Paddling Time

Treasuring stolen moments in the wilderness

words :: Carl Michener

From the time I could toddle, my family summer vacation consisted of an extended canoe trip. Dad would plan the route, sometimes the French River, Poker Lakes or western Algonquin. Other times he would draw a line connecting a group of lakes on Crown land that spoke to him (Mom quickly learned to dread those lines) or slide the canoe off the Oldsmobile into some bug-infested, rain-drenched, black-spruce Zone Écologique Contrôlée (ZEC) in Quebec that he (but why, FFS?) decided he wanted to get to know.

As a kid it never wasn’t an adventure. I’d hook myself fishing, burn my fingers on glowing embers, poke ground-wasp nests and, most memorably, rip open my bathing suit (and my butt) sliding down a granite slope into the water. None of those things mattered— canoe trips pretty much always felt like the best thing I could possibly be doing. Endless discovery, tuning into small changes in the weather, the wind rippling over my bare skin, a soundtrack of paddle dips, waves licking the hull, birdsong and beaver splashes.

As I started planning my own trips, they got more ambitious. When I had kids of my own, I ratcheted it back, adopting Dad’s pattern right down to the questionable lines connecting largely unaccessed bodies of water (but no ZECs). For many summers now, my brother has been bringing his kids back to Ontario from Brazil (where he lives) and the clear highlight for my niece and nephew is The Canoe Trip with their cousins, aunts and uncles.

My brother’s kids are young, but mine are in their mid-teens. And so the pattern is breaking down. The Canoe Trip has been threatened or supplanted by bike racing, biathlon training, equestrian obligations and working at camps. Growing up, my siblings and I never had so much going on and always had time for the highlight of the summer. I think, selfishly, Where does that leave me? And the rest of the family? My deeper fear is an erosion of that connection to the wild and to each other.

Practically, it leaves us bits and snatches: car camping with kids on the way to bike races, the glorious week-long canoe trips of years past reduced to occasional weekends. On the bright side, teen development has also seen us bikepacking in early May and setting off on deep-winter ski adventures. But no extended trips.

Do long jaunts into the wilderness matter? I think they do. I need a thorough mental reset now and then. I think everyone does. To connect, from time to time, with the rock and needles beneath your bare feet, feel the sunshine on your face, soak in the heavy silence of forests and wordlessly sync up with fellow trippers. The very best times I’ve had were spent adventuring; they are the yardsticks against which all other life experiences are measured. In the bush, pressures of all kinds fall away and living in the moment simply takes over.

Because renewing that connection regularly works for me, it’s what I wish for my family. For young kids especially, extended trips provide the time to build a level of comfort with and a strong connection to the natural world. I just hope that connection lasts a lifetime. But if the alternative is snatching a couple of days here and there with overprogrammed teenagers (who have largely outpaced their old dad in the sporty things that he enjoys)… sure. I’ll take it. Whenever and however I can.

Ride Sault Ste. Marie s new mountain bike trails at Hiawatha Highlands that everyone is talking about.

Take a second day to hit up the lookout on the Farmer Lake trail.

Check out Lake Superior, the best lake in the world!

Enjoy some locally brewed beers and awesome food.