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Canoe Trip to Northern Ontario

Kato

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 10, 2005
Messages
2,679
Location
Manitoba - At the end of the road
We decided to do something a bit different this year for our annual Post Moving Cattle to Pasture Pre - Haying Do it Now or Wait for Another Year Vacation. We packed up the canoe and headed off for a canoe trip east of Kenora Ontario. We were gone for three days, and it was quite the trip. The weather was beautiful, the paddling was pretty good, except for a bit of rough water on one bigger lake, and the bugs were pretty well behaved, even the black flies. :shock: :D

The portages, on the other hand ... :roll: :roll: :help:

We covered five lakes, and it took four portages. This is where we found what we were made of, and when we finally got back to the truck we were pretty proud of what we'd accomplished. Two of the portages weren't too bad, and one of them we were able to cheat a bit by tying two lines to the canoe and walking it through some rapids. The last one however was a whopper. :shock: We found the path, and followed it for a bit until it turned to the left. Hubby said to me, that's not a path, it's a dry waterfall! No. It wasn't. It was the path. It went straight up like a set of stairs, and was about the height of a three story building! :? :? We looked at each other, and couldn't believe we could pull the canoe up that cliff. Turned out that we could and did. I'm still not sure how we did it, but I guess when you know you're all alone and miles from a road, you find the strength. You don't have much choice. It took an hour and a half to go 1500 feet. That's with the canoe. There were also several other trips through carrying packs and such. :D

It was a fun holiday, and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for something different to do. It's also a cheap holiday, since there are no costs besides your gas food and fishing licence. We saw lots of wildlife, but no bears. We didn't really want to see bears anyway. :shock: It's amazing how close you can get to the birds when you glide up in a canoe.

Here's a few pictures. I didn't take a picture of the killer portage, because I was too tired to lug the camera back after we'd gone through. :lol: :lol:

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Anybody know what kind of bird this is?

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We snuck up on this eagle fighting with a turkey vulture over a fish carcass.

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Excellent vacation indeed. I can really apreciate missing the portage photo op due to exhaustion. I'm glad the bugs were tolerable, that can be a deal killer.
 
Fantastic bird photo. Clarence probably knows what kind of bird you have there. And the water surface on the lily picture is unusually pretty. Sounds like you had a great 3 days you'll remember for a long time.
 
That bird is a female Merganser. See them every once in a while. Males are better looking than the females :P, and look quite a bit different. Tsk,Tsk Kato..barely driving off the rat-race of the Trans-Canada...should have headed south on HWY 71 just east of the Kenora by-pass and come taken a real vacation on the south end of Lake of the Woods. :D
 
Great pictures!!! It makes me want to go back to northern Canada. Wonderful wildlife and scenery.
 
I suspected it was something like a merganser. They don't come around our neighbourhood, so I wasn't sure. She was a cheeky one.. let us get within about 10 feet before she took off.

Maybe we'll go south next time Aaron. There's no shortage of lakes down there, that's for sure. The lakes we were on were at the north end of a couple of canoe routes that started at Rushing River. They were pretty long routes though.... :shock: We more or less jumped in at the middle of them. Besides, it was remote enough for us for a first time out. We only met one other party, and they were on their way out.

If it wasn't for the gps, we'd still be out there. :D :D :D
 
That sounds like so much fun, Kato. It would be a trip I would remember for a looooooong time :D Also thanks for sharing the pictures! I love to see pictures of Canada! :D
 
The outdoor education class in highschool goes on a canoe trip up north every spring-it's always fun. You don't go to far up here without hitting a river or a lake.
 

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