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For over 20 years I've been collecting stories, photographs, interviews, out of print books and researching various aspects of the human history of Algonquin Park in Ontario Canada. In other words, capturing voices from the past. In the fall of 2020, I launched my podcast 'Algonquin Defining Moments' to both complement my published books but also to continue my mission of sharing stories, recollections, traditions, landmarks and other fun Algonquin Park human heritage curiosities. In this way that those who share my passion for everything Algonquin Park can listen to snippets of the park and its people while commuting, walking, cooking, working around the house or even just meditating on the back deck. Enjoy! Gaye Clemson
Episodes
Friday Mar 26, 2021
Episode 10: Back Country Canoe Tripping Part II
Friday Mar 26, 2021
Friday Mar 26, 2021
Episode 10: Back Country Canoe Tripping Part II
As noted in Episode 9 backcountry canoe tripping has been an integral part of the Algonquin Park, Ontario Canada experience since well before the Park’s beginnings in 1893. This follow-on episode focuses on what the landscape was like that our three canoe trip parties paddled through including majestic waterways, beaver dam filled rivers, and muddy swamps; how they overcame the pains of portaging, cooked over an open fire, and dealt with the bugs as well as the joys of a balsam bed.
Diaries and pictures and books by these canoe tripping parties that are the core references for this episode include one of the area’s first surveyors James Dickson, who brought a group of friends on a month-long fishing and canoe tripping holiday around 1885. They came in from Dwight up the Oxtongue and then continued on to Canoe Lake and as far north as Burnt Root. George Hayes undertook several trips in 1896 and 1897 and photographed them extensively. In 1903, three park ranger guides took Boston Architect Ernest Machado, his brother Jose and brother-in-law Alfred Whitman on a 12-day trip from Canoe Lake to Victoria Lake. They headed north from Canoe Lake to Big Trout and from there to Opeongo and then south down the Opeongo River through Booth Lake to Victoria Lake. The third reference is a fishing trip that John Robins and his friend Tom took on the east side of the Park as portrayed in Robins' book The Incomplete Angler.
I’ve also created a collage of pictures from the Machado 1903 trip and George Hayes 1895-97 trips, which can be found both on my YouTube Algonquin Defining Moments channel
and as a slide show on my website www.Algonquin parkheritage.com.
https://www.algonquinparkheritage.com/podcast-pics-and-vids.html
Enjoy!!!
Wednesday Mar 10, 2021
Episode 9: Turn of the Century Backcountry Canoe Tripping Experiences - Part 1
Wednesday Mar 10, 2021
Wednesday Mar 10, 2021
Episode 9: Turn of the Century Backcountry Canoe Tripping Experiences - Part 1
So backcountry canoe tripping is one of those past times that you either love or you absolutely hate or, as the mother of a childhood friend said, you do it so that you can talk about it afterwards. Have you ever wondered though, what it must have been like venturing into the ‘wilderness’ or the bush as it was called back in the day?
The truth is that backcountry canoe tripping has been an integral part of the Algonquin Park, Ontario Canada experience since its beginnings in 1893. The stories I’ll share in this episode are based on three canoe tripping experiences, two from the late 1800’s early 1900s and another from the early 1940s. The first is surveyor James Dickson’s month-long fishing and canoe tripping holiday that took place around 1885 in the Canoe Lake to Burnt Root area, The second is a park ranger-guided trip that Boston Architect Ernest Machado took with his brother Jose, brother-in-law Alfred Whitman and 3 park guides in 1903. The crew traveled from Canoe Lake to Big Trout and from there east via Merchant to Opeongo and then south down the Opeongo River through Booth Lake to Victoria. The third was a fishing trip that John Robins and his friend Tom took on the east side of the Park. They started at Radiant Lake and after a trek down and back up White Partridge Creek, headed west to Lavielle and from there to Opeongo via the Dickson-Bonfield portage. Of course, there are tidbits from other trips including my own as a child.
In this episode, I’ll focus mostly on the basics, such as equipment and food, and in the next one, I’ll talk about what the landscape was like and the actual physical experience.
I’ve also created a collage of pictures from the Machado 1903 trip, which can be found both on my YouTube Algonquin Defining Moments channel and as a slide show on my website www.Algonquin park heritage.com. Enjoy!!!