On an unmarked 1,350-kilometer canoe route through rushing rivers, ravenous mosquitos and tortuous muskeg, veteran expedition paddler Frank Wolf discovers he still has a lot to learn from the unlike- liest trip-mate
WOLF AND HART SHARE GOOD HUMOR AND 26-DAY BEARDS.
WORDS AND PHOTOS BY FRANK WOLF C
anoe trip pickings have been thin for me recently. By thin I don’t mean I have trouble dreaming up new trips—my
problem is that my once-trusty tripping partners are being sideswiped by real-life responsibilities: kids, jobs and mortgages. They’ve moved on while I can’t shake my expedition addiction. Last summer, with a route mapped and time to find a partner running
out, I settled on Rob Hart, a relative youth at 30 and a regular mountain biking companion. The only problem? He’d never been on a canoe trip. What was it Matthew McConaughey says in Dazed and Confused?
“The thing I like about tripping partners is that I keep getting older, but my tripping partners stay the same age.” Something like that. A British Columbia boy born and raised in the remote mountain
community of Tatla Lake, Rob grew up amongst a scattering of home- steads in the bush. Though he’d never been on a canoe trip before, he was familiar with the woods of the North Chilcotin range. By age seven he was in charge of chopping wood and keeping the woodstove stoked in his parents’ small cabin. Living on the land creates an innate connection with the rhythm of
nature. Paddling strokes and navigation skills can be taught, but being comfortable moving through vast wilderness is an asset you don’t find every day. Plus, Rob was keen and I was desperate. I needed a partner if I was to complete the 1,350-kilometer expedition from Lake Winnipeg to Hudson Bay in 26 days. Even I recognized this was a stiff test for a first-timer, and had pre-
trip doubts about the decision. As it turned out, in many ways, I was to become the student.
This article first appeared in the 2015 Fall issue of Canoeroots. 46 PADDLING MAGAZINE
MORNING SNACK.
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