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CANYON COUNTRY
By August 16 the change in the seasons had become clear. The caribou were heading south to the trees; the geese and most other birds would soon follow. The leaves of the bearberries had begun to turn red, and the willows were fast fading to yellow. Soon the whole tundra would be a blaze of autumn colours, with chilling frosts, shorter days, and bitterly cold winds. Looking at the crimson and yellow hills outside my tent, I thought to myself, “It’s all very beautiful.” Then I thought, “I really need to get a move on.”
I was perched on a small rocky ledge overlooking a little river where I’d camped the night before. I’d almost reached Sifton Lake, a star-like labyrinth of long, twisting bays easy to get lost in. In my backpack I had a photocopied government report of a canoe journey that had started from Sifton Lake and ended at the little community of Baker Lake, my own end point. A floatplane had dropped the party at Sifton Lake on August 2, 1972. It had taken them forty days to reach Baker Lake, arriving on September 11.
If I could equal their pace I’d finish my journey by September 25. Again, though, there were two of them per canoe and only one of me; plus they’d started two weeks earlier in the season. And if bad winds held me up I might not arrive until October—at which point winter would have also arrived, and with it blinding snows, gale-force winds, hand-numbing temperatures, and lakes icing up.
The details in their report weren’t all that encouraging about the winds after mid-August:
It is advisable to plan the trip for July ending during the first two weeks in August to assure the best weather. After mid-August, the weather can be very unpredictable and the party may be forced to abandon any schedule to wait out stormy days. Winds are the biggest factor to contend with on the Barrens. Without the trees as a wind break and over the wide expanses of the 193 km of open lake a party may be windbound up to 10 days at a stretch.
In other words, since I was only just beginning the route and it was already August 16, I could expect dangerous winds the whole way. Their report had also helpfully noted that:
Winds can build up very rough waters…swamping in heavy waves or violent rapids could prove fatal. With little wood fuel for a fire to dry out wet clothes canoeists must be very cautious in their movements.
Now more than ever I thought of the tortoise and the hare as my guiding philosophy. The late season and bad winds were beyond my control. But, I reasoned, I would put in longer days, slow and steady, cutting down on sleep if need be.
Hard paddling brought me clear across the spidery bays of Sifton Lake, which was surrounded by rock-strewn boulder fields in many places. Beyond that, in all directions, lay thousands of lakes gouged out by ancient glaciers.
Leaving Sifton Lake, I arrived on the Hanbury River (named for the same Hanbury alluded to earlier): a river with violent whitewater, numerous deep canyons, falls, and cliffs. It’s a dangerous river, and one perhaps not best attempted alone and late in the season. The river’s fast-flowing, turbulent narrow stretches alternate with many sections of big, wide-open lakes where wind would be an issue.
Thunderstorms and overcast skies marked much of the first part of my advance through these maze-like lakes of the upper Hanbury. Fortunately, the storms occurred mostly overnight when I was warm and dry inside my tent. I avoided camping on any high rocky areas, of which there were many, setting up my tent in low-lying, willowy areas whenever I could find them.
The route next took me toward violent rapids and dangerous waterfalls. These required multiple portages to evade. The last of these portages was a long and difficult one; the total distance I had to trek on foot to avoid impassable rapids and falls was about a kilometre and a half, which, as usual, took four loads and seven trips to complete. The trek alternated between high, windswept rocky outcrops, which often involved careful scrambling to climb and descend (especially with a canoe in the high winds), and low-lying, swampy areas where blackflies still reigned.
But there were cloudberries scattered across the still-green tundra like little yellow-orange jewels, which I feasted on happily. The crop of these berries is brief; soon they’d begin to fade away.
More windy lakes followed, and more big rapids. When I’d crossed another big, round lake and arrived at the start of a second narrow stretch of turbulent river, I saw my first opportunity to save some time and get a leg up on things. (I thought I’d been too cautious the day before when I’d first come to rapids and falls, and probably could have shortened the lengthy, gruelling portage with some wading, lining, and paddling between the worst parts of the rapids.) At first it looked like I was in for another kilometre-and-a-half long portage, to avoid dangerous, unnavigable rapids. I’d strapped on my backpack and hiked for about a kilometre along willow-covered hills, keeping an eye on the roaring river below. But then I noticed that, between two major sections of violent whitewater, the river didn’t look too bad: just minor rapids, swifts, and rocky sections. I figured I could paddle these parts or else line and wade them, and thereby greatly lessen the length of the portage. So I scampered down a steep hillside to the river below, scouted things out again, assured myself it could be done, then left my backpack on shore. I’d pick it up in the canoe when I came down through the swifts and boulder fields above. The only catch was to make sure I didn’t paddle too far and get swept down into the massive, foaming cauldron of water below.
It was a little tricky in sections, given the extensive rocks and currents, but I zigzagged around them and cut across to the opposite shore above the dangerous, seething stretch of water. Here I portaged over a steep hill to get around the thundering rapids, resuming my travels safely beyond them.
Now the river passed through more variously narrow and wider parts, the latter more like lakes where the wind gave me some stiff opposition. But I paddled hard, and aided by the current, continued downriver through rocky rapids, coming eventually to the most startling sandy hills and deserts I’d ever seen—looking more like the Sahara than northern Canada. It was a strange landscape, with windswept sandy barrens that extended for kilometres.
But the river’s course was highly variable; beyond the sand barrens were green hills rapidly changing to red and yellow with the fall colours, and ancient, weathered rock outcrops. With the shorebirds gone it sounded strangely quiet, adding to the sense of desolation within the river sections that were dominated by sand barrens. As hours passed in silence, I’d feel less lonely whenever I spotted some lingering ducks or tundra swans. The sight of a bald eagle soaring overhead cheered me up, as did the return of vegetation along the river.
The cloudberries were nearly done now; their bright orange berries quickly fade to sickly yellow and turn to mush. But there were still plenty of arctic blueberries, and these I ate as much as I could. I made camp on a small lake the river passed through, on what I considered a very attractive little tundra site above some rocks. A warm cup of tea was my reward after what had been a long, hard day of portaging and paddling.
The following morning I awoke to fierce, cold winds of the sort that would normally rule out any kind of canoeing. Given the circumstances, I resolved to push on as best I could. A very exhausting paddle brought me across a three-kilometre-long lake-like section of the river I’d camped on. But given the extreme winds, it felt more like a thirty-kilometre paddle. Fortunately this wide section emptied into a canyon that helped shelter me from the howling winds. The canyon had nothing but minor rapids in it, allowing me to travel quickly down through it with no trouble.
Perched nearby this canyon were two little metal-sided cabins. These had been there for some time, as they were mentioned in the 1972 report as belonging to federal government water scientists (who accessed the river by floatplane). I had neither time nor inclination to investigate them as I whizzed by below in the canyon on the swift current. The fast-moving water brought me to a big, windy, and wave-tossed expanse known as Hoare Lake. This was the last significant lake I’d pass through for some time; afterward the river narrowed for a long way. As such, I was eager to get through it as quickly as I could, to escape from the big whitecaps that had been a constant cause of anxiety to me while crossing dozens of exposed, windy lakes over the past several weeks.
When I entered its waters a gusting northwest wind was sending big waves rolling across its expanse. It’s always hard to judge the size of waves—frequently I find they turn out to be bigger than they looked from a distance. Seated in my canoe, paddling near shore where the river emptied into the lake, my eyes searched the water, trying to determine which way to head and whether I could safely cross in such fierce winds and waves. Hoare Lake is shaped like an upside-down T; I had to get across it and down the stem of the T. Crossing the open lake would mean having the waves hit my canoe broadside, which didn’t sound too encouraging. There was a good chance, too, that the wind would overpower my paddling efforts and carry me down to the far end of the lake, away from where I needed to reach. But if I didn’t cross, instead tracing out the shoreline, that would mean paddling into powerful headwinds, draining my energy, and eating up valuable time.
The best plan, it seemed, was to paddle into the headwinds only a short way and then pivot, allowing the force of the waves to do the work for me—carrying me across the lake until I could peel off and head for the stem of the T. It would be much safer than trying to beeline straight across.
My plan set, I devoured some jerky and dried fruit, drank some water, and tightened the Velcro straps on my gloves. To steer in the waves, I was using my straight-shaft paddle, as I found the bent-shaft one was effective only on calm water. Setting off against the howling winds I began by using the land to my advantage. There was a long island in the lake whose lee side blocked me from the worst of the big waves, so I set my course diagonally up the island’s shore. Once past it, I was into the whitecaps.
“Here we go,” I said to the canoe, drawing powerful strokes to launch it forward into the waves. The canoe’s bow rode over them, reaching into the air, then back down as we plowed through each swell. It was exhausting, but I didn’t have to make it far—a few more strokes and I made my move. Timing it between surges, I executed a quick pivot, turning to ride the waves. Now I could paddle easier, letting the wind carry me swiftly across the lake with me steering.
The final bit would be the hardest: I’d have to temporarily turn broadside into the waves to make the dash up into the north bay (the stem of the T). The waves jostled me a bit but I paddled hard and steady, stroke after stroke, until I was out of the heart of the lake and well up into the safety of the bay where the waves were smaller. A few more minutes of hard paddling and I’d left the lake behind and was heading back down the Hanbury River’s narrow confines.
It was a relief to be back on a closed-in river. I zoomed along as fast as I could, running rapids whenever they appeared. But the wind was not to be placated. It grew stronger and stronger, roaring across the rocky hills and wide-open tundra. The wind was so fierce it soon overpowered the river’s current and my paddling, to the point where I was actually just spinning round and round in the river, like a corkscrew, as even the combined force of the current and my paddling could no longer make headway against the wind.
This called for a new strategy. I landed on shore to rest and rethink things. To overcome the wind I’d need to shift everything I could up to the bow of the canoe, concentrating the weight near the front. This would help the bow sit lower in the water, thus catching less of the wind, and the extra weight front-loaded would make it easier for me to propel the canoe downriver against the wind. At least, visualizing it on the bank, that’s how I figured it’d work.
I shifted everything I could to the front, and shoved off from shore. This proved the difference I needed, and I was able to keep paddling despite the tremendous gusts. But hard paddling, even with the strong current, was necessary just to keep the boat going downriver. If I tried to drift, the wind would just push me back upriver or into the banks.
The river’s course eventually brought me to a desolate scene of expansive sand barrens, where the sand swirled on the force of the winds. In the distance loomed great sand and rock hills, which looked in my imagination like some stark post-apocalyptic landscape. The grey, dismal skies only added to the effect of these sandy deserts that stretched as far as the eye could see. From the satellite imagery I knew one of the sandy plains extended nearly four kilometres, with still other desert wastes lying beyond it. The permafrost in these regions, I figured, prevent trees from growing while the relentless winds strip away any thin topsoil, exposing the sand.
The winds had grown fiercer yet, to the point where, even with my canoe reloaded, paddling became impossible. Still, I couldn’t afford to stop, knowing as I did that summer was over, and that fall had come to the tundra. So I beached the canoe, put away my paddle, and grabbed the bow rope. With my waders on I continued on foot, splashing along in the shallows and dragging the canoe behind me. The winds were cold, and by now I was wearing my wool toque, gloves, and had the collar of my jacket flipped up to protect my face from the blowing sands.
Staggering on like this was slow progress, but advancing even a few kilometres an hour was better than nothing. Yet the weather continued to deteriorate. The winds were so loud I couldn’t hear myself think. On shore was a small patch of green willows. Farther ahead I could see nothing but miles of sandy desert, which didn’t seem an encouraging place to camp in high winds. So I took advantage of this last patch of soil to halt early for the night.
I staked my tent down in the securest place I could find, which on the tundra really wasn’t all that secure. I’d had storms blow down my tents before, but this one, once it was staked down and secured with guy lines, was marvellously strong. The wind shook it violently but it held steady. Even boiling water on the camp stove was difficult; I had to use my canoe and barrels to shelter it from the winds. After a bit of tea and a freeze-dried dinner, I hunkered down in my tent for a stormy night.
In the early morning I woke to lashing rain and screaming gales shaking my tent. It didn’t seem like very good canoeing weather. So I slept in a bit, as I didn’t want to take down the tent in such a downpour, since doing so would mean getting the inside wet. And the wind was too extreme for paddling. Hours passed with no letup in the rain and wind, and I noticed with some disappointment that water was beginning to pool inside my tent in a corner. This was from the sheer force of the wind, which was pressing down the outer rain fly, buckling the tent poles and forcing the drenched fly to press against the tent itself, causing rain to soak through and drip in. The tent, on the whole, was admirably well designed—rain alone couldn’t get in, nor could the winds knock it down—but the combination of continuous heavy rain and fierce winds is something no tent can withstand indefinitely.
But fortunately, I’d spent my teenage years camping and tramping across wilderness with a twenty-dollar Canadian Tire tent, so I’d become somewhat accustomed to putting up with a little water inside a tent, and always made light of it. Some of my fondest memories were of my friend Wes and I stranded on miserable islands on far-flung lakes, enduring terrible thunderstorms in that ragged, threadbare little tent. When I reached my twenties I went through a phase in which I didn’t bother with tents anymore, preferring to sleep in the open or in shelters I’d fix up on the spot (it’s a phase I imagine everyone goes through at some point). This, too, I associated with all sorts of fond memories of adventures far and wide. Eventually, I don’t know if I went a little soft, but I invested in higher-quality tents and rode out countless storms in them.
So, on the whole, I judged my tent’s performance excellent and didn’t too much mind the bit of water that had pooled inside it. I was still warm and dry, and my sleeping bag was dry too, which was the main thing to be concerned about. I also had an emergency blanket that I kept specifically for spreading out inside my tent if the water became problematic.
By mid-morning the rain had slackened enough that I decided to make a dash for it—breaking camp, getting the tent rolled up and secured, and my canoe packed. The wind was still too fierce for paddling, so I took the bow rope in hand and waded ahead, towing the canoe behind me. The desolate sand flats continued for miles.
Wading was painfully slow, not only because of the fierce winds, but because I sank into the soft sand with every step. In one place, because of steadily deepening water that I couldn’t wade through, I had no choice but to paddle across in the high winds to the river’s opposite side. This allowed me to continue wading and towing the canoe. The landscape was dominated by immense ridges made of fine white sand, dunes, and vast windswept desert plains. In places, distant mountains loomed on the horizon. When I made it through the last of the sand barrens I found I could paddle again with hard effort, as some hills helped partially shelter the river from the winds.
It was necessary to run a couple of rapids, which in calm weather would have been a simple matter, but in the high winds required considerably more determined paddling to avoid slamming into protruding rocks. Not far beyond these I came to a small canyon with a roaring waterfall that halted my progress. Here the river squeezed between narrow jagged rocks, crashing loudly over a three-metre, or ten-foot, fall into a pool, then on to smaller cascades over boulders below.
A short portage of a few hundred metres enabled me to safely bypass the falls and cascades, and also gave me time to snack on blueberries. In high winds, one thing I always made sure to do, before setting off with my various loads, was to secure the canoe well onshore. If a wind gust caught it, the canoe might easily flip over and tumble into the river, getting swept over the falls and destroyed. The portage was fairly easy, aside from carrying the canoe over my head in the wind. The gusts made me stagger back and forth with it, but the ground was mostly free of obstacles and I completed it in good time. Just a short distance ahead, however, I knew was a much longer and more difficult canyon.
Less than a kilometre of paddling and wading across a wide pool, with sandy beaches and a few clumps of stunted black spruce tucked in valleys out of the winds, brought me to the start of another jagged canyon. I had to approach it cautiously, as the current was strong immediately above it, but I wanted to get as close as I safely could before beginning what promised to be a long and arduous portage to bypass it.
Where I landed the canoe the entire river was funnelling into a narrow chasm cut through sharp, jagged rocks that looked like something from another planet. The whole scene seemed frightfully apocalyptic. A waterfall marked the start of the chasm, which continued beneath the narrow canyon walls for several hundred metres until it disappeared around an S-bend. I knew from my maps that the canyon was nearly three kilometres long, punctuated with numerous violent rapids, waterfalls, and more S-bends. To portage around it, I figured I could cut diagonally across some of the river’s snaking course, but that would still necessitate a more than two-kilometre portage over rough terrain. And with my four loads, the total distance I’d have to cover would come out to about sixteen kilometres. Such a long portage would have to be broken into stages, and I suspected I’d have to break it up over a day.
I strapped on my backpack, setting off on the first leg. My trek began with some scrambling over rocks and boulders before reaching more hospitable ground that had enough soil for dwarf birch and berries to grow; this level tundra then led me to a steep, rugged range of green hills. I climbed up the first slope, picking my way carefully in the wind. When I reached the rocky summit I had a better view of the snaking course of the nearby canyon.
It had an utterly wild aspect about it—like something primordial, from the very dawn of the earth. Seething, violent rapids raged beneath its jagged walls that twisted through repeated S-bends. Inside the shadows of the upper canyon, amid the swirling, surging dark waters, rose a towering pillar of ancient rock.
I continued my trek down the hill and along the rim of the canyon, hiking as near to the edge as I dared. It was amazingly narrow, just a deep chasm cut into the earth; whitewater frothed and roared some thirty metres below where I stood. When I became worn out with trekking, I rested to drink water and snack on the last of the fading cloudberries along with some blueberries, crowberries, and lingonberries. The skies had stayed dark; rain fell intermittently. I hiked on through willows, up and down ridges, cutting away from the snaking course of the canyon on a diagonal at times to shorten the total distance.
When I reached a flat plain with short grasses, opposite the canyon’s third S-bend—this one concealing a large roaring waterfall tossing mist high up in the air—I set down my backpack. That was far enough for one stage of this long portage. It would take the remainder of the day just to transport the two barrels and the canoe to this spot—although that last was doubtful. It seemed that once more my friend and I might have to spend the night apart.
I managed to get my two barrels across, trekking back and forth four more times after my initial trip with the backpack. My first trip had purposefully been more meandering, as my curiosity about the canyon had led me along it rather than veering off on a more direct route.
I set up my tent on the tundra, made another quick dinner, and then dove inside just before more rain fell. On cold, stormy nights, my tent seemed more homelike than ever. Feeling a little sore and weary from the repeated portaging of the day, I stretched out comfortably in my sleeping bag and drifted off listening to the hypnotic-sounding roar of the distant waterfalls.
In the rain the next morning I carried my canoe over the high rocky hills and across the plains to my camp. Up in the high country, it was a struggle to hold it tight and maintain my balance in the gusting wind. It made me think of a passage in the explorer John Franklin’s journal in which he described one of his Canadian voyageurs portaging their canoe on the tundra only to lose his balance in a wind gust, smashing the canoe off rocks as he fell. Things hadn’t ended very well for any of them after that.
Fortunately, my portage went better. Once I reached my camp I set the canoe down, taking up my backpack in its place to scout out the rest of the way forward. It proved another meandering kilometre of travel: across a mix of level tundra, over high, windswept ridges, then down up to my knees in swampy lowlands and alder thickets over my head. This was followed by sandy plains and dunes, then finally another stretch of rock-strewn tundra to a steep eroded bank where I could resume paddling. When I’d finished transporting all my loads across this kaleidoscope of landscapes, I was underway paddling again.
But this lasted only a few minutes before I came to another wild, dangerous canyon that couldn’t be navigated. To make the arduous portage as short as possible, I paddled as close to the start of the turbulent water as I dared, snaking between great boulder slabs and cliffs. When it felt unsafe to go any farther by water, I climbed onto the rocky cliffs and, holding on to the bow rope, escorted my canoe along in the swift current below. Just before the start of the violent cascading rapids, I pulled into a little cove.
But portaging up and out of the cove proved an exhausting struggle. This sheltered valley hid a small grove of black spruce, alders, and willows, which required some difficult climbing up steep slopes to get through. The canoe I had to haul up from the bow, heaving and pulling to get it up the slope through the thicket. The terrain was thick with spruces and willows; strangely, the wind died just at this moment, allowing bugs to magically rematerialize and attack my face.
I ended this difficult portage by descending another steep slope to a rocky beach. There was still a half-kilometre more of boulder-strewn rapids I hadn’t bypassed, but with the wind down they didn’t pose too much trouble. So I reloaded the canoe and carefully paddled my way through the rapids, passing huge boulders of red sandstone as I went.
It wasn’t long before I reached yet another canyon—this one concealed a considerable plunging waterfall of some forty feet, and demanded yet another strenuous portage. It was late and rainy, so I decided to save this portage for the morning. I figured I’d used up my portage quota for the day.
When morning arrived I was up early—hauling my canoe and three other loads around this last canyon, passing a plunging waterfall tossing spray into the air. Nesting peregrine falcons along the canyon flew up to yap at me with their shrill calls, telling me to be on my way. I told them I was moving as fast as I could.
The portage was a long one, about two kilometres (or fourteen kilometres total with all the trips). The problem was that after bypassing the falls I couldn’t get back down into the canyon easily. The water below was tranquil, but steep rock cliffs meant there was no easy way down to it.
Eventually I came to a less steep gravel slope; although still precipitous, it seemed safe enough. The trickiest load was the canoe, which I had to balance over my head. Angling sideways, I picked my way carefully among the loose stones and gravel, descending the slope to great slabs of rock that jutted into the river.
Here I happened upon an unexpected sight—a pile of abandoned gear. It included three large backpacks crammed full, a plastic canoe barrel, some old, rusted empty fuel cans, and a bag of garbage. From what I could tell, the stuff looked as though it had been sitting there for years. Had someone simply littered in a place like this?
The story the gear told seemed clear: a party of canoeists coming downriver apparently hadn’t been prepared for just how lengthy and gruelling the many portages around the river’s canyons were, and dumped their gear here to lighten their loads. If this conjecture was true, it was ironic: this was the Hanbury River’s final canyon, meaning they’d needlessly littered (and tossed away valuable gear) to no purpose.
The only alternative that seemed possible was that something had gone badly wrong, and the party had needed an emergency evacuation, abandoning their gear in haste. Given the dangerous falls upriver, it didn’t require too much imagination to guess what that might have involved, or else the steep cliffs were perfect for breaking an ankle on. Still other possibilities could have been a different sort of medical emergency, like an allergic reaction to a bee sting. One of the worst accidents I’d heard of involved a party of canoeists on the Coppermine River that had left their propane-butane fuel canisters too close to a campfire. The resulting explosion had caused severe injuries that required an emergency airlift.
An acquaintance of mine, an air force pilot, once told me about the search-and-rescue missions that are part of his job in the Arctic. I was surprised when he told me that the majority didn’t involve canoe expeditions at all, but rather locals from the scattered little towns, who, out for a day trip hunting or fishing by snowmobile or motorboat, became lost or stranded. It’s a reminder of how easy it is for anyone to get lost or turned around in such a vast landscape.
In any case, I concluded that my first theory was the most likely one and that this abandoned assortment of a barrel, backpacks, and fuel cans was simply from litterbugs. (There were no canoes or paddles left behind, and the pile looked deliberately left at the end of a portage rather than hastily ditched.) As such, I couldn’t help but feel a bit of annoyance at whomever had littered in a place like this. I try to tread as lightly as I can: even that unwieldy and ineffective cart I lugged for miles so I could put it on the floatplane rather than abandon it somewhere, and my barrels included my sealed-up wrappers.
My canoe reloaded, I set off downriver, passing cliffs, sand bars, and eroded rock pillars rising along the banks like castle turrets. Paddling the remainder of the river was easily done, with only a few smaller swifts to get through. I pushed on, taking advantage of the calm conditions, until I came to an impressive sight: the Hanbury River’s confluence with a much larger waterway, the last of my journey—the storied Thelon.