Great Slave Lake

[PaddlingPitt]

Thanks for that image on the trim, Mike. I would not like that, although those guys looked happy enough. Wonder if they would still be smiling if they were rounding points in wind and waves.

And you do know your gear. I mistakenly referred to a 45 l barrel in the caption of my first image above. I corrected myself a minute later in the caption of my second image above. No sneaking anything by you!

This is my tarp. Carey and Janice invited us to go on the Coppermine River with them in 1995. Carey was intrigued with the history of Sir John Franklin, who went down the Coppermine in 1821. Franklin overwintered in 1820 at Fort Enterprise on Winter Lake. Carey wanted to start our trip there. That meant that we had to go 110 km (70 miles), over the height of land, to reach Point Lake on the Coppermine River system.

Carey was very organized and disciplined. When we reached camp, we immediately put water on to boil for tea. Next, we put up the tarp. I still take my tarp on all trips, but I have never put it up again. We were windbound here at Big Lake for two days. Even with the tarp up, all four of us spent most of the time in our respective tents. We huddled beneath the tarp only for community meals. Kathleen and I usually travel alone. On days like this we have simple meals, like cheese, crackers, peanut butter, salami. We stay completely out of the elements in the tent. We sip tea. Kathleen reads her book. I study my topo maps. I never tire of looking at topo maps.

On the Coppermine trip we spent 28 days (650 km 400 miles) to reach Kugluktuk (formerly Coppermine). This trip was, and at my age, will remain the most physically demanding trip I have done. Rapids were also quite challenging.

Perhaps I will post images of our overland portion of the journey. Interesting country, as most of it was above tree line.

 

[Guest]

Thanks for that image on the trim, Mike. I would not like that, although those guys looked happy enough. Wonder if they would still be smiling if they were rounding points in wind and waves.

And you do know your gear. I mistakenly referred to a 45 l barrel in the caption of my first image above. I corrected myself a minute later in the caption of my second image above. No sneaking anything by you!

They looked happy enough while paddling in and lucked into a relatively calm day. And perhaps to their credit, a slack tide.

I hope they were as lucky paddling out. They were headed out to a barrier island just south of the Outer Banks on the North Carolina coast. At the time of that photo they were near the hellaciously tidal and open to ocean breakers Bogue Inlet, and less than a mile from the Atlantic Ocean. That is some seriously windy country, and I would not paddle there with 3 inches of freeboard.

I wish we had gotten a photo of their friends following them in another tandem. That canoe was loaded with plastic boxes, stacked in the fashion of a container ship; the sternman could not see over the tower of bins in front of him and they were trailing their friends canoe via bowman commands Come a little right, little more. . . .

I am not sure I would brag about my gear knowledge. I thought our 45L barrel was a 30L for a long time, and boasted about my miraculous ability to fit three weeks worth of food in a 30L barrel.

A 45L barrel is only 1 inch shorter than a 60L, though considerably narrower, so in your photos it could have been either.

 

[alsg]

Wow! What an epic adventure and post!

 

[Robin]

Again, as others have said, Thanks for hanging in there with the posting issues and sharing such a wonderful trip. Your efforts are very much appreciated. I hope you continue to share your past adventures and your thoughts on all things canoe tripping.
I hit 70 yo this year and while non of my trips have been as far north or remote as yours, it was the first year in many years I didn't visit Canada for at least a week trip. Your report was very interesting to me as a soon to be armchair tripper.
Thanks Again.

 

[Guest]

I don't find barrels terribly uncomfortable, just terribly heavy at times. But I love the durability waterproofness odour containment character of them. When I carry them I merely repeat my mantra "No point in complaining 'cause this makes perfect sense."

Same here, although I do find them uncomfortable to carry with the harnesses or lack thereof that we have. Barrels are seriously waterproof and (hopefully) more odor proof, that makes the inconveniences worthwhile to me.

I had reservations a week and a half ago when I saw our daughter's boyfriend carrying my canvas pack by it's tumpline like it were a shoulder bag heading out the door, but they were nearly loaded up and ready for departure for their canoe trip so I didn't want to stop them for a "Take care of my stuff" lecture. I almost regretted telling them not to worry if stuff breaks (I was thinking about the plastic bowls) and that all equipment can be replaced (I was still thinking about the plastic bowls). Sure enough this afternoon as I was fussing over my borrowed gear I came across a sad broken tump hanging from the pack. Bugger. crap. Darn.

Kids, whaddaya gonna do?

Years ago my younger son took one of our internal frame backpacks on his first hiking trip and used it in much the same fashion, hanging from his shoulder with the waist belt loosely cinched. Tore the stitching on the bag and broke the plastic internal frame. It just never occurred to me that I would need to teach anyone how to properly wear a backpack. My bad.

The same son took the Freedom Solo on a downriver trip. When he returned he said, kinda sheepishly, I scratched the boat Dad.

I went out to look at the canoe still on his roof racks; giant Royalex wrinkles on both side of the hull amidships. Uh, son, you did not scratch it, you pinned it.

I honestly did not much care; he managed to recover the canoe, and was not drowned in a strainer, so it was a win win as far as I was concerned.

I would guess the reasons that canoe survived in such good Just scratched Dad condition was that it had float bags, as well as a truss hung seat and a couple additional thwarts for extra rigidity.