We arrived Saturday afternoon and 6.30 am Sunday we were standing in a parking lot outside the Silver City Cinema on the outskirts of Toronto waiting to be picked up by our guide for the week.  Although it would be quite possible, and indeed easy, to “go it alone” for several reasons we preferred to use a guide.  Firstly there is no need to hire a car which would stand idle for the week, all camp gear and food is supplied, not to mention the canoe. 

Therefore, all the logistics are much easier and when all factors are taken into consideration the costs are going to be very similar.  Back to the parking lot and another couple arrive.  They are also from England, a couple of years younger than us and as we found out would, like us, also celebrate their Wedding Anniversary during the trip! Soon our guide arrived with the others on the trip – a couple from the Midlands and a farther and son from South Wales who would keep us in laugher for the rest of the week.  (One of the other attractions of going on a guided trip – the people you meet!)  All loaded, Just! And we were off on the three-hour drive to the Algonquin Park. 

We could not help notice all the cars with canoes on the roof – the park only being three hours from Toronto makes it very accessible to Canadians.  It is a true wilderness, however, something the size of Wales, home to black bears, wolves, moose, beaver, deer and so on.  The park is right on the edge of the Canadian Shield and contains maple, beech, birch and in the northern forest coniferous forest.  There are more than 2,500 lakes and over 1,000 miles of canoes routes.

Midday on Sunday finds us sorting gear and loading the canoes ready to go.  The scene was organised chaos!  We snacked and then put in on the aptly named Rainy Lake.  It continued raining all afternoon, luckily it let up as we reached our campsite for the night so we could get set up in merely damp conditions before it started to pour again lasing all night.  By morning we truly were a sodden bunch.  Apparently we had caught the tail end of Hurricane Ike.  It was certainly a day and night to remember.

Breakfast of hot “Cowboy Coffee”, dried fruit, cereal and pancakes with maple syrup over and we loaded our canoes to continue our journey.  Generally each day would follow the same pattern after breakfast we would break camp.  This was always a meticulous affair to leave no trace whatsoever of our having been there.  Then we would paddle to the end of the lake to unload the canoes for the next portage.  This would mean two trips per person ferrying gear and canoes to the next lake; the canoes carried Canadian style (one person, one canoe carried on the shoulders).  The portage over and we would load up and paddle again to the end of the next lake.  Most days we had three portages, the lengths varied from 120m to 1,400m (almost a mile).  Lunch would be taken after one of the portages during the day and was usually cold meats, cheese, fruit, snack bars etc. All our drinking water was filtered from the lakes and we only had hot drinks morning and evening. 

On arrival at our campsite we divided into teams.  Food preparation and kitchen, wood collection and fire starting and a rigging crew for the food barrels.  Once all those jobs had been taken care of it was time to put up our own tents and sort out our personal gear, changing into dry clothes and shoes for the evening.  The evening meal was usually pasta/meat/vegetables followed by a brownie/cake and hot drinks.  Afterwards we would sit round the fire and talk until time to retire.  Before going to our sleeping bags all food, cosmetics, toothpaste etc had to be put into barrels and then suspended between the trees some little way from camp.  This was the last job of the day. 

And so each day went following much the same routine with the scenery changing all the time.  Luckily some of the trees had turned a vivid red colour and looked superb against the deep green backcloth which covered the undulating terrain.  We saw several beavers, a moose and the highlight for me was on one of the portages where we noticed some wolf tracks!! 

Well, all too soon it was the last lake to paddle, gear to sort and back to Toronto.  Apart from the first day and night our weather had been superb, good food, excellent company and just really great memories. 

Richard Narey, November 2008.