Whiskey Jack
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| Pine Martin |
A rare sunny November day
Yell "Oh!"
You’d almost think they
had a voice. They have so much vibrant colour that they seem to be singing. The
wet trees must be bursting with secrets that they are dying to tell.
Almost as scripted,
Thanksgiving weekend was almost perfect. With deep blue skies laced with
streaming yellow, who could resist a hike through crinkling carpets of leaves? Between
tearing up bread bits for turkey stuffing I kept running outside to breathe in
all that beauty. I finally acquiesced to the cook’s duties but still took joy in
the weed and bright yellow daisy bouquet outside my kitchen window.
The brilliant yellow
birch and poplar trees are especially stunning this year. I don’t remember them
being quite so amazing. Perhaps it is all the rain we’ve had or maybe it is
just me appreciating that hue more than usual. Here by Lake Superior the
yellows stand out like cheerleaders along the shore.
Two types of birch trees are the
Paper (or White) birch and the Yellow. G.G. Erdmann, on a USDA (United States
Department of Agriculture) website, shared some neat data about the Yellow birch.
He says that the yellow is the most valuable of all native birches. It has yellowish-bronze
bark and the inner bark is aromatic with a flavor of wintergreen. The
slow-growing, long-lived tree grows alongside other hardwoods and conifers on the
moist, well-drained soils of hills and mountain ravines. The Yellow is an
important source of hardwood lumber and a good browse plant for deer and moose.
Other wildlife feed on the buds and the very, very light seeds. Erdmann says it
takes 99,200 of them to make a kg!
The shorter-lived
Paper birch has the distinctive white bark. The tree starts out as coppery-brown
when it is young. As it ages, the bark begins to peel and then turns white. The
Paper birch gives out an abundance of sap in the spring, which can be boiled
into syrup. Some peoples used this sap as a medicine for colds. And the leaves,
twigs and buds contain salicylates (the ingredient used to make aspirin), so
they have been used to make teas to relieve pain and inflammation.
Birch trees have a very
important role in life’s play and at one time their demise was a signal that
perhaps not all was well. If Shakespeare had to use trees as characters, the
yellow and white birch would have been in almost every act. For the story of
the tree has some parallels to the human narrative. The birch regenerates best
under shelter wood, but after 5 years, the tree seeks freedom from the
protective overstory. Flourishing birches have an adaptable, well developed
root system. They spread horizontally or go deep underground or follow the
route of older root channels. And trees, too, suffer from PTSD (post traumatic
stress disorder). Damaged trees can take a long time to recover. Or remain
beautiful with their sculpted injuries. I celebrate birch trees whenever I can.
They are the last lights in the forest; their preparation for winter is a warm glow
of hope.
Last week I discovered
another kind of hope, not that given by old trees, but by old humans. I was
waiting in line at a store in the Sault and was becoming impatient. The women
ahead of me seemed to be dallying. (Heaven forbid that one holds up a busy line
on the Friday of a holiday weekend!) However, the moment turned into a bit of
magic that affirmed for me the importance of the aged. The delay was due to a younger
woman paying for a stranger’s, an older woman’s, items. It was a pay-it-forward
kindness. The elderly lady was in shock; the younger woman was just pleased to
help; the cashier was smiling and warm. I was humbled and amazed at the
simplicity and strength of the single caring act. And after going through the
check out myself I stopped and spoke to the slower moving, elderly woman. She
was 90, still living in her own apartment and oh so pleased with the moment. As
was I. We hugged and almost cried. For a nanosecond I felt like I had my own
mother back.
If people are connected
to trees then this was a forest of emotion. We need trees of all ages. We need
people of all ages. Our world is a better, healthier place when it is diverse.
We might be all seen as green but the true colours shine under that cloak. So
as our fall season becomes yellow with age I’ll remember how great this all is.
And wait to hear what our white winter will have to say.
Once Upon a Time is the Best
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| Crescent moon |
From the earliest days
of bed time we’ve known about something. The once upon a time world was the
magic that carried us off to dreamland. Even as very young children we’ve been
aware of the importance of story.
Every day dozens of
stories slide into our lives. Some of them come to us in many layers. Stan
Roger’s epic ballad, Northwest Passage,
is a dormant earworm that awakens in a nanosecond every time I hear those words.
So when crews discovered one of Franklin`s ships lying under 10 metres of
freezing Arctic waters, the song began playing in my mind and all over the
airwaves for several days. Most of Canada now knows Franklin’s story but how
many of us appreciate the role story telling had in the discovery of the ship? If
the Inuit people had not valued their stories and passed them on to each
generation, then the precious information they had about the Franklin
expedition could not have been used today.
Modern times have
modern ways of storytelling. Today, people walk down the street reading their
phones to get the latest news. YouTube has become a popular medium to learn just
about anything. And screens hold listeners’ attention for most of the day.
Story telling has morphed indeed, but the old reliable methods will never fail
to please. Nature can tell a magnificent tale without uttering a word. Last
week the jumping antics of 2 am northern lights lit up the sky. The searchlight
beams spoke of life in the dark void. On September 22, the vernal equinox sun
again set in the exact same spot, proving that balance does exist amidst our earth’s
confusion. And the smaller tracks I saw with no telltale tang told me that a
cow, not a bull, moose had meandered down the road.
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| Driftwood on Agawa Beach at Agawa Bay |
Of course people are the
steady storytellers. We were at the Agawa Bay Visitor`s Centre in Lake Superior
Provincial Park for the arrival of the busload of folks on the CAPT trains
Group of Seven and Glenn Gould weekend. The congenial chatter amongst everyone
was contagious. One group member remarked that he could not believe how much
culture he experienced in just two days. I treasured the stories of how A.Y. Jackson`s
urge to paint had him climbing up steep hills and bushwhacking over rough
trails, even though he was almost 80 years old!
The very young can be
some of the most compelling story tellers. Their view of the world is keen and
refreshing. I listened to a nine year old brimming over with enthusiasm about
the possibility of walking himself to and from school and maybe stopping to get
an ice cream on the way home. And a six year old repeated the story her teacher
had read to her that day, word for word, sound bite by sound bite. Ahhhh. The
wonderful memory of the young.
Ancient things also
have a lot to share. Lake Superior has enough stories in its depths to fill Mishepechu’s
library. Lighthouse keepers stranded for the winter out on Caribou Island.
Shipwrecked folks from the Goldspie walking in the late fall from Old Woman Bay
to Michipicoten Harbour and freezing their feet. Nine days of pure flat calm
that bedazzled boaters.
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| Crescent Lake |
Little lakes tell
amazing tales too. This week we hiked into lake Superior Park’s Crescent Lake.
The colours were splendid, the kind that fill you with peace and good thoughts.
A red maple made flames on the water. The oranges looked good enough to eat.
Yellows were cousins of the sun. And the reflections were almost uncanny. The
water was a wall of colour, inviting you in with the promise of hearing the
story of the seasons. Sleep and renewal, emergence, playfulness and return to
sleep. It was difficult walking away from all that beauty.
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| Ducks in reflection on Crescent Lake |
Just before we left,
Ward and I visited an chiseled granite chimney - all that remains of a log
cabin from the 1920’s, near Kenney Lake. The monolithic old fireplace smokes
with mystery. An old shoe, tin cans and thick broken bits of an old, green
glass bottle lay on its mantle. Oh to be a witness to the fishing and scotch soaked
stories in that old cabin.
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| Chimney close to Kenney Lake |
But there is one scene
I witness in real time, one I experience with awe. That is the sight of
hundreds of geese heading south. Each year they catch some high swift air and
make their pilgrimage to the warm place. As I watch them fly high overhead, if
it’s quiet enough down here on the ground, I can hear the geese calling to each
other. They might be telling tales of encouragement. Or the lead goose could be
chattering about what they will find at their winter home. At the same time
they are passing hope all along the line.
Not a bad way to go.
Stories to give strength and peace. That’s a great book to snuggle down with at
night.
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| September sunset on Lake Superior |
Twenty three and a half degrees
Wow! School’s back in
action. Summer went by already. Did you catch at least one of those hot days in
the middle of August?
Before the warmer time
packs it up for another year and school chases thoughts of it to behind the
blackboard- oops, I mean computer screen or whiteboard - I’ll give you ten
things I liked about this summer. Not in order of preference necessarily, but
just some great things.
1. One is the long,
lingering twilight. One calm evening, we canoed back to the beach after visiting
some friends at their cabin. Along the way we watched the sun, a red ball,
sinking into the lake. And near the end of August we sat by the campfire,
watching that same red ball making the same dip again into a glass calm lake. That
was the same day the highway was closed due to two separate accidents. With no
traffic or lake sounds, a complete silence had enveloped all of us. No one
wanted to speak, wanting to preserve the smooth quiet of the unique moment.
2. Watching dragonflies
dance through the skies on a lazy morning. Their shimmering wings caught the
growing light as they caught the flies.
3. Listening to the young
ravens chatter. In the early spring their persistent calls to their parents for
food is more of a racket. But by summer they have adopted a kind of chortle
that comes out as verse. A young raven sometimes wakes me up in the morning
with its talk. I think it could almost be tame, well, almost.
4. No matter what the
weather, being with kids while they play is the real sunshine. They chat about
all their summer fun. They run barefoot over the sand and rocks, find bugs we
would never see and laugh at the silliest things.
5. Of course I have to
mention the fresh food from the gardens. The sweet crunch of sugar snap peas
straight off the stalk, or an onion pulled out of the ground then tossed into
scrambled eggs has no resemblance to mid-January, California greens. And this
summer I learned that roasting beets is much easier than boiling them. Along
with the bounty comes sharing and long easy meals taken outside. Put a cloth on
the picnic table; grab a plate and try all the different offerings. We are so lucky.
6. My, oh my, I can’t
forget picking blueberries at the burn in Wawa. That’s a visit to another
realm. The fields of blue amongst the sweeping vistas of smaller trees are a
timeless existence. All that matters is shifting your position so your back
doesn’t get too sore as you bend over to pick. Whenever I see the roadside Wawa blueberries (at
some stops they now are $30 for a 3 litre basket) I understand and go right to
memories of our berry picking day.
7. A trip to Bathtub
Island in Lake Superior Park is an annual pilgrimage. But this year one had to
be a live hard fan to make it out there. Even though it’s a short distance to
the wee island, you had to be very brave to make the freezing cold walk.
Tummies sucked in and whoops when the water reached certain body parts were
unavoidable. However, the beauty of Bathtub made it all worthwhile.
8. Exchanging stories around the dining table is
always fun. Summer is travelling season and friends bring interesting
perspectives. One was about an arduous July kayak trip from Hattie Cove to
Michipicoten Harbour. Fog, wind and rain turned the trip into a challenge with
hypothermia as well as hypertension! But
fond memories of Lake Superior often can be that way.
9. Enjoying the rain.
When it torrents down, the sound of it on a summer roof is a soothing prelude
to a nap. And there is no worry about it freezing. Yet.
10. That big moon in
August looked like it was wearing a Hallowe’en costume. When the moon becomes a
huge orange ball each summer, it reminds us that there indeed is a pattern to
the universe. And also there is that tilt.
The earth’s 23 ½ degree
axial tilt is what controls our seasons. On CBC radio’s Quirks and Quarks I heard scientists from the University of Toronto
discussing the consequences of no tilt to the earth. If the axis was straight, the
world would be a much different place. The tropics would be smaller. The ice at
the poles would be much larger. There would be much less habitat variety which
means much less life and diversity. And much less change.
Change does seem to be
a constant these days. But one thing that won’t change is the love for learning
about the lake and the land. And for that, school is always in.
All in a Name
Canada is an interesting country. It is
sometimes mysterious and often contradictory. There are so many different
cultures and so many unique names. Sorting out what our country might mean and
figuring out all who live here is a gargantuan task.
Spread out any Canadian
map on the kitchen table and you’ll see all that variety. For example, on a
1979 MNR map of the Township of Glasgow
in the district of Algoma there is a Carter Lake and a Loch Lomond quite close to Wabatongushi
Lake. Of course the neighbouring Township is LeGuerrier. Warring linguists would have a field day. Just as we do
every year on July 1st, Canada Day.
Our Canada Day here in Montreal River was cool.
Fog clothed Agawa. Clouds covered up that scorching sun from the day before
when “swimming”, then sunning on hot
rocks was a pleasant reminder that summer was in the area. When the rains did
come thundering through I saw a mother duck turn into an umbrella. She sat on a
rock very close to the water and spread herself as wide and as fluffy as possible
so she could protect her brood from the downpour.
But we humans also had
to protect ourselves from an onslaught of other kind. The Flies!! Oh my. Oh my.
They are voracious, aggressive and everywhere. As I don my armour, my bug
jacket, I wonder why there have been SO many mosquitoes the past two years.
Could it be the lack of bats? We used to watch them in the evenings as they
dove around and around catching the mosquitoes. Now a bat is a rare sight. They
seem to have deserted us, or have they died off due to white-nose syndrome. I
wish they’d come back home.
Oh Canada is our home
and native land but who determines what happens here? Who decides the future of our country? I look
to the lake and realize that really no one can own this place. Just as water
slips through our fingers, the earth also can escape our grasp. Such a problem always
stirs up several forms of debate.
Right now there is a court
case over the road into Nanabozhung or Gargantua Harbour in Lake Superior Park.
The word “Gargantua” has an interesting origin. In 1534 Francois Rabelais wrote
a series of novels about a giant he called Gargantua and his son Pantagruel. No doubt French explorers or voyageurs, who
had read the irreverent series, must have thought that Gargantua was an apt
name for this giant among places. But other folks have attached the same name
to other things. Gargantua is also a limestone cave located on the Andy Good
plateau in British Columbia. This giant of a formation has 601 m of passages and
is the largest natural cavern in Canada at 290 m long, 30 m wide and 25 m high.
Oh wouldn’t a Canada Day concert sound amazing in there!
Then there is the
gorilla born in the Belgian Congo, Africa, in about 1929. A sailor originally gave
the infant the name of Buddy but, circumstances had it changed to Gargantua. The unfortunate captive became a
depression era attraction in a Ringling Brothers circus. His story is much too
sad to print.
Another reference?
Gargantua is a solitaire game you can play using two decks of cards.
Lake Superior’s Gargantua
is almost 50 km miles north of Montreal River or about 40 km northwest of the
mouth of the Agawa River. The harbour itself is a wonderful sanctuary.
In the ancient days,
before European contact, the early peoples fished and hunted there. They also
attached spiritual significance to the area’s many wilderness islands. Only
boat or boot took you to Gargantua until the early 1960s. That’s when a rough access
road went in from the new Highway 17 North. During the 1930s and 1940s, when
lake trout fishing was at its peak, about 10 families lived there in summer. In
the winter at that time, two to five families called Gargantua Harbour their
home.
Gargantua is rugged,
mystical, Lake Superior shoreline. I like to think of it before it got a name;
think of the time when it was a home for moose and bear and caribou and fox.
Before men with ships
seeking minerals needed a shelter, before people with canoes had to slip in to
spend the night or before travellers on foot went there to live and harvest,
the place had become a keeper of magic.
Nanabozhung? Or Gargantua?
Who is right? I’m not one to say. But we could ask poor captured Buddy or the mosquitoes.
Or even the stars.
They would give us an
interesting answer.
A Lighter Pack for Satch
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| A Pink Lady's Slipper catches the glow of a June sunset. |
There goes another one.
Between mosquitoes, barbeques and ankle high grass it’s even hard to spot.
Father’s Day has a way of being here and gone in a flash.
Maybe it’s because most
folks are in the let’s-get-ready-for-summer hype. For who can ignore those
earworm lyrics in Alice Cooper’s 1972 anthem, School’s Out? Cooper’s song is much more dramatic than our signal
to Father’s Day, which is an extra thick edition of Canada’s beloved tome, the
Canadian Tire flyer. And even that is loaded with camping gear.
Ahhhh. Camping. Our holiday
tradition does weave summer dreams on a large loom of expectations. And most of
the time they deliver. Since this might be an old school summer, I suggest an
extra thick blanket for warming up after your swim in Lake Superior. And bring extra
doses of bug repellant. But never fear. The wonders are still out there and any
day by Lake Superior is a good one.
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| The Kiyi |
With this approach to
summer, we’ve had a few regular, seasonal visitors to remind us that the warm
time is near. A moose wandered down the driveway and a non-chalant, observant bear
sniffed our deck before strolling away. We also watched the annual passage of
the Wisconsin research vessel,
the Kiyi.
The Lake Superior Biological Station of the U.S. Geological Survey operates this
107 foot boat. Each year the ship comes our way as it circumnavigates Lake
Superior in the quest to find schools of fish at 89 predesignated spots. The researchers
trawl nets along the bottom of the lake to catch the fish and then record the subsequent
data. Hearing the deep hum of the Kiyi’s
engines as it slips by Montreal River Harbour has been a regular June event for
years.
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| A June fog slides over Lake Superior |
As each summer approaches and I prepare for our own
lake adventures, past summers always seem to influence the present one.
Childhood memories come into clear focus. It was my father, Gord Fletcher, who
brought Lake Superior into my life and although he has been gone now for almost
25 years, what he gave and taught me has never left. I still have a fondness
for sitting on a warm dock and listening to the water slosh underneath me. I
still enjoy the mystical nature of fog as it crawls towards shore, lifts for
the hills and then slides back out to the lake again. And I still recognize our
connection to the world by the timeless sway of water to rock to water.
Although my father never spoke of these things to me, he did allow me to
experience it on my own, which might be the greatest lesson of all. My father gave
me two simple, yet profound, bits of advice from his own camping /outdoor life,
his own school of hard knocks. Dad told me that it was ok to put my packsack
down once in a while. And he also declared that one would die of hunger if all
one had to eat was partridge. (It took me a while to figure this one out. I
guess the amount of energy it takes to hunt, kill and cook the wild bird far
exceeds the energy it gives you.)
There’s a thing my father gave me that still sits on an
obscure shelf today. His unusual gift was an old brass school bell with a black
wooden handle that wobbles when you pick it up. Once used to let kids know that
recess was over, the shiny clanger last had life on a New Year’s Eve. Sometimes when I look at that school bell, I hear
Cooper’s song. And this week I found an info bit about his now famous piece of
music. The title, School’s Out, came
to Alice Cooper as he was watching one of those 1940s -1950s Bowery Boys
movies. Huntz Hall (Satch) had done something silly and one of the gang said to
him, “Hey Satch, school’s out!” The Bowery Boys meaning for “school’s out” was
to “wise up”!
All this thinking about summer has fathered an idea.
We know that the sand in Time’s hourglass slips through at an amazing speed. So
no matter what this summer can be, it will be awesome just because it’s summer.
And when the school bell rings again in September, I’ll try to take a few extra
moments to remember my father.
Round Trip
That ticket price was worth it. We've made the trek. Once again we've arrived at our sunny place.And all the journey required was our patience. We didn't have to board planes, pay extra for checked baggage or go through customs to reach the sun. It came to us instead.
Now folks can toss aside winter coats, see blue carpets of forget-me-nots where there used to be piles of snow and glide along streets and trails on their bikes instead of getting stuck in drifts. And just sitting in the warm outside gladdens the grumpy faces.
Here along the Lake Superior
shore, even though one can see occasional white mounds of ice tucked in rock
crevasses, our liquid version of water is back. Last week was such a treat. The
lake had remained smooth for quite a few days. Mornings often carried an early
dreamy mist and twilight lingered for hours with pastel blues and pinks
reflecting on a silken surface. In the
middle of the night, loons called to each other from their resting places and
the peepers, oh the peepers, kept trilling to their heart’s content - and mine.
Spring is also alive
with the birds. White throated sparrows are singing their Poor Can-a-da. (They
must know that we don’t have a Canadian team in the Stanley Cup play-offs!) Red,
yellow, orange or blue warblers skim through the trees like flying flowers. And
then there are the hummingbirds. According to our bird journal they always seem
to arrive mid-May. They are a miracle. How do those wings beat so fast? How far
have they come? And what was it like during THEIR winter?
The return of the sun
also brings out another flock - the fleet footed runners. Running has become a
staple in the activity diet for thousands, maybe millions. It’s great to see so
many people taking up the challenge. Running a marathon used to be a rare feat
(pardon the pun). Here’s an interesting story about the first “modern day”
marathon I came across this winter while perusing a Bradt travel guide to
Greece.At the revived Athens
Olympic Games in 1896, Greeks grew more and more disgruntled because they
weren’t winning anything. The final event on April 10 was to be the first ever
modern marathon, with the winner doing a lap in the stadium under the eager gaze
of the Greek king and his two crown princes.All the Greeks were
looking for a hero. And that year the gods provided one. He surfaced from
humble beginnings. Spyridon (Spyros) Louis, born Jan 12, 1873, was a poor water
carrier in the streets of Athens. Since piped water was not yet in place, his
job was to push large tanks of drinking water around Athens in a handcart.
An
earlier stint in the army had established Louis’ reputation as a runner. So,
under pressure to compete, he borrowed a pair of shoes and entered the
marathon.Twenty- three year old Louis
was rather nonchalant about the race. During the 42.2 km run his girlfriend
gave him half an orange and her father provided a glass of cognac. He stopped other
times for more sustenance - milk, orange juice, a red hard-boiled egg
(traditional Easter fare) and a beer. When it looked like the Australian leader
of the race, Edwin Flack, was going to win, Spyridon Louis poured it on. Then
the unfortunate Flack collapsed a few kilometers before the end of the race.
Louis, who had blown by the rest of the competitors, ran victorious into the
stadium. The crowd erupted and filled the air with flowers. The two princes even
jumped down from the stands and finished the last lap with him. His winning time
was 2:58:50. As the King presented Louis with his medal, the grateful monarch
offered Spyridon anything he wanted. After a moment’s thought, the athlete
asked for a donkey powered water cart.Louis never competed
again, but he did appear once more in the 1936 Olympics. He went to Germany
and, dressed in Greek traditional costume, he presented an olive branch from
Olympia. Spyros Louis died March 26, 1940, several months before the invasion
of Greece, still hopeful that he might have won his bid for peace.
As we all prepare for
this new season, it is a good idea to remember how peaceful summer can be. This
was a heavy winter. Like the peepers who emerge fresh from their frozen state,
let’s sing to the warmth. And like the hummingbirds who return every year,
let’s travel light. That way it’s easier to run the race. Plus all that extra
baggage carries a big price tag.
April 25 2014..... A Train for Thought
Every time I hear the ACR
train whistle I smile. It is an immediate reminder. The wilderness is only a
few hours away. But for how much longer is anybody’s guess.
Talk of the ACR
passenger service to the lands north of the Sault has heated up coffee stops
for several weeks now. And since spring is still under winter’s thumb, there has
been a lot of opportunity to share what the loss of access to the ACR corridor
will mean. I look upon the ACR as an amazing part of our heritage.
The ACR hauls around a
lot of history. The other day I took some time and poured over a 1980 ACR map.
I followed the winding curve of the track and counted out 44 stops, each with a
unique name. Some of them, like Searchmont, Achigan, Montreal Falls (affectionately
known as 92), Canyon and Dubreuilville are still used today. Others, like
Horsey and Bucyrus, have fallen away with time.
But every name had an importance. There’s the town of Hearst, named
after a former Sault resident, William Howard Hearst. He had studied at Osgoode
Hall and became a lawyer in 1888. For some reason, (maybe his compass pointed
north too), he ended up practising law in the Sault. It wasn't long before politics
was his forte. In 1908 Hearst was an elected member of provincial parliament;
in 1911 he became minister of Forestry and Mines. Then, 100 years ago, in 1914, when Premier
James Whitney died, Hearst became the new Premier of Ontario. He was the kind
of man who looked out for workers and believed in compensation for injuries. He
developed reforestation and fire prevention programs and also provided loans to
settlers.
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Qualities of light on snow inspired Franz Johnston . |
An irreplaceable gift from the
ACR is the way it sharpens the artist’s creative edge. Frank Johnston was a
painter who came to Algoma in 1918 with the first members of the Group of
Seven. He fell in love with the landscapes that he saw on his trips up the ACR.
In a 1919 Algoma show,Johnston contributed 60 works, more than any other
artist.
The area around Hearst
and Franz was deep inspiration for Johnston. Although he moved to Winnipeg in
1921 to become principal of Winnipeg School of Art until 1924, Ontario called
him back. Johnston returned and taught in Toronto at the Ontario College of Art
from 1927 to 1929. But it was his connection to Algoma and Northern Ontario that
had rooted into his soul. So much so, that in 1927 he changed his first name
from Frank to Franz, after the town on the ACR line.
Another special locale
is Hawk Junction. In 1909, ACR officials established “Hawk” as a crucial stop
along the line. A vibrant community sprang up. In 1923, when a fire destroyed
the town, residents pulled together and rebuilt everything. The train station
there is a step back in time. It would make a marvellous movie set. The impressive,
two-story brick structure even could be a candidate for heritage status. Several
years ago, I took the train from Hawk up to Hilda to spend a couple of days at
Errington’s Wilderness Resort. I bought
my ticket at the original wicket. I sat on the worn, oak bench where a waiting
passenger, decades ago, had carved a fancy, handwritten initial H into the arm beside the
seat. Such intimate details add to
the overall magic of train life. And no doubt the ACR has been magic for
thousands of people.
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ACR station at Hawk ... courtesy Panttila family album |
Local videographer,
John O’Donnell, tells the story of how during a film shoot of the ACR he
captured some remarkable footage. His camera was running as the engineer on the
passenger train opened his window before approaching a steep grade. As the
train slowed climbing the hill, a raven flew alongside his window. When the speed
was just right, the engineer handed off some food - he gave the raven half of a
sandwich! O’Donnell says that the funny thing was a young raven was flying
about twenty feet behind the mother. The engineer thought that the mother was
teaching the young one the ropes.
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A favourite raven on his favourite perch |
Mmmm. Could there be
some learning here? Can we teach the next generation what Northern Ontario can mean,
to us as well as to the rest of the world? There is spirit and hope in the wild
spaces. There, folks can find their true self in their own private way. That is
a rare thing in these changing times.
No doubt the future
will be a digital one, where most experiences are virtual. But maybe we can help
some of the real ones stick around for a little while longer. Like that long,
slow whistle as the passenger train pulls away from the station.
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The ACR train heads home. |
April 3 , 2014
The icebreaker came.In the middle of the night. And by morning, ice bound ships from Thunder Bay had left. CCGS Pierre Radisson to the rescue again.
Raining Stars by artist/photographer Paula Trus who captured this time lapse image in the early hours of April 3, 2014 at Montreal River Harbour. Lights on the horizon from the stranded ships share the night sky with the stars.
April 2,2014
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| Fisheries and Oceans Canada/Canadian Coast Guard |
Depending on sun, wind and warmth to help out with the
melting of the ice on the lake is a good idea. Nature will provide the balance
while we seek a myriad of ways to cope with this extreme weather.Distractions work well. Between snowshoeing, shovelling, Season Four of Downton Abbey, the
Olympics and the recent Juno awards the days are full. During the televised
Junos I laughed at the exchange between Serena Ryder and twins Tegan and Sara.
They joked about forming a group called the Frost Biters, in honour of this
year’s crazy cold winter.
But extreme winter weather is much more than an
annoyance to the sea faring segment of the Canadian population. The shipping
industry has to rely on the spring break up. When winter won’t let go without a
struggle, then it is time to bring out the big, er maybe bigger, ships. Ice
breakers are a tough breed and they are in a huge demand right now. The
Canadian Coast Guard has 16 icebreakers to operate in Eastern Canada and the
Arctic. There are two heavy duty icebreakers, four medium ones, eight
multi-purpose vessels and two hovercraft. In addition, there is one vessel with
icebreaker capacity on the Pacific Coast.
There’s a desire now to get on with the Great Lakes
shipping season. The U.S. Coast Guard began their annual spring ice breaking in
Thunder Bay on March 27 and the St. Lawrence Seaway’s 56th navigation season started
March 28. That was a special day for Algoma Central Corporation. The Algoma
Equinox, the first of their series of eight, new, energy efficient “Equinox” ships,
went through Lock 3 of the Welland Canal.
The new ships are needed. But so is an ice free lake.
So I
checked with the Canadian Coast Guard to see what icebreakers MIGHT be coming
our way to help out. Right now the Samuel Risley is cracking up eastern Lake
Erie and the Griffon is chewing up ice on the St Lawrence River.
The diesel- powered
CCGS Samuel Risley, built in BC in 1984 is about 70 m long and almost 14 m wide
with a draft of just over 5 m. This ship has a cruising speed of 12 knots and
hosts nine officers and 13 crew members. In 1858, Risley (pronounced is), became the first Chairman of the
Board of Steamship Inspection. He was a pioneer in ship safety regulation.
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| CCGS Samuel Risley Fisheries and Oceans Canada/Canadian Coast Guard |
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| CCGS Griffon Fisheries and Oceans Canada/Canadian Coast Guard |
Another older icebreaker,
the Griffon, was built in Quebec in 1970. About the same size and speed as the
Risley, the Griffon has nine officers and 16 crew members. You can watch the Griffon
on Utube to see, hear and almost feel the crunch of breaking ice.
This vessel is named
after Le Griffon, a much, much older ship, which sailed the Great Lakes in 1679.
On her maiden voyage, the ship sailed the then uncharted waters of Lake Erie,
Lake Huron and Lake Michigan. But it vanished on the return trip, with no
remains ever to be found.
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| CCGS Pierre Radisson Fisheries and Oceans Canada/Canadian Coast Guard |
A third ice breaker, a bigger, middle brother
to the Risley and the Griffon is the Pierre Radisson. Built in BC in 1978, the
ninety-eight m long Radisson has a strong and powerful
diesel-electric motor. She can plow her way through ice a meter thick at a
speed of 6 knots. Named after Pierre Radisson, the French fur trader who
explored Canada’s north in the mid 1600s, the Radisson makes the Arctic its
usual ice breaking theatre. However, this year it has journeyed our way to
loosen Lake Superior’s deep heavy ice and thick drifting snow.
Some say the Great Lakes ice is the worst it’s been
for decades, while others say it’s the best. But, there is no doubt that the
presence of such a huge ice pack has had a huge effect. Some of that can be
most positive. The quietness, freedom and clear air of so much open space pull
on one’s personal magnet. The peace and calm, the muted colours and the
blinding bright light radiate a sense of well being. Good medicine for the tired soul.
But the satellite view of Lake Superior shows that the
lake cover is changing. Cracks in the ice resemble old paint peeling off the
wall. This heralds the end of our icy season. Our sidewalks are going to sink
into the lake. Slush will claim our walkways. The ice paths will be a memory.
That broad, bright, white expanse, which has lit up the lake for a couple of
months, will dim to grey before becoming a brilliant blue. Some will cling to
their digital pix of long walks on all that hard water and others will cheer the
return of Lake Superior’s open water.
There’s a unique music to this ice demise. Tinkling
shards and crashing chunks, the last sighs from a long hard winter, succumb to
the demands of the sun. We applaud such orchestrations. We will add them to our
play list, turning up the volume as the iceman leaves the shore. But, somehow,
I think that there might be a few who would rather be singing Serena Ryder’s song,
Baby Come Back.