27th March 2020                                                CDU Newsletter 644

 

Terry 0417 977 330

terry@canoeingdownunder.com.au (email)

https://canoeingdownunder.wordpress.com/  (website)

https://www.facebook.com/canoeingdownunder/ (facebook)

https://terrybolland.wordpress.com/ (trips & achievements)

Busy times.

Saturday morning at Ascot Kayak Club.
 

Saturday morning at Ascot Kayak Club.
 

Deserted.

Wednesday evening at 6.20pm at Ascot kayak Club.

It's usually a club night. 
 

Grant Pepper paddling with his cute dog on Tuesday night.

Grant was going overseas to take part in one of those week long Adventure Races but like every one, he is staying home. 
 

An Osprey at Fish Market Reserve. Guildford on Tuesday.

Take a paddle up Bennett Brook sometime. Best not to have an under-slung rudder (although I did) due to tree branches and a metal barrier which you have to keep in the centre of the creek where there is a gap.

Go on an expedition near Perth.

It feels as if you are in the middle of nowhere.

An old footbridge halts my progress.
You can paddle further.

Best not to have an under-slung rudder. because of the fallen trees branches.
 

Reflections. This morning.
 

Looking back towards the Swan River. Bennett Brook.

Thursday night paddling home.
Look up and you will see some spectacular sights.

Freya Hoffmeister has cut short her Around North America Trip and is heading home to Germany. She was currently in Mexico.

Go to Freya's website for more details: http://freyahoffmeister.com/

Wednesday 24^th June

It was an interesting first day with all the narrow channels, swamps and reed beds but I was hoping it would get a little easier today but going by my map the river still twisted and turned like a slithering snake.

It was only 292 kms to Minneapolis by air from the start but by river it was 820 kms. This 820km section of the river has several dams that have to be portaged so it wasn’t suitable for big boats or barges that can’t be launched at boat ramps. Below Minneapolis there are locks so boats, barges and even kayaks could use the locks to move through and save portaging.

The mozzies were buzzing in their hundreds when I awoke. It was like they were all waiting for me to get out of the tent so they could have breakfast and as you could imagine I wasn’t keen to get up, but I knew I had to.

Better paddling in deeper water.

I got away by 8.15am and moved virtually straight into a very meandering marsh /wet land that twisted and turned. The river narrowed for a while before moving into another wide valley which curled and turned back on itself. I hit dead ends and had to find alternative routes through the reeds, or follow a vague channel moving from one side of the valley to the other like a giant snake. I lost the river several times.

I looked at the underwater reeds to see where the current was headed. It wasn’t always reliable but there was no other way to tell when being blocked by a high wall of reeds that I couldn’t see beyond. By midday the current was moving faster and although I made better progress the river still meandered in ever ending u turns.

Reeds virtually impossible to paddle through.
 

Reed beds easy to paddle through.

I felt sleepy before Bemidji where the river flowed under over hanging trees and felled trees that beavers had chewed through. I could see their teeth marks in the stumps very clearly. I passed deer drinking, beavers and cranes and more houses started to appear. When I moved under two bridges I knew I was getting closer to town.

There were several deer along the way.

I crossed Lake Irwin and into Lake Bemidji and arrived at the town centre at 3.00pm. I paddled to the town beach and got changed and walked to the court house to get a licence for my kayak. In Minnesota all kayaks have to be licenced.  The female clerk wanted the kayak serial number and although I said it didn’t have one she told me she couldn’t issue a licence without one.  I rushed back to the kayak to check but it didn’t. I raced back to her and on returning queued up again and then this time she gave me a licence without a serial number. Why didn’t she do that in the first place? I was just pleased to get going.

On the way back to the kayak I visited the army store and supermarket to buy a few items and then paddled over to the motel to pick up a box of food that I had left there when I cycled into town. I now had too much food and limited room for it, so I had to carry some on deck which made the kayak more unstable. 

I was paddling a 6.12 m x 430cm Sisson Evolution Classic kayak made in New Zealand which was a long narrow kayak. It was pretty fast but being quite narrow it was a challenge in very rough waters which I would later come across.

The kayak originally had a small cockpit opening but before I sent it to America I made the cockpit bigger so it would be easier for me to get in and out at difficult places along the way. In New Zealand these kayaks are used for Adventure Races which often take place in white water or rough water so a small cockpit is better suited.

The kayak. I extended the cockpit for easier entry.
 

Avoiding the lilies.

I made my way across Lake Bemidji trying to find the entrance to the river which was hidden by reeds. I found the narrow channel, moved under two bridges and came into the river which was much wider and clearer than upstream. There were boats on moorings, a guy in a canoe, deer on the lake’s edge, lillies floating in communities and a guy who I met in the bike shop a few days earlier in a canoe with an electric motor attached. I had only been paddling for a couple of days but it was great to see him.

I reached my first dam and a 250 metre portage. I don’t have bulkheads and hatches in the kayak so all my gear and food are in dry bags which are pushed into the bow and stern of the kayak. It did mean loading and unloading was easier and quicker than unloading a traditional sea kayak with bulkheads but I still had to walk 3 or 4 times to do a portage. 

The mosquitoes were fierce so I was eager to get away. When I did the current helped me along for a while, however I had a few rocks to avoid. The top section of the Mississippi River has several isolated campsites called ‘Primitive’ campsites which were very basic and I found one called the Island Point Landing which was high over the river giving me a great view.  I finished writing my diary at 11.50pm.    

A camp with a view.
 

Early morning.

Thursday 25^th June 98

While trying to dry the tent fly, after overnight rain I sorted my food that I had collected the day before. The campsite was basic but it had a long drop toilet which I was grateful for. It saved me squatting.

It was raining but not cold. There was a slight current but became weak before Wolf Lake which I only crossed a kilometre of it before returning to river for 4 kms and paddling into Lake Andrusia where I saw a boat called Titanic so I started singing the song, ‘they built a ship Titanic that sailed the ocean blue’.

I was moving through a collection of small lakes but the next one, Cass Lake was a little bigger. Knutson Dam at the other side was a little hard to see but when I found it the barrier was up allowing me to duck underneath, cross some turbulence water and follow the river for 20kms which gave beautiful views of swamps and fallen trees caused by beavers.

Reaching Lake Winnibigoshish I had another 23km crossing where 8 boats were fishing but it were the loons that attracted my attention with their beautiful call. With little sleep over the last few days I must have been tired as I started nodding off to sleep whilst paddling which was common for me to do on expeditions, especially when the sun was beaming down. Believe it or not it was quite a nice relaxed feeling to nod off and to be able to paddle automatically like a robot without capsizing. To nod off though wasn’t the most sensible thing to do in a middle of a lake but it was hard for me to stop my eyes from closing. I tried different things like eating, singing and wetting my face but nothing seemed to work. I did notice through squinted eyes that the lake was so calm and beautiful.

I was pleased to reach a point on the other side and step out of the kayak to wake up. I later rounded a point to see at least 80 pelicans and a bit further along a small dam.

I had to portage so I lifted the kayak on my shoulder loaded but the weight made my legs crumble and I collapsed back to the ground. Luckily I wasn’t hurt. I then took all the gear out.

Seeing Pelicans is like being back in Australia.
 

Fri 26^th June 98

I found a toilet sign hidden by bushes so I went in search and found a timber box with a lid on it and a lot of crawly insects using it as their home. I decided to walk in the woods instead. It was much heathier to squat although the mosquitoes made a meal of me in places pretty private.

It was a misty morning but it soon disappeared and by the time I left at 8.35am I had two ticks attached to me. It wasn’t long before I spotted a bald eagle high in a tree searching the landscape with its sharp eyes. I came across another eagle, then another and a deer with two fawns on a sandy bank. They took off showing their white tails and I could hear them jump in and out of the water marshes as they scrambled away. The river was that clear I could see fish under my kayak but not that clear to avoid a beaver bumping into my boat. It startled me and for some reason my first thought was it being a crocodile but it had been 10 years since I had been chased by a croc.

I came to a section where the river had been straitened to allow logs to be floated down river more easily which created many oxbows. The oxbows are now off-shoots of the river which support many forms of wildlife such as fish, otters, ducks raccoons and when filled with water in high conditions they provide protection for spawning fish.

I watched a beaver carrying a reed across an oxbow channel and further down I saw a man on the bank checking me out so I stopped and asked him to sign my log book. He had heard me singing so he came out of his home to check. I carried a log book and every day I would try to find someone to sign it so it would prove that I had paddled this section just in case someone doubted my word.

I stopped at Gambler’s Point Campsite and bought a bagel and jam and sat on a seat overlooking the river. Twenty four kilometres later having slept a lot of the way, or should I say dozed, but not on purpose, I stopped at Schoolcraft State Park and sat on the jetty and ate another bagel.

The river was the home of many eagles.
 

A deer and two fawns.

The river was lined with reeds and low grasses with woods a distance away from the river. It was slow going, there was virtually no current, there was a strong headwind and I was nodding off and apart from seeing several herons it was a lonely river. Arriving at Blackwater Lake it wasn’t what I expected as there were channels and grasses rather than a wide lake. It was still windy and the grasses helped to slow me down even further.

Slowed by weed and grasses.

I soon passed Cohasset town and many houses and 4kms on I reached Pokegama Dam which I had to portage. A campsite nearby was going to charge me $12.00 so being tight with my money I decided to move on.

I started fighting the wind on Paper Mill Reservoir just before reaching the town of Grand Rapids and after giving up a great campsite I was just hoping I could find somewhere to camp close by which is always difficult when arriving in a town. I pulled in at a boat ramp at Sylvan Park where I thought I would camp when it got dark. I asked some people there about the portage around the dam downstream and they said they lived right at the portage and if I wanted to they could take me and my gear to the bottom of the portage by car. I explained to them that I couldn’t take a lift and had to paddle there so I left them and started paddling to the portage. When I arrived, Mary, Julius and David asked me if I wanted to stay the night at their place and of course I said yes.  It was a nice spacious home and I was soon in the shower and had my clothes in the washing machine.

By this time they had fetched a Burger King whopper, chips and ice cream which were washed down with a coffee. We chatted late into the early hours of the morning until 12.30am and I wrote in my diary until 1.20am.

At home with Mary and Julius in Grand Rapids.