Published 20 Nov 2016
An Unnamed Island
Story of a fishing trip into the Ontario wilderness in 1993
We were seven: my brother, with his youngest son, a friend of ours with his youngest son and myself accompanied by my own two sons in two vehicles: a car encumbered with a single canoe, and a van supporting two more. As we sped east from Winnipeg on Highway 1, as straight as a runway here, I considered the vast level grassland of Manitoba, below a light blanket of white cloud, just beginning to be screened by the appearance of scattered stands of trees as we neared the western perimeter of Ontario. Soon, dense stretches of them were forming an unbroken curtain of branches and leaves, while here and there low walls of grey rock broke through the band of grass that bordered the road. The growing forest on either side was all deciduous at first, but then the needly pines began a conspicuous advance into the land of trees with leaves.
We passed the sign that fixes the limits of the two provinces and marks too, roughly, the place where the great sea of the Canadian Prairies breaks on the western verge of the Canadian Shield.
Location of Daniels Lake
The road now rose and fell in gentle sweeps upon the stony structures beneath the thin rapping of earth, following the curves of hollows flushed with moss, marsh, ponds and small lakes that traced the way.
Near the town of Kenora we stopped on a roadside patch of gravel, and, with the plan of purchasing fishing licenses and a supply of bait, we entered a timber-built paint-blistered establishment that advertised fishing supplies. Our request for bait was answered by the lady owner, who scooped a couple of ladles full of live minnows from a tank of water swirling with the little critters, and tipped them, live, black, shiny and wriggling into a clear plastic bag that she'd half-filled with water. Then she squeezed the neck of it round a pipe and pumped in a puff of air from a cylinder. To finish the business she twisted and tied the top in a knot.
After a further journey of 30 or more miles, we turned north from Highway 1 onto a rutted and bumpy gravel road which bore no road signs whatever, since it led nowhere in particular, except to a few secluded cabins. However, my brother had brought along a topographical map of the region, and we knew where we were going, or at least we thought we did. But our way seamed to be confirmed by the site of a body of water on our left identified as Medicine Lake on our map.
Route from Highway 1 to the Island in Daniels Lake
Our vehicles now jerked on for about three miles, and then swung left onto another crude and narrower way which jolted us about for maybe three miles more before it shrivelled into a rough track impassable to cars or vans and we came to a stop. Here there was a fairly open space sparsely populated by small pine trees and bushes, not 300 yards from the shore of Daniels Lake, we knew, again by reference to our map.
But to verify its presence and scout out a spot to launch our three canoes, all seven of us set off on foot northwards up a low rise of earth and grass cut through in places by stark tracts of exposed stone. When we crested the top, our eyes embraced the lake spread out before us, smooth and silvery in its great basin, its low rocky brim bristling with serried ranks of pine trees. About fifty yards from where we stood the forest briskly ended in a hem of grass and bright green moss spread over a slab of rock sloping right down to the water's edge. An ideal place, it was decided, for the launching of canoes. Two or three boats were beached on the shore nearby, one of them a motorboat.
I noted now that the vast sweep of sky overhead was layered with grey cloud, and lamented that our enterprise would miss the blessing of sunshine. Returning to our vehicles, however, we began unloading canoes, equipment and supplies when a fine rain began to fall. But luckily it persisted barely ten minutes, and when it ceased we lugged the canoes down to the shore.
Well, we knew where we were now all right - in a little cove on the southern shore of the southern half - and a handy landmark was located about half a mile out from the shore: two green islets only yards apart, each plumed with angular pines like the sails on a yacht. Our map told us the channel we sought was more or less on a line with these two sentinels and looking out at the green shoreline a mile or more beyond, you could just make out a trace of grey. That could mean a gap in the screen of trees.
When we'd paddled past the two islet sentinels we caught a breeze blowing over the open lake, ruffling the water and slowing our advance. Something I noted about the surrounding land was that its covering consisted almost wholly of small young pine trees. Scattered among them, to be sure, were several tall spars standing stark against the sky, but they were dead. It was evident that the whole region had been ravaged by a forest fire several years ago.
Digging with our paddles now, and braving the slap of the waves, we navigated this stretch of lake to the mouth of the channel, located exactly where we had expected it to be, and slid into its calmer waters. To the west the sky looked black and menacing. I wondered what we would do if suddenly caught in a squall and found ourselves drenched, perched as we were on our thwarts.
But no rain fell. Now, to our intense amazement, a motorboat came ploughing down the channel and shot behind us. What? I thought this was a wilderness, not Lake Windermere! We swung our canoes to face the advancing wake and rocked on its waves till we'd ridden them out, while I wondered how many more motorboats we'd see in this wilderness. But in fact we saw not another soul for the next three days.
This land looked vaguely like some landscapes in the English Lake District, and it was a little difficult to believe that there was not a single village or road or anything at all built by man anywhere beyond these green crests. But the map confirmed our relative isolation. For example, if you struck northward in a straight line for about four miles, you would find not a single sign of human habitation until you reached a branch of the gravel road we had bumped along from Highway 1. If you crossed that beggarly stretch of disappearing gravel and advanced for several miles more, you would come at last to a railway line. But beyond that thin ribbon of civilization you would meet no mark of human hand until you reached the remote settlement of Churchill, Manitoba, on the shore of Hudson Bay, almost 600 miles northward. However, a glance at any map of the region shows that there is almost as much water as there is land. You couldn't traverse this wasteland at all without a canoe.
The channel was perhaps half a mile long and bounded by an irregular shore on both sides. At its end it narrowed notably and we paddled through a gap in the rock formation maybe just 50 yards wide to enter the wide expanse of North Daniels. Our goal now was a small island that a fisherman friend of my brother had marked on our map. It would make a great place to camp, he'd said, and a handy base for fishing trips into neighbouring waters.
The open water here was dominated by two islands almost joined together and jointly forming roughly the shape of a boot. Our island home for the next few days lay beyond them, so that the way to it now lay across a mile of open water to a second channel, straight as a canal, between the 'sole' of the 'boot' and an extension of the southern shore. Once we'd paddled through that passageway we would at last be able to survey our destination.
My brother's canoe, following the shortest course, struck out over the open lake, but we two others kept for a time to the lee of the southern shore. But afterward we tackled the choppier water in a dogged drive northwest to the channel entry, where our canoes coasted smoothly into calmer water, and we paddled placidly for a quarter of a mile between parallel ranks of pines just a hundred yards apart. Then the band of trees to the north swept astern and revealed across the open water less than a quarter of a mile to the northwest, an island, the very one we sought.
Northwest Angle of the Island
At the northwest angle of the island we came upon a fairly open and gently sloping terrain that showed signs of former occupation. The slender trunks of several pine trees there had been denuded of their branches to a height of six or seven feet, and several thin poles fashioned from hewn boughs had been suspended between them for the obvious purpose of supporting a makeshift shelter. Also, a rectangular piece of plywood had been fixed to a couple of trunks to act as a fish-gutting counter, and nearby, upon the open ground, a single large boulder reposed, rigged with a u-shaped arrangement of stacked stones enclosing the ancient remains of a fire, a blackened tin can and a battered rack from a kitchen stove.
At a respectable distance away, a large black plastic sheet had been draped over and attached to two poles propped against two narrow trunks just two feet apart. The structure thus formed a screen on three sides. Within this arrangement, about a foot and a half from the ground, a piece of plywood had been fixed in place with a hole cut threw it about the size of your face. A second piece had been positioned edgewise on the ground in front to conceal the contents, which, I noted by previous example, you were supposed to cover with litter from the forest floor. Why, a few short logs had even been sunk into the thin soil in front of this rudimentary comfort station to provide a firm footing for finishing your business!
A few signs of habitation, did I say? The place must have just missed getting a rating in the Michelin Guide to Accommodation!
After this swift survey of the place we returned to our canoes and paddled along the shore to our chosen place of abode. When they had been unloaded we dragged them onto a bank and turned them bottom up beside a beacon someone had set up there: a white plastic bucket inverted over the stump of a pine tree. Next we settled into the task of erecting our tents.
As a fine rain began to patter now, we made use of the suspended poles to erect a collective shelter by employing a large blue plastic sheet that had been brought along. As the air was distinctly chilly at the end of this work, the Coleman stove was lit to make some tea to warm us up. Later, use was made of the fire pit and the battered rack to roast a number of sausages to eat, and then, as darkness descended, we retired to our tents to sleep.
As a fine rain began to patter now, we made use of the suspended poles to erect a collective shelter by employing a large blue plastic sheet that had been brought along. As the air was distinctly chilly at the end of this work, the Coleman stove was lit to make some tea to warm us up. Later, use was made of the fire pit and the battered rack to roast a number of sausages to eat, and then, as darkness descended, we retired to our tents to sleep.
The next day began dank and dull. At times a thick mist crept round the island, hung over wood and water for a wile, and then stole softly away. The nearby shore that faced the island sometimes faded to a ghostly form, but half an hour later returned to normal view. Despite the gloomy aspect, our friend resolved to take his son and my younger one on a little fishing expedition up one of the far-flung waterways that were a feature of this lake.
The three figures in their red life-jackets were at first vivid and solid human shapes against the grey backdrop of lake and sky, but by degrees they grew smaller and paler until at last they simply dissolved in the faded distance.
Now the mist came down again, and the place seemed more cold and lonely and desolate than a Scottish Loch in winter. Our island home seemed the only real thing in the world, the only entity of substance, colour and form. Still standing at the spot where the canoe had been launched, I looked along the gentle curve of the island's northeast shore. The conifers thronged the rocky heights like figures on a stairway. But just here the scaly trunks rose straight and thin from a gently sloping bank carpeted with lime-green moss embedded with little light-coloured stones. The entire embankment was sprinkled with a layer of rust-coloured pine needles.
I looked down at the water. Little waves the colour of beaten tin lapped at a skirting of bare rock blotched with pale algal shapes. The entire scene offshore by contrast was whited out like a bad snapshot, such that the northern lake shore was just dimly visible, suspended in the mist. I was somewhat troubled that this fog had swallowed my younger son so completely, but a couple of hours later a canoe materialised far off in the water, and its three occupants came safely to shore.
With no fish, though.
We emerged from our tents next morning into blazing sunshine. Luck at last had smiled upon us, for today was to be the day of our planned expedition to Dicker Lake and a certain location on it marked with an 'x' on our map by my brother's fisherman friend, who'd promised that the fishing there was 'first-rate'.
The sun warmed our backs as we paddled southwest across a stretch of lake where blue wavelets gently rocked our canoes from side to side under an azure sky adorned with puffs of white cloud. In ten or fifteen minutes we glided into the channel we'd been scanning our eyes for, one that penetrated two and a half miles into the solid rock formations of the region. Reaching the waters of its western extremity would mean the completion of the first stage of the day's journey.
The reaches of this apparent river opened now one after another, some narrow, some wide, some even boasting little islands of their own, green scraps from off the banks, so that you could sometimes fancy you sailed amongst the reefs of some southern see. But finally the forest closed over the channel and we rested upon what looked like a little lake.
The next stage of the venture promised to be of special interest, as we were to attempt a portage of about a quarter of a mile northward into Dicker Lake. I had assumed, for some unlikely reason, that this transit would take place across fairly level terrain. I was amazed to learn that the plan here was to carry the three canoes and our store of equipment right up and over a ridge, which was maybe thirty or forty feet high, and then carry them down to Dicker on the other side. With this idea in mind we beached the canoes on the north shore of this channel. I looked up the slope: grass and bush mostly to begin with, but further up a large patch of damp rock and bare earth, and near the top, a few young trees, deciduous and pine.
We unloaded our rucksacks and fishing gear and lugged the stuff up the slope. As we moved across the top of the ridge, the forest closed in, and we were forced to move in single file along a narrow track that meandered through the trees. Others had been this way before. Then we began the descent, glimpsing vistas of blue waves between branches. Half way down, the track became something like a chute that we more or less shuffled down, arriving at a ramp of bare rock that plunged straight into the shimmering lake.
Dropping our gear now, we stared at our new surroundings. Here the band of rock and trees enclosed a loop of bright water that opened into a much larger one to our left. And we had this whole lake to ourselves. Or did we? There were a couple of boats here that someone had lugged up over this ridge. They had been upturned to keep rain out of them, and the bottom of one of them, an aluminium one, seemed to have been staved in. Was there a message here? And did it say: Stay off our lake! But we saw not a soul that day.
Now we retraced our route to fetch our canoes.
Two to a canoe, we carried them inverted over our heads, the two canoes ahead of ours moving clumsily about the slope, looking like a pair of monstrous mollusks, specimens of some fantastic species with long shiny shells and four legs. The job was awkward enough because the canoes were heavy and we could not see properly where we were going, but we managed to creep carefully over the slippery patch and stagger to the top where the going was not so hard. But then we floundered amongst trees descending the northward slope, digging our heels into the scanty turf to check the commencement of a headlong collapse towards the bottom.
Fishing lines were then fixed with pickerel rigs and baited with minnows, and we pushed off in the canoes. With fishing lines streaming behind us, we raced toward the spot marked with a cross on our map, wondering, after our stupendous efforts to get here, whether the fishing would be any better here than at the extremely more reachable locality of yesterday's attempt.
We settled ourselves at a spot mostly consisting of bare and level stone where my brother gutted the fish. After finishing the job, he tried to throw the bloody scraps into the lake, but they landed on a flat rock lightly washed by water. Soon a single gull, drawn by the prospect of a satisfying meal, alighted on the lake nearby.
It was wary of we intruding humans and paddled obliquely towards the tempting rock, as if pretending to be engaged in a leisurely swim, instead of focusing the whole of its being upon this one little rock just yards from a place where seven large creatures were pursuing similar purposes of their own. But at last it hopped upon the rock where it looked like a little bowling pin on legs, and from time to time marched forward toward the scraps and then marched back again, as if practising for a parade.
Returning to our fishing now, we caught several more trout for our evening meal, and then, late in the afternoon, we began the return journey to our camp. During the day the surrounding clouds had been thickening, and just as we were paddling into the bay of our earlier launch upon this lake, a fine rain began to fall.
It went on falling softly as we made our portage back to the Daniels channel, and persisted while we paddled back along its length. It was while making our way back along this placid waterway that my imagination was captured by one of the most memorable scenes of my life: a sky like smoke, dark forms of pine trees drifting idly by, rain so fine it merely moistened and freshened the face rather than whetted it, and water that shone, smooth and still, like a lake of quicksilver. It almost seemed an act of profanity to plunge a paddle in it.
Back at camp the fish of the last catch were filleted and cooked up for an evening meal. It was calculated that we had hooked a total of 26 fish that afternoon, including, that is, several that had got away.
Next morning the weather was bright again. We struck camp, bundled all our equipment into the canoes and left the island that had been our home for the best part of three days to return to civilisation.
but we crossed it without mishap, passed the two islets guarding the entrance to the bay and landed once more on the southern shore a little to the east of the point we had departed from. There a wide slope of rock rose from the water to a patch of open ground. It was plainly a place commonly used for the launching of boats.
The weather had turned dull again, but fortunately no rain frustrated the disembarkation. My brother and our friend went off now to retrieve the vehicles, and on their return we loaded all our equipment and then we got in. Within minutes we were tingling with a bodily warmth and heady glow after our adventure in this dank land of lakes.
The drivers then turned their vehicles around, and we set off up the rutted gravel road for Highway 1 and Winnipeg.
It was an experience that left me with enduring memories.
No comments:
Post a Comment