Canoe North Awarded Frozen Globe

Courtesy: Canoe North Adventures — Whitewater on the Mountain River

Canoe North Adventures was honored to recieve two prestigious nods from the 2014 Frozen Globe Awards last week.

The Frozen Globes celebrate the cream of the crop across Canada’s three territories in all types of business in a variety of categories.

Canoe North Adventures, a Northwest Territories-based outfitter, was awarded with 2014 NWT Entrepreneur of the Year as well as 2014 Northern Entrepreneur of the Year.

A guiding company, owned and operated by Lin Ward and Al Pace, CNA has been in business for 18 years with Al and Lin’s paddling experience spanning a combined 25,000 miles in Canada’s far north. Their expertise spans rivers and hikes in Nunavut, Northwest Territories and Yukon with Al’s first trip occurring in 1977 on the Coppermine River. After several years paddling rivers in Nunavut, Al and Lin started paddling in the Yukon and in the last 10 years have been very focused on the Northwest Territories.

During the summer, they are based in either Norman Wells, Northwest Territories or Whitehorse Yukon. They run a combination of novice, intermediate and advanced trips for youth, women, men, couples, singles and for the not so young vintage paddlers. Their reputation is for offering safe and logistically sound expeditions with a high level of personal attention and care for their paddlers.

Learn more about their 2014 trips, including trips on the Keele, Coppermine and Mountain rivers, here.

Wild Rice: Power To The Paddle

Stories

Photo: Larry Rice — Choosing the right paddle is important

Paddles are like Rodney Dangerfield, they don’t get no respect. We spend days, months, even years, pondering what type of canoe to buy. Then, when it comes time to choose a paddle, we nonchalantly grab the closest one off the rack.

Years ago, I purchased a new Kevlar solo cruiser, a sleek 32-pound gem of a canoe as wispy as a heron’s feather on the water. Since the boat put a serious dent in my savings account, I thought I’d economize on the accessories. Instead of splurging on the ultralight, bent-shaft carbon fiber paddle I really wanted, I bought a cheap, heavy aluminum and plastic bent-shaft. After only a few days of use, I admitted that my new clunker paddle was a total mismatch for my high-performance craft.

So I marched back into the paddlesports shop and did what I should have done at the outset: I snagged the best bent-shaft I could afford—a high-strength, graphite paddle made for touring. All it took was a half-hour on a nearby lake for me to realize that I had made the right choice. I could paddle my hot little cruiser all day. My new blade made each stroke more productive, meaning I could cover longer distances with ramped-up speed, ease, and, yes, even more fun…

To read the rest of this article, check out Canoeroots & Family Camping, Summer/Fall 2013. Download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it here.

Tripping Canoe Review: Mad River Expedition 176

Overhead view of two people in red canoe with blue barrels — Set out on adventure. | Photo: Dan Caldwell

Whether it’s for the weekend or a whole month, Mad River’s Expedition 176 is a tripping canoe designed to take on the miles with you. It has the speed, capacity and seaworthiness to excel on long open-water paddles but is sized to handle smaller lakes and rivers.

The 176’s roots lie in Mad River’s famed tripping boat of the ‘70s, the TW Special.

“Tripping boats are essential to Mad River. We hadn’t had a true composite tripping hull come out through the early part of the century and that’s the heart of the canoe market. We wanted to bring it back into the game,” says Mad River Canoe’s product manager Buff Grubb of the 176’s release three years ago.

Mad River Expedition 176 Specs

Length: 17’6”

Width at gunwales: 34”

Depth at bow: 22”

Depth at center: 15.25”

Depth at stern: 18.5”

Weight: Aluminum trim 60 lbs; Wood trim 63 lbs

MSRP: Aluminum trim $2,579; Wood trim $2,799

madrivercanoe.com

The Expedition series, designed by Bob McDonough, began with the Expedition 186. Both are classic tripping boats, though the 176 is a foot shorter and more maneuverable. Whereas the 186 is large enough for a summer-long trip, the 176 is a more flexible option.

“The 176 is a boat both for the real enthusiast and someone who’s an aspiring paddler and doesn’t want to limit where they can go,” says Grubb. “It’s a boat that can take you from the Barren Lands to tripping in the borderlands.”

At first stroke, it’s easy to see why the 176 is such a popular boat. Its asymmetrical hull provides excellent forward speed and tracking, making for efficient paddling.

The shallow V-shaped hull offers high secondary stability and superior rough water performance. The lightweight composite construction makes portaging easy, while still providing solid durability.

Side by side with another tripping canoe of a different brand, what you’ll notice first is the outfitting. Mad River’s high-quality wood trim sets it apart from the rest. It boasts a sliding contoured cane bow seat, contoured portage yoke, adjustable stern ash foot brace, cane bucket stern seat and shaped ash carry handles.

[ Paddling Buyer’s Guide: View all Mad River canoes ]

You’ll also notice the Mad River logo laminated into the foam core of the hull. Confident Rabbit, Mad River’s symbol since 1971, was born out of a Micmac legend. While the rabbit sits, smoking his pipe, around him creeps his mortal enemy, the lynx.

But the rabbit isn’t worried—he’s confident in his own wisdom and knowledge. Similarly, canoeists can be confident in the knowledge that they would be hard pressed to find a better canoe to trip in. The only question that’s left is, what’s in the pipe?

Canoe Routes of the Deep South

Trips

Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. Photo: Virginia Marshall — Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge.

This canoe trip destination article was originally published in Canoeroots and Family Camping magazine.

Many of the finest Deep South routes penetrate into the wild heart of sprawling wetlands. This is no euphemism; these aren’t the atrophied, blackfly-infested swamps familiar to northern paddlers. Instead, you’ll discover oases of towering, knuckle-kneed cypress; ghostly veils of Spanish moss; and confetti flocks of rare and exotic birds in these nutrient-rich, black water backwaters.

OKEFENOKEE SWAMP, Georgia

North America’s largest un-fragmented wetland wilderness is protected in the 700-square-mile Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. Paddlers exploring the refuge’s 120 miles of day and overnight water trails are rewarded with spectacular wild- life viewing including alligators, sandhill cranes, egrets, herons, ibis and the brilliantly pink roseate spoonbill. Head to the east entrance, the area least affected by a devastating 2007 fire, to paddle through unique wetland prairies, cypress forest and snowy fields of water lilies. www.fws.gov/okefenokee

ATCHAFALAYA BASIN, Louisiana

The Atchafalaya is the largest overflow swamp in the U.S. and can receive up to half of the Mississippi River’s flow, varying the water level by as much as 30 feet. It’s divided into six sectors west of Baton Rouge. The Indian Bayou paddling trails in the northwest sector offer a varied and accessible glimpse of this enormous wetland. Slip through green tunnels of cypress, black gum, native pecan and moss-draped oaks on seven marked trails ranging from 4.5 to 14 miles. www.paddlelouisianaonline.com/the-atchafalaya-river

BARTRAM CANOE TRAIL, Alabama

Don’t be surprised if you see more gators than paddlers on the 150 meandering miles of this water trail system in southern ‘Bama. Second in size only to the Mississippi, the Mobile-Tensaw Delta is a beautiful, some- times spooky wilderness of cypress-tupelo swamp and bottomland hardwood forest far removed from the Gulf of Mexico into which it spills. Venture out on one of the half-dozen day use trails or choose an over- night route and stay on a floating platform campsite. Just mind the delta’s five species of venomous snakes (water moccasin, coral snake and three varieties of rattlesnakes—in case you’re wondering). www.outdooralabama.com/outdoor-adventures/bartram/index.htm

PASCAGOULA RIVER BASIN, Mississippi

The Pascagoula flows freely through south- east Mississippi’s ancient bottomland swamps before branching into a rich net- work of channels and bayous at the Gulf of Mexico. The Pascagoula basin, including the Leaf and Chickasawhay rivers, is the last unregulated major river system in the lower 48. Listed by American Rivers as one of the top 10 most endangered rivers in 2009, this year the Pascagoula gets recognition from the National Park Service with creation of the Pascagoula River Basin Recreation Corridor, including an anticipated 81 miles of water trail from source to sea. www.nps.gov/ncrc/portals/rivers/projpg/watertrails.htm

WITHLACOOCHEE RIVER, Florida

Okay, so this route isn’t in a swamp, but if you’re paddling in the South you can’t miss northern Florida’s incredible clear water rivers. The Withlacoochee (North) River Paddling Trail begins at the Georgia state line and travels 28 miles south to the confluence with the Suwannee River, chuckling over shoals and passing limestone bluffs, white sand beaches, tupelo and cypress forest, and several campsites along the way. En route, don’t miss a dip in the crystal clear swimming hole at Madison Blue Springs State Park. End your trip at Suwannee River State Park, or keep right on paddling down the 170-mile Suwannee River Wilderness Trail. www.dep.state.fl.us/gwt/guide/paddle.htm

This article originally appeared in Canoeroots & Family Camping, Fall 2011. Download our freeiPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it here.

Why I’m No Longer Opposed To Blowup Boats

The first time I took on Oregon’s wild and scenic Rogue River, I was in a solo hardshell open canoe, as were my boating buds. Self-supported, with camping gear and food for our three-day trip, we used every trick in the book to avoid capsizing as we negotiated 35 miles of remote, challenging whitewater. We weren’t always successful, but we did fine-tune our skills chasing down runaway boats. Tackling rapids can test even the most experienced wilderness tripper.

Ten years later, I returned to the same section of the Rogue with the same crew. Only this time, there were no swims and we were even able to run one difficult rapid that we portaged before. What gives?

[ Paddling Buyer’s Guide: View all inflatable boats ]

We were all paddling inflatable canoes. Self-bailing, and with more stability than their hardshell counterparts, our burly, blowup boats bounced through the frothing rapids of the Rogue, emerging triumphantly into the emerald pools below every time.

I wasn’t always a cheerleader for inflatables. When I was first invited to use one—on a weeklong, self-supported, 100-mile whitewater trip, no less—I was suspicious of their durability, usability and lack of sex appeal. Would it be sluggish on the flat stretches between rapids? Would it hold up to the beatings a hardshell can take on a wild river? Would my buddies think I was a wimp for choosing an inflatable over my trusty Bell Nexus tripper? Could I really trust my life in the wilderness to some kid’s ducky?

How an open boat and open mind can change a stubborn man. That 100-mile trip made me a true believer. My fully loaded, 14-foot inflatable felt and responded like a hardshell canoe. And because of its stability and self-bailing attributes, I was able to run boat-swamping rapids with aplomb while my hardshell brethren scrambled to make it through the gauntlets unscathed.

The inflatable canoe has evolved into a technological marvel over the past 15 years. Built of rugged materials and designed by paddlers for paddlers, these are serious boats for serious boaters. The fun factor definitely diminishes when paddling an inflatable on flatwater rivers and lakes, but speed isn’t everything when river tripping, which is the inflatable canoe’s true domain.

[ Also read: The Best Inflatable Recreational Kayaks ]

I’ve grown to rely upon these versatile craft. Their large cargo capacity is perfect for multi-day river safaris and I’ve taken them across the continent, everywhere from Texas’ Lower Canyons to the Nahanni in the Northwest Territories. My friends used to laugh at me, but I’ve since made converts out of them, too.

More than anything, my inflatables have proven their worth on remote and exotic rivers—the steamy jungle of Nicaragua, mountains of Bolivia and in the wild steppes of Mongolia. You try getting a hardshell there by mule, backpack or public bus. These rivers are only an option if your boat packs smaller than a golf bag.

Whether it’s short sojourns near home or hardcore getaways, don’t be surprised if, after putting it to the test, you, too, advocate for these practical and efficient blowup boats.

Larry Rice resides in Buena Vista, Colorado. Among his fleet of canoes are four inflatables, from 10 to 16 feet in length, stored neatly in bags under the pool table in his basement.

Skills: Night Photography

Photo: Mike Monaghan — Skills: Night Photography

Of all the great canoe tripping memories I’ve had over the years, some of the best evoke the magic of the night sky and the warmth and comfort of the evening fire. Capturing the spirit of a wilderness trip through the lens can be a challenge at the best of times, but photographing low-light and nighttime scenes demands some expertise and a lot of patience.

Beyond the essential equipment for effective low-light photography, which includes a digital SLR camera, tripod and fast aperture lens (less than f2.8 is ideal), there are some basic concepts to remember when out on your next trip.

The first is that the longer your exposure, which is also known as your shutter speed, the brighter your photo will be because more light is let in.

While you can photograph a campfire after dark, some of the most effective campfire shots are taken during twilight, when landscape detail or silhouettes put the campfire in context. Also, the darker it gets, the smaller your fire needs to be if you hope to balance it with the ambient light. A glowing bed of coals and a few flickering twigs will appear as a crackling campfire after a 10- or 20-second exposure.

On clear, moonless nights, capturing the stars can make for great images. To include foreground elements you’ll first have to expose for the sky, being sure to keep your exposure to 30 seconds or less to avoid blurring the stars due to the Earth’s rotation. Foreground lighting can take the form of a headlamp, off-camera flash or simply the glow from a nearby campfire.

A bright, moonlit night is a great time to make unique images. Moonlight provides backlighting to clouds, shimmers off water and provides an all-round spooky array of shapes and silhouettes. Including the moon as part of a longer exposure will result in a soft, circular glow.

If you’re lucky enough to experience the northern lights, photographing the display makes for an exciting and memorable tripping experience. If the aurora display has definition, keep your shutter speed to 15 seconds or less to avoid washing out the bands of light. Don’t forget to include some foreground to help with framing the image.

View seasoned wilderness traveler and photographer Mike Monaghan’s work at mikemonaghan.ca.

This article first appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Canoeroots Magazine.

Basecamp: The Forgotten Phase

Stories

Photo: Ontario Tourism — Basecamp: The Forgotten Phase

The nacho chips and salsa were just placed on the kitchen table and already conversation was shifting from how nasty the ski conditions were today to my idea of a family rafting trip down the Coulonge River next summer.

By the time the pizza was coming out of the oven, the mothers were planning the menu. The other dads and I were Googling river levels to see which rapids we could run and which we may need to portage. Sitting at the cooks’ end of the kitchen table, one dad, hearing talk about boxed wine and lawn chairs, suggested we best keep the portaging to a minimum and run everything we can. That was our plan.

If we’d invited Professor Ed Krumpe from the Conservation Social Science Department at the University of Idaho to join us for dinner, he’d say we were deep into phase one of the five phases of a satisfying recreation and tourism experience.

Anticipation and planning is the pouring over guidebooks, route and food planning, campsite booking, travel plans and gear preparation phase. It’s an important step because it creates buy-in and commitment. Done well it sets expectations for the whole group. Done poorly—well, you probably know the answer—the experience would more than likely end in disaster.

The dads were looking for a big water run. The mothers had more of a low-water float trip in mind. The dads were thinking of starting way up north in the spring and stretching the trip over 10 days. The mothers were thinking three nights in August without bugs. Eventually we’d settle on a trip that offered just enough adventure and margaritas on the sand bars.

These important details are best worked out before the travel phase, before the participation phase and before the travel home phase, so the final recollection phase is a pleasant one.

A truly satisfying experience, according to Krumpe, is one where expectations are met or exceeded. How the story will be told après ski in years to come has everything to do with anticipation, planning and setting these expectations before the trip. Our memories are burned into our subconscious and affect the planning or likelihood of follow-up trips.

But we know that family trips never, ever go exactly as planned, especially ones in the backcountry, which is why I believe there is an even more important phase of the outdoor recreational experience. The imperfect recall phase falls somewhere between Krumpe’s travel home phase and recollection phase. You may know this phase better as selective memory.

When planning goes all wrong—shuttles are late, rafts flip, fish hooks enter fingers, tequila runs short and bugs live too late in the season—imperfect recall is our natural ability as parents to remember the good times and block out or make light of the bad. Imperfect recall is really what affects the likelihood of a follow-up trip.

Rounding up our ski jackets and our kids, we’ve already forgotten how cold, windy and icy it was on the hill today. Going out the door, we make plans to meet again early next Saturday morning at the lodge. —Scott MacGregor

This article was originally published in the 2014 Spring issue of Canoeroots

This article originally appeared in Spring 2014 issue of Canoeroots Magazine. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions here, or download the Paddling Magazine app and browse the digital archives here.

Betcha Didn’t Know About…Bears

Stories

Photo: Courtesy Casey Anderson/caseyanderson.tv — Betcha Didn't Know About...Bears

Bear Brutus is just part of the family for naturalist Casey Anderson. His 800-pound ursine pal attended Anderson’s wedding as his best bear. He’s even sat down with the family for dinner.

Bears can run at speeds up to 35 miles per hour. The average human sprinter clocks in at 12 to 15 miles per hour. Don’t even try it.

Spokesbear for U.S. Forest Service, the original Smokey Bear was an American black bear cub rescued from a 1950 wildfire. After being nursed back to health, he lived at Washington’s National Zoo for 26 years, receiving up to 13,000 fan letters per week.

Though attacks are a common wilderness fear, bears have been responsible for only two to three deaths per year in North America since 1990. By comparison, dogs kill an average of 15 people and lightning kills 80 people each year.

For his show, Man vs. Wild, Bear Grylls has consumed frozen yak eyeballs, camel intestine juice, raw goat testicles, a live snake, giant maggots and live insects. The goat testicles were the worst, he reported—he bearly made it though.

It was Theodore Roosevelt refusing to shoot a tied-up bear on a hunting trip that gave the toy teddy bear its start. Roosevelt’s refusal made the papers, painting the soon-to-be-president as a compassionate man. It boosted his popularity and toy manufacturers jumped on the opportunity, creating the immediately successful “Teddy’s bear.”

This article first appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Canoeroots Magazine.

Idaho: Home of the Best Hole in America

Stories

Photo: Mike Leeds — Idaho: Home of the Best Hole in America

“It’s the sickest play hole probably ever built,” says Junior World Champion freestyle kayaker, Jason Craig. “At least, that I’ve paddled in—and I’ve paddled in a lot.”

He compares the top feature at Kelly’s Whitewater Park to the Ottawa River’s world-class waves, but at Kelly’s, there’s never a line in the eddy.

It’s a ghost town a lot of the time says Craig, who spent a month at the Cascade, Idaho, park last summer—an eerie emptiness that you’d expect to see bustling with big-name boaters and beginners alike, based on the quality of whitewater.

There are four main waves at Kelly’s and the biggest is Craig’s secret training ground, a hole he says is the best in the country for boosting freestyle scores. The bank is landscaped with boulders that form amphitheater-style seating for more than 3,000 spectators near this feature alone, benches that are packed on event weekends when people flood to Kelly’s to join or watch high-level competition.

BRINGING IN BUSINESS FOR CASCADE

Since it opened in 2010, the park has hosted two National Kayak Championships and the 2013 Payette River Games, which drew 14,000 people, including a long list of world- class kayakers, to the park for a weekend of SUP and kayak competition.

The 2014 Payette River Games are from June 20 to 22 and have a prize purse of over $100,000, with $10,000 top prizes in both men’s and women’s categories—the biggest money weekend in whitewater history.

The events are booming business for Cascade, a single-store town that only 1,000 people call home.

Mark Pickard is the man responsible for plopping this world-class whitewater on the map in the middle of Idaho. A retired Wall Street hedge-fund founder, Pickard and his wife Kristina poured funds into the park as an act of philanthropy— a memorial to Kristina’s late sister, Kelly, and an economic jolt for Cascade, a town the New York-Miami Beach couple had fallen in love with.

“We’re not paddlers,” says Pickard, who transplants to the area for a few months each year. But a whitewater park was a long- time dream of the community so Pickard worked with a team of engineers to blast through its planning and construction in a matter of months, turning a donated abandoned sawmill site into what he hopes will become a national tourist attraction.

MORE THAN JUST WHITEWATER

Everything at Kelly’s is completely free, and Pickard didn’t stop with whitewater. Beach volleyball courts, an outdoor concert area, horseshoe and bocce ball pits and an extravagant visitor’s center are all part of the plan to bring more people to the not-for-profit park, on more than just competition weekends.

Between events, the site is scattered with small groups of local kids attending Kelly’s Academy—a program where fifth- to twelfth-grade students from the area get free lessons from world champs like Craig, who agrees that it’s just a matter of time before the park catches on as a whitewater hotspot.

“It feels like paradise. Every level of paddler would love that whitewater park,” he says, adding that it’s only a short drive from Kelly’s to the legendary 15 miles of Class V on the North Fork of the Payette River.

It’s “an incredible place to be a kayaker,” he says.

This article first appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Rapid Magazine. For more great content, subscribe to Rapid’s print and digital editions here

Access Denied in Wyoming

I write this stuck in Wyoming’s Grand Teton National Park—not a bad place to be—but the park is closed, the place is deserted. The river I came here to run is now out of bounds; one of the most famous, historic and flat rivers most paddlers have never heard of.

Here for a risk management conference at a private lodge, we are victim to the U.S. government’s Obamacare shutdown and budgetary deadlock. We’re carrying on with our conference, but the park’s gates are locked. We can leave but we can’t get back in if we do.

Famed landscape photographer Ansel Adams’ black and white The Tetons and the Snake River (1942) seared the jagged skyline of the Teton Range into the American psyche, making them what most Americans picture when they think of mountain peaks. Snow capped, ominous and rising from the western plains, the iconic mountains have served as the center of American mountaineering for over a hundred years.

Adams’ famous photo used the upper reaches of the Snake River to contrast against the triangular peaks: the river’s sinuous curve draws the eye from the foreground, down the bank and up the jagged peaks into the sky above. When I first saw the photo on a Christmas gift coffee table book, the image of the Snake drew me in, left me longing to be pulled down the humble river beneath those peaks. And now I sit here, struck by the reality that the river is beyond my reach, its access controlled by the government’s whim.

Rows and rows of sad-looking rafts and dories sit on trailers on the parking lot of Jackson Lake Lodge, where I’m locked up. They, too, are imprisoned, leaving one of the busiest scenic float rivers in the world deserted like the rest of the park. River guides either mill about with nothing to do or have called it a season and moved on. The same Snake that downstream passes through whitewater Ho-

back and Hell’s canyons, up this high is just flat and swift, dwarfed and humbled by the Tetons. The Snake is often overlooked by seri- ous whitewater paddlers, but is magnificent in views and important in our history.

Grand Teton National Park is one of the birthplaces of commercial rafting and the Snake continues to put any other commercial rafting river to shame—upwards of 200,000 tourists float this section every year.

THE TETONS FAMED HISTORY

The famous and extremely wealthy John D. Rockefeller Jr. was an avid outdoorsman and visited the Tetons in the 1920s. Rockefeller secretly began buying up land with the intention of handing it all over to the government as a gift.

Political and legal wrangling got in the way, and it was not until 1950—more than 20 years later—that his donated land gained of- ficial park status.

Rockefeller promptly set about building Jackson Lake Lodge and hired horse wranglers to take clients down the Snake in WWII surplus inflatable bridge pontoons with sweep oars.

That was the start of commercial rafting in this watershed. Further to the south in Utah and Arizona, Bus Hatch and Norman Nevills were pioneering commercial whitewater on the Green and Colorado, but for Rockefeller, the river was about scenery. He wanted people to float through Adams’ photo, and revel in the spectacle of the mountains looming overhead. When whitewater daredevils were gaining media attention in the mid-60s, a half dozen river operators sprung up and still operate on the Snake, capturing the road traffic through the Tetons and nearby Yellowstone National Park.

As the creator of the commercial float trip, Rockefeller waited out decades of government delay to ensure this land would spread the love of rivers to the masses. Like Rockefeller and so many others, I was drawn to this river, but here I sit, my access denied, looking at a real-life image of the Tetons and the Snake River, and a snapshot it will remain.

This article was first published in the Spring 2014 issue of Rapid Magazine. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions, or browse the archives.

Canoe North Awarded Frozen Globe

Wild Rice: Power To The Paddle

Tripping Canoe Review: Mad River Expedition 176

Mad River Expedition 176 Specs

Length: 17’6”

Width at gunwales: 34”

Depth at bow: 22”

Depth at center: 15.25”

Depth at stern: 18.5”

Weight: Aluminum trim 60 lbs; Wood trim 63 lbs

MSRP: Aluminum trim $2,579; Wood trim $2,799