Chapter 5

The next few days were more of the same. The river got bigger by the mile as it gathered in more and more tributaries. The gradient increased as well, as we got nearer to the gorge. Gravel beds gave way to boulder gardens and the paddling got more technical. We had to stop and scout, occasionally at first but the more often. Several portages were necessary to avoid river wide ledges with massive hydralics at the bottom.

We still occasionally found signs of the passage of the ladies that were ahead of us. Drag marks from a canoe, the occasional boot print and one camp with fire ring at the end of a portage that we passed at noon today. I got the vague impression that we were gaining on them a bit.

The weather had held good so far- a typical High Summer pattern. Some mornings had been somewhat obscured by fog on the river which burned off as the sun rose.

All in all, the trip had been everything we expected. Beautiful scenery, wild and heavy water. We’d had some excellent fishing catching Char (Brook Trout), walleye and the occasional whitefish. We were far too high still to see any salmon (which we had no licenses for anyhow).

At the end of day eight could see the land rising ahead of us as the sides of the river got higher and began closing in. We were about to enter the gorge, which ran about 20 miles. According to the topos, once we were inside we were pretty well committed to the river, as there were very few places that offered an easy escape. The main exception was the confluence with the Petit Nissipinissi, which entered from its own gorge with a very steep plunge. The maps showed a possible chute where it would be possible drag a canoe to the top of the ridge and (maybe) bushwhack across a big loop of the gorge. It would be chancy, with lots of carrying and likely dry camps this time of year. Definitely a somewhat desperate expedient.

As we broke camp on the morning of day nine, we took the time to dig out and put on the spray skirts, since we expected to face some big water. We made extra sure that everything was lashed down tight and that our PFD’s were snug and all our emergency equipment was securely fastened on.

Finally we looked at each other with a grin and a shrug. “No putting it off any longer, I guess”, said Jeff. “I guess not”, I replied.

We scrambled into the boat and pushed off. The current was fast, and the path was obvious- just stay in the center of the flow.

The next mile or so was easy. Then we came to a place where the river was pinched down a good bit and the flow was fast enough to develop waves. We powered through this bottleneck and made it to a wider spot. We eddied out for a bit to catch our breath. “Dang, that was fun!” I hollered at Jeff. He grinned back “Damned straight!” We’ll need to stay on our “A” game for the next day or two!”

“Oh, yeah!”

“What’s up next?”

I looked at the laminated map and aerials that I had tied to the gunwale.

“Looks like we hit a bit of a wide pool with a gentle curve river left for about a mile, then a rapid for about 100 yards. We’ll want to scout that, but lt looks like it’s a pretty straight shot staying left, then another shorter pool with a sharp drop. We might have to carry that. There might be a sneak route on the right, but you can’t tell a lot. Once we’re past that things widen out a bit, but it looks like a very fast stretch with some standing waves before the river makes a hard right and pools again. I expect we’ll be doing some eddying out somewhere in there to scout.”

“Ok, lets do it! With a little luck, we can maybe stop at the pool below that last drop for lunch. I imagine we’ll burn some time if we have to carry the second drop.”

“Yeppers!”

I put the bow over and Jeff put us into the current with a strong stroke of his paddle.

After a short run down the chute, the river widened out once more and we took an easy paddle to where we began to hear roaring water and see the river hemmed in once more. We eddied out river left and clambered up on some rocks to scout the next stretch.

“Looks like you were right, as far as we can see. It’s a little misty yet at the far end. I’d say stay river left, but watch out for that undercut rock way down there...” Jeff took some compact binoculars out of a pocket on his PFD and scanned the far end of the next stretch “ Ok- it looks like there is a pretty good eddy behind that undercut rock, if we need it. If we can’t see what ahead by the time we get down there, I’d vote to eddy out and scout again. It’s a PITA, but I don’t want to go swimming with no backups.” He handed me the glasses.

I scanned things myself. “I think you’re right. I can sort of make out a tongue at the far end, but it’s not clear at all. The only problem I can see is that the left bank comes down really steep. If we end up carrying, I think it’s going to be a tough one.”

Jeff took the glasses back and examined the river right side. “OK- look to the right there below the rock. I think if we ride the eddy as far back up as we can go, then backferry across, there’s another eddy we can hit below that rock that come sloping in from the right. It’s hard to make out, but I think there’s a sort of rockslide or pile at the water’s edge. That would likely be an easier carry.”

I studied it all again. “I agree, we might even eddy out there first and try scouting from that side.” I looked over the aerials once again, but there just wasn’t much detail. “I think that mght be our best bet. If the right side is too steep, we can cross to the other eddy and check it out.”

Jeff scratched his chin. “Hmmm. Yeah- lets do it that way. It keeps us away from the rock, too. Ok- so to be clear, the plan is to hold river left until we get close to the rock, edge over right and eddy out.”

“Yeah- subject to change based on what we encounter. This looks pretty straightforward, but I don’t like going blindly past the rock.”

“Yep- Ok, time to make the donuts!”

“Yep”

We got back to the boat and pushed off once again.

The current was heavy, and the standing waves were taller but easily manageable. As it turned out, there was a clear tongue pretty much all the way down, so it was mostly a matter of powering along. The only tough spot was right above the eddy we wanted. The current pushed hard left, what we thought was good eddy there would have been really tight. We slowed against the current, backferried hard and then peeled into the right eddy.