Back to Canoeing

This past week I went on my twelfth Algonquin canoe trip! But even though it was my twelfth, it was the first in a few different ways — first without campers, first since COVID, muddiest portages. Not to mention that for one of our group of five, it was her first canoe trip ever!

We ended up pushing through what should have been our second last day to avoid bad weather.

To back up a little bit, in May a friend (Claire) reached out and asked if I would like to join her (and two of her friends) on a 6-day canoe trip this summer. I agreed, excited by an opportunity to go on another longer canoe trip after so long, and one without campers! Although this was trip twelve, my last week-long trip was in 2016. After a bit of talking back and forth, our other friend Jenn said she would love to experience a trip, and so she was invited along. I assured her multiple times that I had taken 12 year old kids on similar trips, so even with no experience, she was fully capable of joining us!

I did a bit of extra shopping this time around, as I was so used to simply using equipment from our old Girl Guide camp. Last week we packed everything up and drove out to join Claire, Anik and Tom at Canoe Lake.

What followed was a delightful trip! We often joked about the 'typical canoe trip experience' that Jenn was having, and mentioned whenever something could be ticked off the list. Some highlights that anybody who's been on trips will recognize included crossing beaver dams, canoeing in the rain, rocky portages, listening to loons, and pretty sunsets over lakes.

We had some wonderful moments, like seeing a moose on our very first day! We had great luck with the weather (aside for deciding to push through our fifth day and end early in order to avoid rolling thunderstorms), and our journeys across the big lakes weren't too windy. We found beautiful sites (with some very new thunderboxes!). And of course some struggles, like knee deep mud at a beaver dam that almost ate my croc and a grassy bay that seemed to go on forever. I slipped in mud on a portage and the canoe fell on my forearm. The 2390m portage was a challenge! But honestly, canoe trip struggles turn into some of the best stories, and they really add to the feeling of accomplishment at the end of the trip!

Going on this canoe trip reminded me of how much I enjoy them, and why. It was such a different experience going with friends instead of campers. My last trip was in 2019, and I hope I don't have to wait so long to go on another one!

A Few Days in Algonquin Park

A few weeks ago, for the first time ever, I went camping with just some friends! I have been camping with all of these people before, of course, but always with Girl Guides. This was my first time going camping without campers to look out for.

The trip was four days, but only two of those days were entirely in Algonquin Park. They can be easily labelled—the hiking day, and the canoeing day! There isn't too much to tell, so this post will mostly be a collection of photos.

The Hiking Day (Aug 10)

The first morning, we got up and had a leisurely breakfast. My favourite part was using the Kelly Kettle to boil water for tea. I love these! You build a fire in the bottom, fill the kettle, and carefully place it on top of the fire. The 'chimney' is wide enough to continue dropping sticks into. Pretty quickly the water boils! The only downside is it's size. While that didn't matter much on this trip, I've taken them on canoe trips before and they can be a bit cumbersome!

After a quick stop at the Portage Store to ask about renting canoes, we set off for a day of nice little hikes. We started with the Algonquin Logging Museum. This trail starts off in the bookstore, with little dioramas to look at and a video (which wasn't playing at the time). The rest of the trail is made up of chronological outdoor exhibits of different buildings and equipment used for logging.

I think this trail would be interesting for anyone who likes history, but I had a special link to what we learned about—my paternal grandfather was a logger who died in a related accident when my dad was a teenager. While this museum specifically talked about logging in Algonquin Park, the techniques would have been similar across Ontario. As I read the displays, I wondered if my grandfather had lived in these kinds of buildings, or used these kinds of tools as he worked in the 50s and 60s. My dad remembers some things my grandfather told him about, such as having a horse he often worked with.

I would definitely recommend checking this trail/museum out.

Station One - The Camboose Camp from the 1800s

Station Four - The 'Jammer' Crane

Station Nine - The Alligator Boat

Station Fifteen - Sawlog Camp (1940s)

After the Logging Museum, we went to walk the Spruce Bog Boardwalk. This was a short hike with some very unique scenery. Heather did a spectacular job acting as a tour guide for us by translating the French guidebook (as there were no English ones for us to use!).

We stopped off at our campsite for a late lunch, and went to do our last hike, Two Rivers Lookout. This was a short walk, but the climb was quite steep in places! Still, the view from the top was work the trek. We took lots of great pictures.

(Yeah, I look like a Girl Guide Advertisement—That's what happens when 95% of your camping clothing is related to GGC or Camp Woolsey!)

After our hikes, we went back to our our site for a quiet, relaxing evening around the fire!

The Canoeing Day (Aug 11)

Heather and I have gone on plenty of canoe trips in Algonquin Park, so we knew of a nice little day trip we could do on Canoe Lake—visiting Tom Thomson's Cairn for a picnic lunch.

Tom Thomson's story at Canoe Lake is very interesting, and I highly recommend reading more about it. The short version is that he was found drowned in Canoe Lake, but details around what happened to him, and then what happened to his body, are confusing and suspicious. He was a famous painter and said to be a very good canoer, making some people doubt his death was an accident. Whatever the truth is, the story is fascinating.

The weather was perfect for our little trip. We packed a lunch, rented two canoes, and headed out. I'll admit, my canoeing skills are a little rusty after two years away from camping. But we made good time and arrived at Tom Tomson's Cairn with no problems. It was a pretty popular spot! We had a nice picnic, then made the trip back to the Portage Store to return the boats.

(Funny aside, once as a kid my family was camping in Alqonguin and my dad and I wanted to canoe out to the cairn. I remember it being a pretty windy day. We made it to the right point, but thought we were lost and went back before going around the corner to see the nicely labelled dock!)

We had some well deserved ice cream, and went back to our campsite for another relaxing evening reading more about Tom Thomson, relaxing around the fire, and reminiscing about our old camping adventures at Woolsey (which is a very common topic for us!)

The next morning, we got up, slowly packed, and went home. Overall, a very nice couple of days with some good friends!

Horses and Mountains in British Columbia

Just about two weeks ago I went on a week-long trip to British Columbia to attend a horse archery clinic. Which I suppose warrants a bit of a backstory before I get into the trip itself.

My brother and I started doing archery at camp—Camp Woolsey for me, Scouting camps for Kevin. Over time, Kevin got his first bow, and I got mine a year or two later. We started going to a range at a nearby hunting store to practice, but more or less, we were on our own and self-taught. During this time I helped teach archery to plenty of girls and women while I worked at various Girl Guide camps, and sometimes I brought our bows along for adults to try something a little more substantial.

After some time, we got interested in trying out new bows. I decided on an longbow, but Kevin was starting to get interested in the different styles and history of horse bows. During the lockdowns, with time to spare, he started doing a lot of research and found some interesting youtube channels that talked about Eastern archery styles. I ended up getting my own horse bow sometime earlier this year (spring, 2021).

My three bows — my first take-down recurve (Ragim Matrix), my longbow (Ragim Fox) and my horsebow (AF Archery Tatar Blue)

Then, last spring, Kevin discovered a place nearby that teaches horseback archery, called Horses of the Sun! This was something we had talked about for awhile, but never thought we would actually get the chance to try it out. We got in contact with them and signed up, and started taking classes in the summer. I took riding lessons from when I was about 8 or 9 to when I was 16 or 17, but Kevin didn't have any experience with horses. So far, we've both been having a great time!

Me with some of the horses I've ridden for lessons - Marko, Inka and Drishti

Which finally brings us to the trip to British Columbia! At the end of August, we were told about a clinic that was taking place in British Columbia. The clinic was for a particular style of horse archery (Kassai) which isn't the way we're learning, so it sounded fun. Not only that, but horse archery in Canada is a fairly small sport, and part of the appeal of going was to meet other people in the country who do it. Also, I had never been to British Columbia before!

So Kevin and I, along with our teacher Uwe and our friend Sonja, went on the trip! We flew from Ottawa to Calgary and got a drive to Luxor Corrals, where we camped for the week. We learned about the Kassai style of shooting, as well as helped with the Kassai track and competition that took place at the end of the week. Unfortunately we didn't get to do quite as much riding as we had hoped, given that the three of us were far behind everyone else with riding experience. Later in the week we did get our own beginner riding class, and we also got to go on a trail ride (which was definitely one of my favourite parts of the trip!)

Another fun thing that happened was that we got to ride some mules, so now we can say we've done mule-back archery! This was also my first time every trying western riding!

Top Row: Popcorn

Middle: Luna and Junior (a mule!)

Bottom: Junior (the one picture I have of me holding a bow while riding, and it's barely visible) and Dreamwalker (another mule!)

Views from our hike and trail ride

The scenery was beautiful and camping was fun (if a little colder than we expected for mid-September!) We didn't see much else while in British Columbia, since there wasn't time for much besides the clinic. However, we did make a few trips to the nearby town of Radium to visit the hot springs, which were very nice after some of the cold and rainy days!

On the way back to Calgary, we had a chance to stop at a beautiful trail called Marble Canyon. It was a nice quick hike, following Tokumm Creek and the canyon it carved away from the road until reaching a waterfall. I loved the colour of the water, which is caused by rock dust from the glaciers scraping against bedrock. The dust reflects the light to create the colour. I also thought it was interesting to see how the trees were growing back up after a forest fire.

All in all, it was a fun trip! We got to try out some new stuff, and meet new people. Also, beautiful scenery! Now we hope that next time we see everyone, we'll be able to hold our own a little better (with riding, we're actually pretty good at the archery side of the sport)!