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Wavelength's profile
Username Wavelength
Status active
Joined Oct 29, 2009
Interests Canoeing Photography
Biography
I’ll scan a map of my journey another time. I put in at Rain Lake traveled through (portaged to) Casey then to Daisy. Followed the Petawawa. Portaged my gear through to Juan but kept canoe and sleeping bag at the Petawawa side. Next morning paddled into Little Misty and then portaged into Misty. This is truly a beautiful expanse of water. Doubled back to where I had taken my gear to Juan – Jubilee then Sawyer and back to Rain about 12 to 13 portages X 4 trips both ways. As I said there is some beauty in the thing that makes you sweat.

I was in my own rhythm in the water like it was moving in my body. I never wanted to be land locked again. After every portage, through the undergrowth again and there is the reward the jewel. That's where the sacred lies. And I remember stripping down to meet the water, wading out to where the sky turns under. Only once did I ride far into the night. I had to camp on the portage trail (a favorite for the animals and their nocturnal watering). It is as if found my second skin, second wind
Oh and didn’t I feel I could have been born to swim, I could have been born to camouflage. Sometimes I'm an Indian caught only by the sky, I want to know the meaning, and I want to share all these things. This whole journey it just feels good like poetry. I burned my fingers and my lips on fires and knives. You know how sometimes when a dog runs free the first thing they do is roll around and revel in their freedom. This is what it was for me. The whole experience belly deep hard to come back from. I started talking to myself day one and by day three I was talking to snakes.. There was some garter snake out for a last slide over the fallen leaves. I had just finished the 1275 meter for the third time and the heat was rolling off me. He flicked his black tipped tongue and carried my scent to his nostrils. I noticed something I had never seen before. I touched him and he assumed a strike position doubling his body in size. The muted tawny yellow pattern changed to a light blue/green …subtle. On the Petawawa River (which winds through a cranberry like bog) I turned a bend and startled a huge grayish cow moose. I reached for my camera but by the time I swapped out lenses she did a 180 turn and trotted the shore and cover of trees. The beaver were plentiful and played smack water jack with their tails at night just to let me know who the guest was. The wind was just a little breath on the water for the most part although the first night the temperature dropped to minus eight and the lake froze just a thin surface of broken glass. Monday was a misty rain day. After covering 2/3 of the portage up and downhill. At first I dug into it like rock climbing then I laid the canoe down and threw myself down on my back and let the drizzle cool my face. Mist was rising from me as well. My river beds turned to lakes, the lakes to bogs and back again. I move through the day in these rhythms. I let the water take me in I would lose my myself in this place and feel home. Nights I looked up into the starry skies and how many times have I felt the passion rise for this wilderness The bog is such that if it does happen to grab you by the boot it will not let go without a struggle. I fell in once with my tent strapped over my shoulder and neck. I kept trying to use it for leverage to push myself out the sucking mud. I realized that every time I pushed off my face headed toward the bog. “Brilliant, take the tent off from around your neck “. At this point I had to laugh at myself. Truth be told I laughed at myself a lot. The last day the sky was drifting in and out of blue. The weather was changing I just want to lie here a while tempting fate. It’s not a weakness just something I’ve begun. Life is something set to the sound of my paddle. It’s deep in my soul it’s on the tip of my tongue It’s the feeling I used to get when I was very young. I realize getting back that life is only half way in my hands. I'm glad I'm tired so I don't feel the full impact.
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