expects to hear voices, so it assumes that it does. I start to hear voices as I cook the pancakes, but soon dismiss them as just the wind howling through the brush, the waves lapping the shore. Maybe it's just the bleak surroundings, the land with no trees, that makes me want to hear people that really aren't there. What a surprise when I realize that I really AM hearing voices. I jump up to find real people approaching the portage landing.

Three canoes manned by energetic travelers arrive and begin to unload as I stand there, smiling. A surgeon from Winnipeg is traveling with his two daughters. Another woman and two men complete the party. One man is from Los Angeles, the other from San Diego. I've traveled close to 160 kilometers and these people are only the third party that I've met that are also traveling by canoe.

My smile slowly fades as I face the wind and the desolate shores of Hansen Lake. I've been checking my traveling distance and need to keep going if I want to get home before my two weeks are up. I get confused by the portages into Glenn Lake. Evidently there's a new portage on the north shore, but the old portages on the southern shore are so distinct that I take them instead. I end up doing three short ones instead of the one long one, but they're not too bad.

Now comes a long dreary paddle to Optic Lake. The fire destroyed land is not pleasing to my eyes, and I worry when I think about the future of the park. I realize that fire is a necessary part of nature. Thick, dry organic soil can't be laid down forever. The same bed of pine needles that make a soft, well drained campsite is also a perfect bed of tinder on a windy day. The land just gets more and more prone to fire until the smallest spark sets it off. It's way too early to expect much mineral soil to form; this whole area is only ten thousand years from the retreat of the last great glacier.

I'm just worried that some day the whole park will burn at the same time. If that happens, I won't live to see the trees return. There's not much that can be done except to keep the fires of men from increasing the odds of catastrophe. This land, this part of the park, can only get better as the years of my life go by.

Rain is coming again as I search for a campsite on Optic Lake. There are areas of unburned forest here, but the points of land that I pass offer no room for my small tent. There's a long peninsula on the map, near the next portage, and I'm betting that I'll find a campsite there.

Rain or not, I'm hungry, and I need to find a little flat spot to cook some noodles. A small rock of an island has a good landing, and as I pull up to the shore, some seagulls take off and circle overhead. A few minutes later, as my lunch cooks on the gas burner, I notice sounds coming from the trees just twenty meters away.

I've blundered into a seagull nesting area. Evidently the chicks are alone now, prey to other birds that could come in and take them from the nest. Seagulls circle overhead, but don't try to drive me off. I refrain from wandering inland, and leave as soon as my meal is over.

Now the point of land I'm hoping to camp on comes into sight and I find that it IS a good spot for a tent. So good, evidently, that someone put a cabin on it some years ago. There's no time to go looking, so I land on a nearby shore just as a heavy rain comes bursting out of the sky. Luck is with me, the rocky shore, covered with lichen, has a tree broken about two meters from the ground. I lay the bow of my canoe on the stump and crawl under it. A cup of hot coffee helps me pass the time as the wind swirls and the rain soaks the land. There are voices (real voices) coming from the cabin nearby, so I'll have neighbors this evening.

I meet my neighbors later as I'm resting in my tent. A motorboat pulls up and two young men look curiously as I crawl out and say hello. They've just flown in and wonder where the heck I came from. I mention Red Lake, the long portage out of Artery... somehow I'm not connecting.

"Yes, several portages.." I begin to realize that these young men don't have any idea about the rest of the park. They were flown into a "remote, inaccessible lake", possess no map of the area, and believe that the "terrible" portages lead only into the adjoining lake, where a cached motor boat waits. Both men appear to be strong and in shape, and it was their natural curiosity that brought them to my campsite. What a perfect team for a canoe trip!

In the week they will be on this lake, they may putter around, fishing here or there. Perhaps they will walk one of the portages, start up the cached motor boat, and see one more lake. In the night time, they will crawl into comfortable beds, just like they did back home.

Their strength will never be tested on a steep hill, or against a stiff westerly wind. Their eyes will never see the strange muskeg forest, the thundering waterfalls, the cryptic paintings of long ago. They will never have to follow a compass, read a map, or check for signs of bear when making a camp. They will never feel small and alone as thunder slams down and wind rattles their shelter, never feel powerful and alive as they triumph over angry water or gaze on a distant wilderness shore.

We say "so long" and the two young men motor off to their cabin. I hear their voices that evening, rising and falling with the wind, mixing with the sounds of the wilderness, blending in until I'm not sure if the voices are real...