A detailed trip report and documentary on our 230km journey down the famous Bloodvein River from Artery Lake (Ontario) to the Bloodvein River Bridge (Manitoba) in the Summer of 2023 over almost two weeks.
Tag: camping
VIDEO TRIP REPORT: THE SOUTH NAHANNI RIVER
A detailed video trip report documenting our journey down the fabled South Nahanni River in 2022:
TRIP REPORT: NAHANNI NATIONAL PARK RESERVE – VIRGINIA FALLS TO NAHANNI BUTTE
Few wilderness canoe destinations, the world over, have been documented and celebrated to the extent of the fabled South Nahanni River in Canada’s Northwest Territories. The river valley and its surrounding wildlands – the rugged Mackenzie Mountains – are famous for their immense natural beauty. This is a land of towering 3,000 foot canyons; cathedrals of limestone, castles of sandstone; of Virginia Falls – one of the largest waterfalls in the world; a land of spectacular karst terrain, cave systems, hot springs and gemstone lakes; northern lights, wild rapids, roaming grizzly bears and wood bison. This is a place with a river that flows through a greater diversity of landforms than virtually anywhere else on the planet.
VIDEO TRIP LOG: LOWER MISSINAIBI RIVER
A brief video documenting our 2016 trip down the Lower Missinaibi River:
VIDEO TRIP LOG: MISSISSAGI RIVER PROVINCIAL PARK
A video trip report documenting our 2020 trip through Mississagi River Provincial Park:
VIDEO TRIP LOG: WABAKIMI PROVINCIAL PARK – ALLANWATER – WHITEWATER – CARIBOU
Just finished off a video trip report on our 2021 trip through Wabakimi Provincial Park:
TRIP REPORT: WABAKIMI PROVINCIAL PARK – ALLANWATER – WHITEWATER – CARIBOU
Grey vapours loomed above us as we stood on the edge of Mattice Lake in Armstrong, Ontario. The cool, early morning air held a faint scent of smoke; a manifestation of record-breaking wildfires raging just to our west that would claim some 800,000 hectares of boreal forest by the end of summer, 2021. Under the hazy, overcast sky, a slight breeze tickled the surface of the lake. The water was cold and dark and the forest was dark too. The scene held a magnetic gloominess that stoked my sense of anticipation. We were about to begin an adventure through the heart of Wabakimi Provincial Park – a land of some 10,000 lakes and 2,000 kilometres of canoe routes…
TRIP REPORT: HALIBURTON HIGHLANDS – HERB AND GUN LAKES
I have always loved paddling the Haliburton Highlands Water Trails (HHWT). Here, outside the town of Dorset, on the southwest edge of Algonquin park, lies a diverse, interconnected web of canoe routes over a swath of 28,000 hectares of beautiful wilderness. The mixed forests and exposed Precambrian rock that characterize the area are typical of the southern Shield and support rich habitats for an assortment of wildlife…
TRIP REPORT: MUSKOKA RIVER (SOUTH BRANCH)
Beyond Thompson’s Folly we found ourselves paddling through picturesque Crown forests, with gently sloping, tree studded hills running up from the rocky shoreline on either side of us. By this time of the season, the splendour of the colourful fall foliage had long passed and in its place were barren deciduous trees, beige leaf litter on the forest floor, coating the hills, and long, dry, sun-bleached grasses along the riverside. We were now approaching Cook’s Falls, a scenic, gurgling CII rapids that lay in the shadow of a towering granite cliff – this would be our campsite for the night…
TRIP REPORT: MISSISSAGI RIVER PROVINCIAL PARK
In the summer of 1912, Tom Thomson – one of our country’s most beloved artists – ran the Mississagi from Biscotasing or “Bisco” to Lake Huron over two months. In a subsequent letter to a friend, Thomson remarked that the Mississagi was “the finest canoe trip in the world.” While we can only guess what precisely caused Thomson to write those words, it is clear that the Mississagi still undoubtedly retains the magic that he must have felt as he sat on its rocky shores and sketched the wild panoramas that surrounded him that summer.
As you embark, perhaps, on your own journey down the Mississagi, please remember that in exploring these immense and formidable landscapes, we not only draw ourselves closer to the earth, our home, but we also rekindle the glory of our country’s formative years when the land was younger, before the ceaseless march of the modern world. When we carve through the emerald cathedrals of the Mississagi, we reawaken the ghosts of a still wild kingdom, so that they may sing and chant and paddle once more.
THE TERRA INCOGNITA 