Step into the Wild
Let the Adventure Begin
Life is an adventure. Around every bend is a new discovery—we just have to open our eyes to see it. Throughout our lives, Bob and I have loved to investigate new spaces, beginning with moving from Mississauga to Northern Ontario back in 1979. The desire to live in a land relatively free from traffic, with open fields, wild forests, lakes and rivers drew us here and we haven’t been disappointed. We’ve enjoyed country living—definitely discovering new sights and smells on our farms and marvelling at the welcoming, friendly neighbours. What a blessing it’s been to live here.
But it wasn’t just the day-to-day living, that called us here, it was the ‘wild’. That precious gift of rivers, streams, mountains and forests to explore all around us—and that’s what we did, and that’s what I’m going to share with you over the next little while. So, Step into the Wild with us and experience the joy of adventure. Real life escapades that test one’s skills, one’s patience, one’s durability and one’s faith. Were they worthwhile? Well, you decide—as you travel with along with us. And perhaps when we’re done, you’ll set out on your own journey of discovery.
Story Number One – The Spanish River is soooo easy—ha!
Chapter One
The next bend, held no big surprises, just a few swifts with a few rocks to dodge. For the rest of the morning the river flowed at an easy pace.
When we decided to do a white-water canoe trip, it was decided to put safety first, even if it took much longer to do the trip. So, we made it a practice to pull up to the shore before any rapids that were identified on the map. This gave us a chance to walk beside the river scouting the best path to take through the rapids. It also gave us an opportunity to identify obstacles of concern—like overhanging trees, that would need to be avoided. Our first set of marked rapids came about noon on this first day of paddling.
“Pull up at the yellow portage sign, ahead, Lynn,” shouted Bob from the stern. He had to shout because the noise of the river was deafening.
“Are you sure we can even run these rapids, Bob?” Listening to the crash of water against rocks gave me goosebumps.
“We’ll see—just head for shore.”
I willingly did this since going down whatever lay ahead seemed way too scary for me. The canoe ground against the shore and we jumped out and headed down the portage trail. It was soon apparent that the cause of all the noise was a small chute between several guard rocks at the beginning of the rapids.
“Oh, that doesn’t look very hard—there’s a clear path straight down that chute and no rocks at the end.” I said, pointing.
“Ya and if you look farther ahead, the rest of this set is just a boulder field that we’ll have to pick our way through. We’ve done lots of those this morning.” He swept his hat off and wiped the sweat from his eyes. “I think we can run these.” Eyebrows raised as he looked at me.
“I agree—piece of cake.” Grinning, we walked back to the canoe.
Chapter Two
We got back into our canoe, then paddled up river a bit so we could line up to run the chute. I kneeled bracing my knees against the hull, as we drifted towards the chute. Dipping my paddle to correct our position, we plunged down the chute. It was an exciting, wild ride, but there was not time to consider that we had made it, untouched by rocks, when the boulder field loomed ahead. Leaning forward, I picked a path between the rocks, zigging this way and that. We bumped off a few rocks, but nothing really jogged us off course. Within minutes we glided into calm waters.
“Whoo-hoo, that was a blast,” I shouted. Jubilation shone from my face. I turned to look at Bob. We smiled at each other. Our first obstacle was conquered.
Glancing at the map, Bob said, “The next several kilometers should be fairly simple, just like the ones this morning. There are no other marked rapids until tomorrow.”
We paddled on, full of confidence and elation for successfully shooting the rapids. The sun was just dipping below the horizon when we arrived at our first campsite. A sandy outcrop on the side of a point was the perfect spot to camp—out of the flow, overlooking the river. The quiet place looked inviting. It proved to be an easy place to land and unload the canoe. We set up camp and soon dinner was bubbling on the cookstove and a fire crackled, sending it’s sparks skyward to join the stars. We huddled together with a sleeping bag over our shoulders—nights in May were chilly. Bob hauled out the map, to plan the next day.
“Look here, Lynn,” he said, shining his flashlight on the map. “This is where we are and this is where we have to get to tomorrow.”
“That’s only 10 kilometers, Bob. Surely, we can go farther than that in a day?”
“Normally, yes, but you see all these lines?” He pointed out two sets of double lines and several single lines. “The double lines are major rapids and the single lines normal rapids, like the one we shot today. We’ll likely have to portage around the major ones.”
“Oh, I get it. The portaging will take a lot of time, so we won’t be able to make the distance? Hey, look this double set is called, “Graveyard” rapids.” I shivered.
Chapter Three
The sun had risen, along with the mist on the river. It was going to be a beautiful day, but a long one. We gobbled down a quick breakfast and broke camp, then set out, once more along the river. As expected, this section of the river flowed fast and hard, cascading over zillions of rocks. Every bend has a swifts or small unmarked rapids. Around 9am we came to our first marked set for the day.
“Okay, Lynn, rapids ahead—aim for shore.”
As if I couldn’t tell that there were rapids ahead, we had been hearing them for half a kilometer. They sounded wicked, dangerous. “Are these a marked double or single set, Bob?”
“Double.” We landed at the portage and ran to the river for a quick look. Sure enough, it was a deep, fast flowing torrent with lots of twist and turns and a mean looking drop. “I don’t think we can run these?”
“Me, neither.” I sighed. Thankful, I didn’t have to admit that I was too scared to try them.
Over the next hour we unpacked, portaged and repacked our canoe, then once more glided down the river. It was calmer in this section and we successfully shot several small sets of rapids and one marked set. We were feeling pretty good about our skills.
Bob shouted, “Graveyard rapids ahead, pull over.”
I did, really quickly—not wanting anything to do with rapids that had Graveyard in the name! As usual we got out to take a look and what we found was a fairly easy looking set of rapids with a few twists and turns—nothing we hadn’t done before. We looked at each other.
“There must be more than this?” said Bob. But the portage ended at calm water and there was no other marked portage to be seen, only a rough path across the rocks by the river. “Looks safe enough to shoot?”
“I agree, but I’m sure puzzled about the name. Perhaps there is a graveyard up on shore?”
“Maybe, well let’s get going, we’re burning daylight.”
“Arrrrh.” I hated it, when he said that. I got into the canoe.
Chapter Four
I braced myself. Even though the rapids looked fairly each, I had a niggling feeling that we were missing something—but what was it? “Oh well, we’re committed now,” I mumbled.
We dashed down the first chute, then there was no time for thinking, just for reacting. We zigged and zagged, down the river, narrowly missing rocks on a number of occasions. At last, we glided into calm waters.
“Yippee, best set yet!” I threw my hands in the air and turned to discuss the run with Bob.
“Ya, that went surprisingly well.” He bent his head to look at the map, while we lazily drifted downstream.
I watched him for awhile, then suddenly noticed that it was much noisier than before and the current had picked up. Looking ahead, I saw waves, flashing in the sunlight. That meant—rocks & rapids—possibly something…bigger! I couldn’t see over the edge, past the first rocks.
“Oh no, it’s a falls, Bob,” I shouted.
He dropped the map and looked up, then looked to the right and to the left. We were mid-channel in a fast-moving torrent, that was swiftly taking us to the drop-off. “I’ll brace the canoe, Lynn. You stand up and see if you can pick a path.” He gulped, then braced.
I shakily stood to my feet and the only flow that wasn’t blocked by rocks was the centre. Quickly, I sat back down. “Centre,” I yelled and braced myself.
Paddling was not necessary, but we did it anyway. We were swept over the falls and dropped to the bottom. The drop seemed like a hundred metres to me (but I’m a writer, so I tend to exaggerate). I think fifteen to twenty metres is a better estimate. I’m thankful that it was springtime because the heavy spring run off, propelled us through the undertow at the bottom of the falls. Canoe full of water, we drifted to shore. Shakily, we got out, emptied the canoe and sat looking back at the falls.
“Guess the Spanish River isn’t so easy?” I said to Bob. He gave a weak grin.
“Nope. Not the best beginning to our canoeing hobby, but we’ll live to paddle another day—lessons learned.”
The good Lord spared us to paddle on.
Discover how the adventures began
Step into the Wild
The Book
