Wilderness Canoeing in Canada

Compulsion Bay - 3km SW Wollaston Community

Happy Canada Day

Distance 32km [548 km]

Great nights sleep, up and in the canoe by 7.45am. We were excited at the thought of a day without portages, lining and rapids, nothing but straight forward paddling, yea!! Loaded off the sandy beach, what a joy, not only is it much easier but it meant we were able to go bare feet, such a treat as one of the things I dread every morning is putting on wet socks and shoes.

Despite a cross wind we made excellent progress up the southerly bay and made the main body of the lake by lunch, putting us only about 10km from the Wollaston Dene Community. If it had not been Canada Day and a public holiday we could have done our shopping, made our phone calls and have been on our way across the lake. The lunch stop was another sandy beach so we both stripped off and had a quick dip as it was very hot, the forth hot day in a row.

We paddled onwards towards the Wollaston Community looking for a camp site not far from town but out of sight. Wollaston, like Reindeer, is crystal clear and we started seeing fish in the water just beneath the canoe. We saw four or five schools of from ten to several hundred fish, amazing sight. By 2pm we had found yet another sandy beach only about four kilometres south of town. We are now having a relax in the shade, doing the laundry and having a swim. The water is cold but nothing compared to Reindeer Lake. We were visited by a boat load of young people from the Dene Community, they are participating in a fishing derby as part of the Canada Day celebrations. They told us that the schools of fish we had seen would have been Lake Trout. They were very proud to tell us about all the different events taking place in Wollaston to celebrate Canada Day and show us various Canadian souvenirs they had including a Canadian tie, though God only knows when anyone in Wollaston would wear a tie!. They appeared to have little knowledge outside their immediate geographic region hence it was impossible for them to understand where we have come from and where we are going by canoe. Beautiful sunset in the evening.