Long, Lonely Slog South

I left with some regret and some longing.  Regret that I might never have it so good again and longing to see if anyone else was alive in Canada and the lower forty-eight. When I camped on the river that first night, I was totally exhausted, having made two heavy trips that day knowing I would be on the water for a long time and could carry much more food and gear than I could walking after I left Hudson Bay.

The river looked normal and the water was drinkable and good. With one cast of my short rod and reel I caught a northern for my first camp supper. Downriver the next day, I saw about half the game that I saw the year before. The bears were especially gaunt and hungry looking. But then, they had just come out of hibernation and would probably be fattening up with grass rather than wildlife at this time of year. Grass was already knee-high along the riverbank because of the very warm spring. Mosquitoes had already hatched and filled the air in clouds at dusk. My mosquito netting was a lifesaver.

By April 18, the river spilled out into Hudson Bay. It was a formidable stretch of water that I did not want to be caught out in during a storm. So, I hugged the shore on my way to Churchill using my sail whenever the wind was right. I reached the burned area just north of Churchill and was surprised to see that pine, spruce, hemlock and fir sprouts were now two foot tall with grass and flowers and deciduous sprouts forming a thick green blanket over the dust covered ground. I watched for polar bears, and saw only two. They were starving and dirty gray mangy looking--a far cry from the magnificent creatures I remembered. The previous long winters must have formed the ice they hunted on, but now it was gone.

The second bear was being stalked by a pack of five wolves. It made me wonder who would win. Would the bear have wolf meat to eat to fatten up, or would the wolves feast on the bear? Would there be dead wolf to feed bears left behind? Would there be cannibalism among the bears and wolves so the species could survive? I didn't know because I moved on quickly and didn't see the confrontation that would surely come.

By April 22, I had Churchill in sight and a favorable wind so I reached the docks there about three in the afternoon, hoping to see another human and find out how bad things were further south. What I saw was mostly burned out except for metal buildings here and there. The place looked abandoned to the polar bears who weren't there either. A ghost town.

I found a metal shed with some boats stored and made my camp inside just in case a hungry bear would come around at night. Mice had taken over the place. In spite of their presence, I made my bed in one of the boats after throwing out the mouse eaten cushions and sweeping out the turds. I then walked from one end of town to the other looking for signs of life and found none. I did find some rotting corpses thawing by their smell in two houses that escaped burning. I left the first one retching at the sight of what had happened, wondering if I would ever find anyone alive.

Other places, I found  human bones that may have been stripped of their flesh by predators like wolves. I surmised that most of the inhabitants had probably left by boat to escape the flames, only to perish later, trying to survive the three bad winters. My hope for Julie and Uncle Frank's survival diminished. If these hardy people didn't make it, how could they? A chill ran through me to think that I wouldn't find anyone up ahead alive. I tried to shake the persistent thought off as I tried to sleep that night, but couldn't. Hard rain on the metal roof didn't help.

That night I got an idea. Why paddle or sail if I had power? In the morning I found a skiff that was flat bottomed and a 65 horsepower Mercury outboard engine that looked like it might run. The skiff was on a trailer and the Mercury was on another boat. It was all I could do to drag that heavy motor over to the skiff. It was big enough to make good time out on the lake. Believe it or not, there were cans of gasoline in that shed that hadn't exploded during the heat of the fires. I had to credit that to the metal building's aluminum walls' properties of dissipating heat.

I managed to drag the whole thing down to the water and put it in. I pulled off the cowling on the motor and the emergency pull cord was still in good shape, like it never had been used. There was gas in the engine, but I wasn't sure if it was any good… Or if any of the gas I had was any good. Or the right mix. But I had to try. I opened each can, poured a little bit out, smelled it, checked it for oil residue indicating it was a mix and then burned it. I finally decided on three ten gallon cans that seem to be right and a 50:1 mix that was shown on the machine.

Rummaging around the shed for anything else useful, I found a couple of cans of quick start fluid. But first, I pulled out the plugs and had a look at them. They were quite clean. So I put them back in after giving a spray of the fluid into the spark plug hole first. When the plugs were all back in, I wrapped the cord around the top of the flywheel and gave it my best pull. All that paddling had strengthened my arms and that big engine started to spin and ignited on the starter fluid right away, but then, sputtered out.

It only took one more pull and the engine was running. It wasn't running well on that old gas, but I didn't have any new gas and would have to put up with what I had. The boat easily took my inflatable, some tools, rope and a come along I found, oars, and all my food and gear. I left Churchill under power with the feeling of power that I could make real headway with that big motor in that small boat. It was great to feel the boat surging forward so fast and the wind in my face. I knew I would make 50 or more miles that day.

The Churchill River was flowing too swiftly for me to make headway up it, but it was also headed in the wrong direction, straight west, so I followed the shoreline of the Bay further south. When I got to Fort Nelson and the Nelson River at days end, the town appeared long abandoned and the river was like the Churchill, headed west. I made camp for the night.

Five miles around a point the next morning, was York Factory and the Hayes River. The factory was a single building that had seen the wear and tear of three years neglect. Again, no one there. The Hayes looked less swift, but, according to my maps, all those rivers would take me further west to Lake Winnipeg and far west of my destination, nearly straight south. I motored on for two days until, about noon, I came to Severn. Again, not a soul in sight. Here, I found the Severn River would take me nearly straight south against the current. The Severn was much smaller, but could still be rough if it had rapids and shallows to deal with.

Twenty miles or so upriver it became so shallow that I started to hit the bottom and the motor would kick up. I slowed my speed down not wanting to damage the prop. I pulled the engine up and continued holding it up and running shallow until I came to shallow rapids and was at the end of my very brief, but enjoyable powerboat ride. Just the rest I needed before the hard work of paddling upstream began. At the bottom of the rapids, I pulled the boat upon the bank. Took some time out to fish and immediately caught two whitefish for dinner.

I removed the motor and dragged it up on a pile of grass and ferns on higher ground that were abundant to insulated from the damp ground. I then covered it and the gas cans with a tarp that I picked up in the boat shed. I quickly made camp by tipping the boat on its side like a lean to on two sturdy saplings I cut off and then made a bed of grass and ferns underneath.

Just as it was getting dark, I made a fire and fried one of the fish for supper and the other for breakfast. Everything was right with my world at night. I slept well under the stars, now headed in the right direction. The days ahead I knew would be much harder. In the morning, I pulled the boat over the top of the motor and the gas cans providing enough cover that would keep them for several years in operating condition. I might return here someday or someone may stumble across by lucky find.

As I struggled both with paddling upstream and pulling my sledge when I was portaging along the riverbank, I finally had to leave behind some of my heavier stores of food. For the few days before, I overate to add pounds. That didn't work because I was burning all those calories quite quickly building muscle. Each day, I got stronger. But, I still couldn't carry and drag everything anymore. Marking the spot with a pile of rocks on a high bank close to the river, I buried about 30 pounds of pancake flower, dried food, and even some smoked fish. If anyone ever came this way and saw the marker, they could dig it up.

I doubted if I would ever be back this way again and whether anyone would ever find the cache except the mice that seemed to be everywhere, under every rock and burned stump. Actually, a good sign. I saw some of their predators, like foxes, that had somehow survived the winters on the carrion of the dead. They were in good health now with plenty of springtime food. Nature was rebounding at a wonderful pace. Seeing this gave me a sense of happiness to lift me from the dread of what happened to my fellow men up ahead.

As the Severn got smaller, it became less navigable, until the water got too shallow for me to safely wade and pull the inflatable behind me. Some days I made ten miles. Some only five. The hard part of my journey had arrived. So far, I hadn't had to patch the boat at all. I was glad for that because I knew there were sharp rocks ahead. I only hoped that I could make it to the Wisconsin Indianhead country before the snow flew at the rate I was going. Like all streams, the Severn River ended in the small spring fed lake that was its source.

Southward, lay a maze of countless, many nameless, lakes and streams, high rocky ground and low swampy ground, sometimes making walking difficult because I caught my boots in the thick matting and muck when it rained.  I had no problem snaring ground squirrels, rabbits, and even squirrels in their underground and burned tree hideouts. Through the burned-out trees, I had no difficulty spotting occasional deer, moose, and even bear, foraging in the new growth that was everywhere abundant. Ducks appeared miraculously and I found fresh eggs in their nests. I can only assume that most of these animals and birds had survived on unburned islands, because the whole area had burned.  It quickly got very hot by noon each day and I found myself stripping to bare chest and shorts to carry and drag my heavy load on the long portages.  The heat and gully washing storms that cropped up were fueling regrowth at a rapid rate.  The North Country had never seen such growth because of its short, cool summers.  I hoped I wasn't heading into hell.  Little did I know. There was a long way to go.

On May 25, I chanced upon a dust covered gravel road running east-west.  It hadn't been traveled and crabgrass was sprouting everywhere, giving it a strange green look for as far as I could see. 

It was time to decide whether I would abandon the lakes and walk the roads or continue southward through the Boundary Waters area in a straight shot to Lake Superior and the Indianhead.  The water and land route was harder, but I would still have to leave my inflatable like I had left the boat earlier. And then come not have it for lake and river running later. 

The road route was much longer, skirting the Boundary Waters and entering settlements that may still contain people. I would still have to drag my gear.  My solar powered smart phone still had GPS from the satellite and maps that I saved before the Internet failed.  But I couldn't reach anyone with the phone.  Believe me, I tried and tried.

After studying the maps, I began to think like a voyager and decided to take the water and overland route straight south.  Once I got to the States, I knew that the water routes would probably be easier and safer.  For the next 250 miles, no roads would help me.  I could use roads later for portaging.  The inflatable boat was too valuable to leave behind. And it was still in good shape.

I covered that 250 miles in 26 days. Twice, I came across the northern and southern routes of the Trans Canadian Highway, 17 and 11. At both crossings I paddled under a bridge and pulled up to the shore to take a look. Route 17 was a substantial highway of concrete and asphalt, but it was already showing the neglect of three years without use. Looking either way down the lonely stretch, I saw nothing except the accumulated dust from all the dust storms and fires drifting across the road and sprouting flowering weeds. One day later, I paddled up to 11 and found it to be similar. Two major highways that once linked Western Canada with the East, now totally abandoned and forlorn. It made me feel the same way as I gazed down 17 for a few moments in each direction and then returned to my boat so disappointed that life for me was okay, but without others to share it with, very lonely. 

But all was not barren. Islands that had not burned were filled with all kinds of berries and other edibles, like mushrooms.  There was lots of dead, unburned wood for firewood, and fish jumping to be caught. Frogs were everywhere for frog leg breakfast with cattail hearts, blueberries and wild rice. But going wasn't easy. There was more land than water. I struggled on those long portages, especially rocky ones where dragging the sledge was so hard and the aluminum was scraping off until it became useless. I ended up breaking it in half and saving one of the shovel bottoms as a fire reflector.

On an unburned island, I cut two green aspen poles and made myself an Indian travois. The two poles moved better up and down over rocky trails than the sledge had except in swamps. Those poles were awkward on the inflatable, especially in narrow streams, where they stuck out catching the bank often, but I managed. At times, I had to use the 200 foot of rope and come-along I brought with me to get me up and down particularly steep crossings. But mostly, I found trails that had been long etched into the landscape between lakes by animals, the Indians and finally, the Voyageurs.

The inflatable also suffered. Occasionally, it would catch on a sharp rock and open a rip in the rubber. More than once, I had to swim or wade to get it quickly to shore as it deflated. As I neared the end of my journey after crossing the US border, I ran out of patching materials and had to abandon my useful friend. In a proper funeral, I burned it that night. The smoky bonfire it made probably scared every wolf and bear for miles, thinking that the fires had come again. From there on, I walked.