Four members of the Lo-Ellen Park diaspora set off to brave the mid-summer whitewater of the Madawaska River in August 2009. This group has been paddling together off and on for over 50 years. We gathered at Peter’s cottage on Lake St. Peter just south east of Algonquin Park – Steve from Los Angeles by way of his French River cottage, Dave from Halifax by way of his brother Bill’s wedding in Sarnia, Graham from Etobicoke by way of Winnipeg and Peter from Scarborough. Absent this year was Don MacKinnon who had anchored the bow seat of Steve’s canoe last year and Ken B.
Our route selection resulted from a studious and at times inconclusive debate over whether to tackle the upper or lower stretches of this river which originates in Algonquin. The Upper would have been a new experience for all of us but seemed short of campsites and long on nasty looking portages. The Lower had the advantage of being a reliable source of manageable rapids to run with lots of camping options. Fond memories of our 2008 trip tipped the balance back to the same stretch of the Lower Madawaska as last year running between Aumond’s Bay and Griffith.
The weather forecast was ominous, and Tuesday night saw Peter drenched while bravely flipping burgers on the BBQ for his guests. We witnessed a spectacular son et lumiere show rolling up the lake with wild winds, lightning and a brief power outage. We enjoyed a late evening spinning vinyl records and reminiscing. A favourite of all of us in the mid-70s was CANO (La Coopérative des Artistes du Nouvel-Ontario) whose albums “Tous dans l’meme bateau” and “Au nord de notre vie” evoked memories of our Sudbury youth and early canoeing adventures, perhaps best illustrated by the album cover of their first LP.
I have created a CD containing the trip slide show and MP3 copies of a selection of tunes from both of these albums, digitally captured from my 35 year old LPs. See an example of their music on the following video – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAatTr4xco0.
For breakfast on Wednesday Steve cooked us a hearty feast of eggs and ham on English muffins – much better than the Egg McMuffins which he cited as his inspiration.
The drive down to Griffith, where our outfitter Don Adams is located, took more than an hour over rain slicked roads. Don and his brother, both well into their 70s, were waiting for us with a truck loaded with two Royalex canoes. These virtually indestructible canoes are ideal for whitewater rapids and the rocks which invariably lurk below the surface. Always our authority on technical matters, Dave provided us with an excellent explanation of the construction technique for ABS and Royalex which matched this diagram from the Easy Rider Kayaks website nicely.
After a quick lunch, Steve and I jumped into the back of the pick-up truck while Peter and Dave rode upfront and were regaled with stories of the seedy side of life in this rural “paradise”. The logging road down the north east side of the river seemed in better shape than last year, or perhaps it was just that the two life jackets I was sitting on this year were more comfortable. We had to huddle under the canoes to remain sheltered from the light rain.
Upon reaching the launch access point, the river gods beamed down on us, quite literally, and the rain cleared off. We then knew that we had slept in for a good reason after all. The river was wide, relatively slow moving and seemed to be running higher than we remembered, likely at medium high (MW reference in the guide books). After five kilometers we came to the beginning of the Snake Rapids, a series of 8 rapids spread over four kilometers. These required a couple of portage carries last year, but this year with the higher water we were able to proceed cautiously through the first four (Island, Dog Leg, Shallow and The Narrows) fully loaded. This brought us to the Rifle Chute, a grade 3 to 4 rated drop which we had portaged last year. We had our gear well protected in dry sacks and a barrel, but decided not to tempt fate and carried the packs over the portage while dodging some poison ivy. After scouting the rapids, we decided to run the canoes through empty and set up for our “Photo Shoot at the Rifle Chute”. We each had two to three chances to run through with mixed configurations and success. Fortunately, we were able to get some lively and incriminating photos and video this year (you will need to see all the pictures for the full story).
We encountered a group of a dozen or so teen-aged girls from a summer camp also running the river and setting up camp just beyond the Rifle Chute. We carried on past them and settled on the same excellent camp site as last year. After we set up our two tents and organized our gear, maitre du chef and brigade Pierre took charge and whipped up a marvelous meal of chicken fajitas over our open fire. Fueling the fire was a great challenge due to the incessant rain over the previous few days which had soaked all available kindling and fire wood. Steve, Peter and Dave all showed far greater prowess at this than me. After and during dinner the Gösser beers we were drinking had a distressing effect on Steve who spontaneously broke out into a dreadful Austrian accent for the balance of the evening, only marginally improved on his earlier attempts at French. Dave and I enjoyed some fine wine from a Tetrapak box and Peter came up with a potent coffee, hot chocolate and brandy mix brewed in a billy can. It was so good we tried it again with breakfast. Sitting on an outcropping overlooking the river we sang camp songs and valiantly tried to remember the words to various decades old favourites. I’m not sure about the others, but I was eaten alive by mosquitoes that evening. The next day I counted over 40 bites on each of my exposed wrists and hands. I was disappointed that there were only a few fireflies to be seen this year. Don and I took great delight last year tracking the flights of dozens of them over the gentle rapids in front of the campsite.
Steve and Dave both introduced new innovations this year with their inflatable mattresses, definitely an advance on my ½ inch foam pad. That said I believe most of us slept well.
Thursday breakfast was a recipe offered by Peter’s daughter Lee named optimistically “instant campfire muffins”. They were anything but instant as Peter labored over them for 45 minutes, and certainly looked nothing like muffins, but we all enjoyed them and ate our fill. The coffee and brandy helped.
Almost immediately after breaking camp we encountered the Split Rock Rapids which, much to his dismay, claimed Steve’s favourite sun glasses. This was followed by the Raquette Rapids where Dave and I portaged over a small island and Peter and Steve lined their canoe around the shore. The balance of the day included a series of modest swifts and rapids (Crooked and Wadsworth) and two long carries around Slate Falls and Highland Falls. The former was very muddy and difficult. We saw some herons, an eagle and turtles sunning themselves on a rock while back at the campsite Peter had been quite excited to encounter a Leopard frog, the first he had seen in many years.
As has been the case over the years, Dave led the way in innovative fashion statements, particularly with his headgear. This multi-purpose bandana from Mountain Equipment Co-op, an emporium we all dearly love, clearly brands him as a charter member of the MEC gang.
After Highland Falls we had a final two kilometer pull to the take-out at Griffith, punctuated by a sandwich lunch on a rock point. Don Adams collected his canoes and we headed back north toward Peter’s cottage, stopping for dinner and beers at the Bent Anchor Inn in Combermere. Back at Lake St. Peter, we were greeted by Peter’s sister-in-law Joanne and her husband Doug who were staying at the cottage that week. Dave slept over while Peter chauffeured Steve and me back to Toronto, arriving at midnight. On the trip south Peter tried without success to interest us in the poetic mysteries of rap music. It was otherwise a very enjoyable trip.