The Defintion of Kanjaku

light stripped of blue
warms the shoreline reeds
the oboe's voice

Summer morning, toes in wet grass, reaching for the kite resting on the back of the lawn chair, large piece of duct tape over the tear. Also an evening as dad brings the power boat in, the wind blown out, the waves gently slapping stones, me on the dock, watching, sand in a line on my thigh. Also up the West Fork, fly rod in hand, sweat drying on the back of my neck, the way the elderberry  flowers are half turned to berries, the redness of ripe against green. And recently the sound of cooling metal, the softness of the silence lying out across the lake after the engine is turned off.

 Near Regan Lake

There are moments, fat as summer raindrops, which hit you from a blue sky. The sudden awareness of awareness. The sudden appreciation of slackness that would be exhaustion if you had worked for it, the sudden slumping of something inside, like a pile of sand slumps as it dries out next to a sand castle. That very fine sound of grains tumbling. It is a pleasant sensation, a deep adjustment in the muscles. And complex, because while being relaxed and tired, it is also sharp like pricked dog's ears.

Brewster Lake

In Chinese the word is xian, in Japanse, kan. A state of mind that is free from worry, open to embrace the Dao. The root kan is joined to jaku, which means lonely or still. Jaku has a active element though, even in the stillness, like the action of making oneself loose and open. Shaking out cares, limbering up. One translator puts it simple as, "carefree idleness," and that is not bad, but there is the missing element of being open to the larger meaning in things, to being open to the smaller meaning of things. Being open to whatever there is without expectation or anticipation. Just letting go and being present.

Gray Lake

out over the dark lake
wing tips peep
sharp specs in the silence

All Eyes on Izon Designs

A beautiful canoe made by a talented and iconic boat designer is always a treat to see in action. This Discovery Channel production is a warm celebration of one of Skip Izon's performance tandem designs:




Skip, quoted in the Grand Bend Strip Community Newspaper in August 2008, said, "The third [design I created this year] I call The Little Tripper. It’s a 12.5’ open kayak, like a little canoe, but you use a double-bladed kayak paddle. You’re out in the open, so you’re out in the sun. You’ve got access to all your stuff, same as a canoe, but it’s light and fast like a kayak. So I’m trying to get the best of both worlds."


Ah, doesn't that sound perfect? Best of both worlds, kayak and canoe? Wait... I have one of those! I know, I know, but it feels good to gloat a little sometimes.

And the exciting news is that Skip is interested in getting his designs to manufacturers who can create more affordable versions for the average person on the street. So far, however, it doesn't appear that his Little Tripper has been picked up by anyone.


Chana R. Schoenberger writing for Forbes said, "Izon's boats come unadorned with flashy graphics or trims. "If you can make a natural shape, it ends up looking pretty," he says. "It borders on art." His customers agree. Many row their canoes in the summer, then hang them on the wall in winter."


Schoenberger indicated in the Forbes piece that Izon started selling designs to manufacturers in or around 2003. Hudson Boat Works, Mad River Canoe and Raven Works are listed. Hudson Boat Works' website does not include photos with their boats, let alone reference to the designer. Mad River Canoes doesn't  brag about who designed their hulls either. Raven Works appears to have gone out of business or at least let their domain registration expire. There are numerous links to them from canoe and kayaking sites across the web, but the tent is gone and only a digital wind now blows across the empty stake holes where the site used to be.

Not mentioned by Shoenberger is the Souris River Skeena. This is a white-water-capable tandem tripper with an attractive flat water layup that unfortunately still weighs in at a hefty 50 lbs.

I will keep my eyes peeled for other Izon designs and if you are as interested as I was, you might try searcihg for the drool-worthy pictures of the Shadow River Chipmunk I found online.

Looks like Mr. Izon does not have a website for his company, Shadow River Boatworks, which is not surprising for a fellow who does all his engineering and design calculations by hand without the aid of a computer.

If anyone knows of Izon designed boats being built in a less expensive layup, I would be pleased to know.

Lake List Updated and Plans for this Summer

I have now visited 134 lakes and paddled 77 of them. 

Updated the lakes list: http://www.stillinthestream.com/files/lakesvisited.html

I'm planning two longer trips this summer, one to the Kennedy Lake area and one to the North Island. The North Island has the most potential for lakes but the Kennedy Lake area has some areas with high potential, particularly the Kennedy River Bog and Muriel Lake.

Muriel Lake

Of course I will also be checking out some of the lesser known lakes in the Sayward Forest and revisiting some favorites.

I recently purchased a copy of Michel Gauthier's excellent book: A guide to the Sayward Forest Canoe Circuit and will be reviewing it here soon.

 

http://www.dogwoodavenue.ca/index.html

Wenonah Solitude and Rendezvous

A few weeks ago my friend Paul took some photos of me trying out his Solitude and Rendezvous canoes when a few of us got together with different boats and paddles. I thought I would post  a brief review of the two boats with some of Paul's photos.

Wenonah Solitude (now built by Clipper):

The Solitude is a classic Jensen design with minimal sheer and a low stern. The tumblehome is modest but pleasing and the boat paddles equally comfortably with a single or double paddle.

This is an efficient hull that feels slightly more zippy than my Solo Plus but with relatively similar glide and tracking. The Solitude is shorter (15.6 for the Solitude, 16.6 for the Solo Plus) and a bit closer across the beam (28" at the widest and 30" at the waterline compared to the Solo Plus at 29" and 31.75" at the water line). It turns a little easier that the Solo Plus, matching the exact depth at the paddling station but with a different shape in relation to the ends. The Solo Plus has a more pronounced sheer line making it seem lower to the water at the paddling station.

I would recommend this boat for the kind of day tripping I like to do on flat water. Short two or three day trips would also be quite comfortable in this craft.

The boat's most noteworthy quality, in my estimation, is it's clean lines and somewhat minimalist aesthetic quality. Here is a shot of Paul in the Solitude that accentuates the rich aged look of both the kevlar and wood gunwales.  A genuinely pretty boat.

And also...

Wenonah Rendezvous

You can see three different paddles in this shot, and despite the look on my face I was happy with how this boat performed with each one. The bent shaft carbon fibre paddle of Paul's that I am using in the photo really accelerated this canoe nicely and I was surprised at how little effort it took to keep this moderately rockered boat on target. I'm generally not keen on bent shaft paddles for solo paddling, but because this boat is so easy to maneuver, it was actually almost effortless to paddle with a standard Canadian stroke.

My Cree/Iroquois style single blade was also comfortable, though slightly less enjoyable than it's performance in my Spitfire.  I'm still mulling this over, but for some reason the Cree/Iroquois blade is perfectly suited for the little pack canoe, while in this boat if felt merely adequate.

The Greenland style double was also comfortable to use with this boat, perhaps surprisingly given the higher paddling station (15"). Our craftsman extraordinaire, Charles, subsequently designed and fashioned a longer Greenland style paddle (actually an Aluet design) for use with our solo canoes and I will be reviewing it in an upcoming post.

I have to confess that paddling the Rendezvous disrupted my long held beliefs about rockered boats. I had always considered them to be designed for, and best suited to, river travel. For the kind of flat water paddling I now do, I have been leaning toward minimally rockered racehorses like the Wenonah Advantage. Now I am not so sure. I have to take my hat off to the designer of this hull - maybe Mike Cichanowski? There is something magical about it.

It is nimble, easy to correct and keep on target, and amazingly exhilarating to paddle. It SEEMS to go faster with the same amount of effort I would put into paddling other boats. Next to the Rapidfire, this is the hull I am now most enamored with.  Just a lot of fun to paddle.

So thanks Paul for letting me try out your boats, and for taking some shots of me in them. It was a great day and very educational.

Oyster Mushroom

May 18th, 2010, there in the forest, a tall trunk of alder with tawny ruffles -- Oyster mushrooms.

On Vancouver Island alders often grow near water, and so old alders can be seen from the water, and so, for paddlers who are also mushroom lovers....

I have and recommend three books on the subject:

Common Mushrooms of the Northwest - by J. Duane Sept (see my review at the Amazon page)
Mushrooms of the Pacific Northwest - by Seve Trudell and Joe Ammirati
Edible Wild Mushrooms of North America - by David W. Fischer and Alan E. Bessette

I also recommend the following online resources:

Pacific Northwest Key Council - http://www.svims.ca/council/keys.htm
Here is the above site's link for Oyster Mushrooms - http://www.svims.ca/council/Pleuro.htm

British Columbia Ectomycorrhizal Research network Mushroom Matchmaker - http://www.pfc.forestry.ca/biodiversity/matchmaker/help_e.html
Mushroom Experts - http://www.mushroomexpert.com/

I have to confess that these beauties were located a good 200 feet up a steep bank from the water's edge, but worth the climb to retrieve them. The snag had numerous other growing buds, so I will be returning over the next few days/weeks to harvest more if no-one else finds it.

I ate these for breakfast today. Yum.

Even Fresh Water Paddlers Need Healthy Oceans

I am primarily a fresh water paddler, but I do paddled on the ocean from time to time and have a special affection for estuaries. This talk by Jeremy Jackson is about what has happened in the past 150 years to our oceans and what the future holds for them. It isn't pretty.

The crisis is of such magnitude that I felt morally obligated to share this video. We have to face the issue for what it is. Tough it out and watch to the end if you can; then add your voice to the call for sustainable fishing and careful science-based management of all our water related resources.

Sedge Bending

The world if full of grand vistas. People flock to the Grand Canyon for example, or the Rocky Mountains. People huddle their houses together for a view of the ocean, to take advantage of a steel and glass cityscape, to share the sight of a volcano. There is, on the other hand, no rush to view alleyways, boarded up factories, or a vacant lot.

Here on Vancouver Island, you can view a volcano, a beautiful cityscape, and everywhere the changing plane of ocean. It is a common blessing, like being Canadian, like shopping in a super market. It comes with the territory. We sometimes stop to wink at each other, "can you believe we have it so good?"

Evan so, and perhaps because we are saturated by the ubiquitous privilege of our situation, there are beauties we miss. In the brace of affluence it is actually the case that saturation can be the problem. We have the good life, but it has us too, in it's teeth, and it is biting down hard. We are overweight, we are stressed, we are depressed, we are trudging along. What good is it to live in paradise if we slave each day to stay here?  That my friends, is the middle class dilemma.

Sedge Bending might not be the antidote to that, but it might not hurt. So let me tell you how it works.

The Sedge Bending Formulas 

The intro formula: 1 self powered water craft + 1 quiet shoreline with sedges - all electronic distractions = Bliss

The committed formula: 1 beautiful self powered water craft + 1 quiet shoreline with sedges and a few other specific features  - all the distractions of electronic life + a list of "experience enhancing" extras = Bliss2

I agree, the formulas seem too simple to really work, and to be frank, they only work for a certain segment of the population, maybe 10%. But if you are in that 10% you could be missing out on, well, bliss. So might not it behoove you to read a little more about it?

 
The Sedge Bending Secret 

The secret to sedge bending bliss is the Vita Ora. Vita is the Latin root of vital, and generally refers to life; and ora mean edge, rim, border, boundary /coast, coast-line. Thus it is the vital edge, the border of life, the rim of vitality, or the boundary of being.  This is the place on a lake that biologists call the Littoral zone. It is a biogeographic region where conditions are favourable for life. Not just sedges, but rushes, reeds, auquatic plants cluster along this threshold between the relatively barren deep water and the dryer expanses of land, dominated by the light soaking conifers and angiosperms.

In short, there is a magic region of water loving plants and animals that for some of us, not only epitomize life, but impart it to us just by going there. We come alive in this district of dragonflies and redwing blackbirds.  We feel at home amide the frogs and turtles. We belong.

Are you a Sedge Bender? I'd love to hear from you.

And the Winner is.....

If we abandon that other inadequate phrase discussed in the last post in favour of something better, what better phrase should we choose? I compiled a list from a select group of contributors, who’s names shall remain a secret, lets just call them Paul, Charles, James and Jeff for now.

I will list each contribution, comment and rate it on three crucial qualities, and render my verdict. The three criteria for ranking are A. Alliteration — is it fun to say this phrase, does it sound poetic? B. Accuracy — how well does it capture or describe the experience? C. Vernacular — how likely will the phrase be adopted by other paddlers? 3 is high, 2 is average, 1 is low, 0 it doesn’t even qualify.

The List

Candidate Couplet	Rationale	Total
Backwater Idling	Alliteration — 2 — Three strong syllables with a side click tapering to a soft “ing.” Sounds ok, but nothing special. Accuracy — 2 — Fairly accurate, though backwater has a slightly ambiguous meaning, sometimes carrying a negative connotation similar to Hicksville or boonies. Vernacular — 1 — Description but not very inspiring or endearing.	5
Bay Investigating	Alliteration — 1  — While investigating is an accurate description of what a person does who appreciates these locals, the word itself is 5 very distinct syllables, slowing the word down too much and making it heavy. Accuracy — 2 — Not inclusive enough. The golden zone we seek is not just in bays. Vernacular — 1 — Sounds too much like a job for Columbo.	4
Bog Snogging	Alliteration — 3 — Great alliteration, I have to admit. Accuracy — 1 — Bogs unfortunately are not as accessible as fens for the average paddler but some “bog-like” corners of lakes might qualify. Unfortunately the technical definition of a bog includes the isolation from sources of fresh water; a bog depending almost exclusively on rain and snow fall. And not all places of interested are bog-like. Vernacular — 2 — I can see this one catching on because of the humorous if slightly bawdy connotation, but in the end that might not be the quality we ultimately want to sit in our minds.	6
Calm Collecting	Alliteration — 2 — There is a nice ring in collecting, but calm has a soft sound. Accuracy — 1 — This phrase has the danger of sounding like some new age “hunter gatherer” activity. Nothing indicates paddling or a location in which the collecting is done. Vernacular —1 —I doubt this would catch on.	4
Duck Mucking	Alliteration — 3 — A great rhyming couplet. Accuracy — 2 — There are ducks, but we don’t muck them, and we do muck a bit, but not like ducks. Ok, a little bit like ducks. Vernacular —1 — Unfortunately it sounds like something ducks do, or something you do to ducks.	6
Fen Wending	Alliteration — 2 — Not bad but the “en” sound is inherently weak. Accuracy — 3 — A fen is a mineral rich wetland usually dominated by sedges and calcium loving herbs and shrubs and is characterized by the accumulation of peat. In hard water areas fens are often accessible from nearby lakes and streams. Fens are often the pre-cursor to swamps and bogs. They are distinguished from bogs by the influx of water from sources other than snow and rain. Swamps are kind of like fens with trees, and so a fen and a swamp can be hard to tell apart. Vernacular —2 — Sad as it may seem, very few people know what a fen is, so there would be an educational component to using this phrase.	7
Liminal Drifting	Alliteration — 3 — There is a nice onomatopoeia to this couplet. Accuracy — 3  — Liminal is from the root Latin word limin, which refers to a threshold and this traditionally descriptive word is more and more used allegorically for a state of mind characterized by ambiguity, openness, and indeterminacy. One's sense of identity dissolves to some extent when in a liminal state, and there is a sense of crossing over to an altered way of seeing. More concretely (and traditionally) a liminal space can be any blurry boundary zone between two established and clear spatial areas. Both definitions seem to capture the essential quality of cruising along a weed bed on the margin of a lake. Vernacular  — 2 — Liminal, confused sometimes with luminal, was tarnished in past decades by hippie new agers, but it is so apropos that it is tempting to try and jump start it’s use in the vocabulary again.	8
Littoral Cruising	Alliteration —2 — Nothing special here but nice enough. Accuracy —3 — Well, of course littoral means, of or existing on a shore and is from the Latin for “stem” presumably in reference to those plants growing on or near the shoreline. We call them reeds. Vernacular —2 — Could be confused with litter, or literal, which might not be a bad thing, but might not be a good thing either.	7
Reed Clipping	Alliteration — 2 — There are some nice sounds in this couplet, the long ee in reed followed by the sharp ip in clipping, but somehow the clipping seems to trip the tongue. Accuracy — 2  — While technically there is a fair bit of reed clipping (in the sense of “I just brushed harshly against that reed” in the shallow water exploration process) it conjures up both harvesting images and also sailing images. Vernacular — 2 — I just don’t see this one catching on.	6
Rush Hugging	Alliteration — 2 — Fairly good alliteration but not as good as others in the list. Accuracy — 0 — Well, in a metaphorical sense, yes, but you would have to be a very tiny person to really hug a rush easily. I’ve heard of people hugging a grudge, but not hugging a rush. The image problems seem insurmountable. Vernacular — 0 — The “tree hugger” connotation along with a certain smarmy feel, just boots this one right out of the pond.	2
Sedge Bending	Alliteration — 3 — A nice slow roll on the tongue echoes the slowness of the activity. Accuracy —3 — Extremely accurate as bending sedges is almost impossible not to do if you really get into it — so to speak. Vernacular — 3 — Seems to have a natural infectious feel despite the possible negative connotations of going on a bender.	9
Serenity Inspecting or Tranquility Inspecting	Alliteration — 2  — The slow quality is good, but number of syllables, rather than their consonant/vowel blending creates the slowness, so it is not as strong a couplet as others. Accuracy — 1 — Can you inspect Serenity? Perhaps, but if so, it is an inner inspection and while the concept is kind of nice, it is not specific to paddling. Vernacular — 1 Hard to say, but my sense is that serenity or even tranquility loses out to other more concrete image based couplets. The phrase seems shifted away from the direct experience into interpretive language.	4
Shallow dipping or Shallows dipping	Alliteration —2 — Ok, but nothing special. Accuracy — 2  — generally accurate, in the sense that when paddling the littoral zone one must paddle more carefully and with less depth, and one “dips” into bays and shallow areas to take a look, but it doesn’t really capture the magic of the moment. Vernacular — 1 — Is it Shallows or Shallow, the confusion is bound to arise and so it is unlikely to catch on.	5
Shallowwater blading or Shallowwater paddling	Alliteration — 1 — Unfortunately this couplet actually catches on the tongue. Accuracy — 2 — The word blading just seems to conjure up the wrong image somehow and paddling is accurate but suffers from an association with childhood wading or duck behaviour. Vernacular — 1 — Shallowwater and blading are both not already in the vernacular – I don’t think it will fly. “Shallow water paddling” is a good description of what occurs, but really does not create any spark, or inspire any devotion.	4
Silt Disturbing	Alliteration — 3 — Strong sounds with a unique stab at the beginning and a running out towards the end. Accuracy — 2 — It happens. Vernacular — 2 — OK, I can see this one catching on, because it sounds like another kind of disturbing, but seriously folks, is that the image we want to evoke with this phrase?	7

So, five phrases stand out, with Sedge Bending being the winner.

Sedge Bending – 9   THE WINNER!

Liminal Drifting – 8

Fen Wending – 7

Littoral Cruising – 7

Silt Disturbing – 7

 Not exactly sedges, but some serious bending going on....

A Rose is Not a Stink Prickler

There is a paddling term that stinks. It needs to be changed. But changing the name people use for a thing can be difficult, and sometimes we assume names don’t really matter that much. Shakespeare’s famous line, “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet,” is often interpreted to mean that names are not important.

This assumption is dead wrong. In actual fact the Shakespeare line is not an argument to ignore names, but to discard them if they are inadequate. Juliet, who utters this line in the play “Romeo and Juliet” is telling her fair Romeo that he is misnamed, that he is not a Montague. She tells him to take off his name and identify himself with her instead.*

Imagine that instead of calling it a birthday we called it our “placenta discarding day” or our, “causing mother to howl in pain day.”  Would we bake a cake for such a day, would we gather to sing a happy song? Probably not, but fortunately it is aptly named. We call it our birth day, the day we became an entity outside our mother’s womb, took our first breath of the air of earth. We celebrate the best part of it, not the blood and pain and extravagant loss of the water world of prenatal bliss. It is right that we do.

Some of us, gripping paddles in our hands like placards at a rally, would like to change the name of an activity we love, but which either has no name at all, or has a real clunker. Someone named it badly, and it is time to fix that.

So, what is this name? This misfortune, this grievous insult? I’m putting off typing it. As soon as you read it you will cringe. I’m thinking of the beautiful activity, and I don’t want to taint it with that word. People know the name, and are embarrassed by it. They hang their head when it is said out loud. The old name, harsh as Orc guttural, has a certain descriptive quality which is not entirely inaccurate. But certainly not the name a lover would use. Juliet would not approve. It is not the name an enthusiast would use, not the name an aficionado would use. The name must, I’m afraid, be written, if nothing else to be examined for it’s inadequacy before suggesting a raft of better alternatives.

The name is Gunkholing. There I’ve typed it. If you google the term you will quickly discovery that the majority of references are for saltwater cruising and involve not only the visiting of “gunkholes” but going from place to place in search of them. Gunkholes are secluded shoreline places with gunk. Gunk, according to Wikipedia is any filthy, sticky, or greasy substances. This is the identical definition found in my trusty desk copy of the Houghton Mifflin Canadian Dictionary of the English Language. Gunk, in this context is supposed to refer to the mud and slime that is evident at low tide in saltwater marshes, estuaries, and bays.

The application of the term to freshwater locations is secondary, occurring I suspect because no other term has been widely used.

It is time to change all that.

So, before suggesting alternatives, this first post will critique the word Gunkholing. There are three main reasons for abandoning it outright, and a further one for questioning it’s use in my world of freshwater paddling.

1. Is the Gunk the thing? The mud and slime of marshes and estuaries is seldom sticky or greasy. Slippery, yes, and when you step in it up to your knee or deeper, it can be difficult to get out of, but most of the mud is made up of fine silts and decaying organic matter. One might just as easily describe it as silky, soft, or smooth. I will grant that such mud can be filthy. Filth is from the root word for putrid, and since there is decay at work in such places, fair enough, yet the attraction of such places lies not in the filth. So why include it in the name?

2. Where is the hole? Most places enjoyed by gunkholers are bays, bights, inlets, and coves. If these are holes, they are atypical. Holes evoke first and foremost a sense of depth, but in fact, most gunkholes are shallow. Holes are also generally round. Not very common in gunkholes.

3. Does it describe the love for doing it? The term is often used with an attached apology; “gunkholing, if you’ll excuse the term,” or similar phrases. Why keep apologizing, why not create a better term?

4. And finally, since the level of water in freshwater marshes and swamps moves less dramatically, usually a yearly and not daily cycle, the mud is generally covered for most of the year — only peaking out where reeds, rushes, sedges and grasses have not yet colonized. Take away the mud from the experience, and you take away a lot of the sense of filth.

In the next post I will review some better alternative names, and tell you the one that a small group of us paddlers have settled on.

---

*"It is nor hand, nor foot, nor arm, nor face, nor any other part belonging to a man. O, be some other name! What's in a name? that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet; So Romeo would, were he not Romeo call'd, retain that dear perfection which he owes without that title. Romeo, doff thy name, and for that name which is no part of thee take all myself."

Catch Magazine - a real treat

Have you seen Catch Magazine yet?

Even if you are not a fly angler, you can not help but stare ga ga at the beautiful photos in this free online feast for the eyes.

http://www.catchmagazine.net/

Migration Complete

Well, the ducks and geese are migrating so I decided to migrate my blog from my own domain (stillinthestream.com) onto Blogspot to take advantage of some of the new features such as "following" and other gadgets, and because Blogger is discontinuing ftp editing, making it impossible for me to continue uploading content the way I was before. 

It is spring, and I'm feeling ready for new things, so this change will be good. Here is a photo from a recent paddle on Westwood Lake. I was interested in trying out fellow paddler Paul's Wenonah Voyageur. I was very impressed with the tracking, glide, and overall efficiency of the boat. A real Gem.

Switching from Still In The Stream to Blogspot

This blog is now located at http://100lakesonvancouverisland.blogspot.com/.
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I have been exploring Wikimapia. Interested in contributing some of my data, but not sure this is the best way to do so. The base map is quite out of date, and low resolution over much of the island. I had inserted map code, but it really slowed down the page load for this already long blog, so I deleted it. Still not sure this is the venue for my information.

Flick River

Kissinger Lake

Vancouver Island Backroad Mapbook Fouth Edition - Map 9 A1
Atlas of Canada Link: Kissinger Lake
Latitude/Longitude:
Degrees, Minutes, Seconds: 48° 55' 15" N 124° 28' 53" W
Decimal Degrees: 48.921° N 124.481° W
UTM Coordinates: 10U 391470 5419726
Topographic Map Sheet Number: 092C16

Trip Date: June 30, 2009

In the canoe beside me two men cooperate. Patient, they talk out their preferences, a way to paddle together, a civilization of two. I am in a single, responsible only for myself, able to watch human friendship set against a precedent beauty.

Right now they paddle along a shoreline of giant broad leaf maples, the sun illuminating several layers of canopy, leaves like mirrors turning the light away from the dark under story, only the greens getting through, so that even the death of rotten wood and humus is coloured the shade of deep green water. The sun also breaks through to patch the lake with ragged beams through which the paddlers go, paddles glinting brightly on the forward swing.

As is often the case at times like these I think about all this matter bathed in the filtered fission energy that powered out from our very own star. This matter itself the result of ancient cataclysmic star deaths, all those years ago, worked on by time and sunlight, scaled into beings that can balance inside a curving hull. Also, the distant and ancient breath of stars that moved relentlessly through nothing, till it ended abruptly at something, this ball of coagulated earth.

And on the ball, moving like a plague, we engineer a sickness for our grandchildren, a hurdle too high for most animals, no matter how frantically they leap. A rain of bees drops off the grid, a storm of frogs thunders out of existence, the cascade of death like Della falls, spectacular in it's long streak upon the dark stone of history. Only a few of us turn to look, only the odd cocked ear, only a rusty stain of inquisitive sadness on the soul of a few sunburned biologists and we children of privilege. For the majority of us humans existence is a dust of dried sweat and grime to salt our dwellings at the end of a long hard day in the sun. Salt and dust. What we are made of, what we make of things.

Who moves like the moon upon the night, who glides like mist upon a lake, who rides like clouds across a crystal tarn? Not me. Not us. We go down on things, violent scavengers, cunning as knives. And each blow releases from us a larynx keened cry, saddle shinny and brittle as glass, the cry of conscious paradox. What we must do to live is an exquisite sacrifice; we must die a little with each bite we take. Today, for me, it is a swath of forest beyond this happy mere. Today for me it is salty tears for the gaps in that forest.

One of the paddlers with me is a leader in environmentally responsibility. Car poor, bike powered, vegetarian, energy efficient, example to me and others, his values pounding out of him like heartbeats. He has ridden his bike around Cowichan Lake. Not something I would ever do. The other paddler, like me, makes a sincere effort. Middle class piety from our deepest hearts. I felt our good intentions like fellowship as we bounced from pot hole to pot hole in my 4 wheel drive to get to this oasis of calm. Burned fossil fuel mixes with dust along the logging road that leads to Kissinger Lake. A wake of carbon to get to the pristine nature we long to see before it is gone.
On the way here we passed three logging trucks, two with old growth trees filling their trailers. Yes they are still cutting away at the 20% of old growth left on the island. Only 110 hectares of protected Douglas-fir forest remain on the east coast of Vancouver Island, while just two percent have been set aside as federal, provincial and regional parks. It's open season on the rest. According to the Western Canada Wilderness Committee, BC Government studies estimate that the current level of cutting is 30 percent above sustainability. The knives of the forest companies spin on chains. Shouts of "timber" echo across each section cut. The forest peels away like the skin of a fruit under the thumb of hungry homo sapiens. Logs from private land are sent away for someone else to use. On Vancouver Island we are mainly cutters now, working for overlords. Even pulp is mostly made elsewhere. Cutters and scavengers caked in salt and saw dust. Same as it ever was. Same as it ever was.

Two dragon flies collide above me; distract me with their paper crinkling sounds, like paper swords clashing. This particular variety is birdlike with their wing patches and silvery bodies. Damsel flies, two kinds, sway above my gunwales, deciding to land or not. A rough skinned newt surfaces, then begins her lazy decent to the bottom again. I photograph a floating garden, this one featuring a central strand of Sticky False Asphodel and a fringe of Marsh Cinquefoil and the insect eating Sundew, drops of nectar glistening in the sun.

Jalbum

I tried out the Jalbum site for photo presentation. Pretty nice actually....

http://stillinthestream.jalbum.net/Gray%20Lake/slides/Gray-Lake9d.html

Gray Lake

Vancouver Island Backroad Mapbook - Map 39 G6
Atlas of Canada Link: Gray Lake
Latitude and Longitude: 50° 3' 25" N - 125° 35' 49" W

Trip Date: August 21st, 2009



There are 4 vehicles already occupying sites when we arrive late Friday night after spending the day working our way up island, stopping to buy groceries and tea at the Courtney Tea Centre - one of the best tea retailers on the Island by the way. The Gray Lake Recreation Site has 6 sites, so we have our choice of two. We quickly set up camp and then head out for a paddle, just as the mist starts to rise off the lake around 8:00 pm.
We paddle north, away from the sandy beach and James heads off into the growing dark. I set up my camera on the tripod and start taking pictures. The aperture is wide open and the shutter speed down to 1.3. I can hardly see anything through the view finder.
After a few minutes the auto focus on my camera stops working, too little light. I set it to manual and keep shooting.
Finally, as the last light ebbs from the sky I get a nice shot of the mist after waiting for the canoe to come to a complete stop and I hold my breath while the shutter yawns open for 3 long seconds.
Within minutes I find it hard to see anything and rummage in my bag for my headlight. Down the lake I see Jame's headlight wink on. There is a chill in the air now and I listen to the silence, the smell of cedar faint and mixed with something indistinct, a soft earthy smell, plant essential oils breaking down after so many long dry days. There is a fire ban, so there is no smoke, no cheery flickering lights along the lake, only the darkness of trees against the slightly less dark blue black sky.

In the morning, startling James with my suggestion to paddle before breakfast, I head for the shore, the canoe beaded with dew, my warm pollen sweater a reminder that late August nights can be cool.

After James has a bowl of cereal he joins me on the water and we paddle down the misty lake, taking it easy, enjoying the atmosphere and watching time pass. On the remote western shore, something large thrashes in the underbrush as we glide by, but we don't see what it is. We keep going to the end of the lake and head up the inflow.

We paddle up stream, water dripping from the bushes on shore, a silence amid the trees that seems to absorb our voices, we talk in low tones, pilgrims visiting a holy site.
After passing an open marshy area, we travel between high rounded black banks, grooved here and there with otter and beaver trails, the sharp tooth-edged stubs of willow and sweet gale where the beavers have harvested. The canoes drift to a stop where the creek turns into a rocky trail, the water to low to paddle further.
We head back, the day still gaining light. On the lake again a woman steps from a camper on shore and seeing us, waves. We wave back. A man steps from the trailer behind her and puts his arm around her waist. We glide on, the bows of our canoes peeling open the refection of the sky.
For more images from this paddle, please visit the photo album here: http://stillinthestream.jalbum.net/Gray%20Lake/index.html

100 Lakes Visited

Bear Lake

Yesterday I visited the 100th Lake in my exploration of lakes on Vancouver Island. Of those 100 lakes visited I paddled 54, some more than once (Trail Pond, Turtle Lake, Mohun Lake, Bear Lake, Somenos Marsh, and Westwood Lake).

The reasons for not paddling 46 of the 100 were varied. Some had no easy access, or the lakes did not look interesting, or I didn't have sufficient time to paddle the lake on the day I was there, or I ended up paddling somewhere better.

I have posted a list of both the lakes visited and the lakes paddled so far here: http://www.stillinthestream.com/files/lakesvisited.html

Of the lakes visited but not paddled, I plan to paddle 24, but only 10 are high on my list. I still have about 30 other lakes to investigate first. I expect to paddle another half dozen before 2009 comes to an end.

Of the 54 lakes paddled so far only a handful were less enjoyable than I expected before visiting them, and only three actually disappointed me (Cedar Lake, Hawthorn Lake, and Darkis Lake). Some others such as Dougan and Echo Lakes turned out to be prettier to look at from the highway than to paddle on (and both suffered from excessive traffic noise).

Afew turned out to be more rewarding than I expected. Anutz and nearby Atluck Lake both overwhelmed me with their interesting shorelines and scenery while Spirit and Grace lakes provided a sense of remoteness and peacefulness that was out of proportion to their setting. Subtle beauty and a satisfyingly untouched quality seem to be the reason for these shallow quiet lakes charm.

Grace Lake

Some urban lakes turned out to have surprisingly natural shorelines (Thetis Lake and Westwood Lake) while some wild lakes suffered from overuse as evidenced by severely trampled and eroded shorelines (Spectacle, Peak, and Twin Lake).

Peak Lake

I have learned how much water level can effect the feel of a lake. Somenos Lake dropped 4 or 5 feet over a few months changing the paddling experience significantly, and the exposed beaches of Buttle, Elsie, Darkis, and Klaklakama Lakes detract from otherwise promising locations.

Some of the jewels of the island felt vulnerable and fragile. Mohun and Amor lakes are world class paddling destinations yet active logging throughout the Sayward Forest threatens to reduce the recreational value significantly. Many areas are closed for logging and I will be returning after the fact to see what is left. This whole area should be protected for posterity now. While the logging that is going on is responsible, it's just too pretty an area to scar with clear cuts.

Mohun Lake

Other gems, like the swamps and lakes of the Stamp and Ash valleys are on private land and at the mercy of the giant forest companies who own them.

Moran Swamp

Pat Bell, minister of forest and range, said in response to recent questions about the status of large trees on Vancouver Island that sufficient old growth is already protected - the rest is free to be logged. This comment reinforces his January declaration that the old growth ecosystem is amply protected. Mr. Bell sees no reason to protect more forest from the saws. I do.

I witnessed in July of this year one logging truck on the Cowichan Highway (Hwy 18) with three massive tree trunks filling it's trailer. These are very large old-growth trees, and the loggers are obviously active in our woods getting every last one.

I need to learn more about the BC government system and discover if it is possible to bring the aesthetic quality of our wetlands and forest into focus before it is too late. How can such beauty be destroyed for the profit of so few when if they are protected they can benefit so many for so many years to come?

Surely money isn't the only abstract construct that can be extracted from these locations. Should poetry, tranquility, and the healing power of nature feature in my writing? A lake without a large clear cut beside it is significantly more attractive than a lake with a tiny ribbon of trees between it and the surrounding expanses of dead stumps, slash, and torn up soil. Will it help to paint this picture? Can my writing and photography have any effect?

Hand Made Paddles

James and I stand in the airy workshop of Larry Bowers. Around us are the hulls of canoes Larry is building, in various states of completion. There is a sweet smell of wood and varnish. Larry takes from the wall several patterns for canoe paddles and we ask him about the advantages of each. He shares stories about a few of the paddles he has made. We look at and hold a few of his favourites. Paddles, even more than canoes, connect us to water. Beautiful paddles connect us to something deeper.

James has done his research. He laid out his findings to me on the drive from Nanaimo to Campbell River where Larry lives and runs his business. James is keen on a traditional Algonquin blade pattern and his reasoning is this: the Algonquin blade has a slightly narrowed and rounded tip, allowing a clean entry to the water with less friction than other designs. Between a ½ and ¾ of the way up the blade it widens slightly before tapering back to the shaft. The advantage of this shape is that when the blade is drawn back from that initial entry and submerged fully beside the canoe the wider section of the blade engages at a point where the arms have their greatest leverage, putting the maximum blade surface in the water during the most powerful portion of the stroke.

It is a logical and persuasive argument and as we stand looking at the templates we listen to Larry tell of the two paddles he has favoured over the years. One of them is very close to the shape of the Algonquin blade. Both James and I decide to order this blade shape from Larry. But I am also attracted to an unusual shaped blade that Larry describes as a Cree design. He tells us that he used the template to build a paddle once but that he rounded the tip more, moving the shape from an exaggerated “tip-heavy” design to a more beavertail-style tip. It turned out to be a good one.

Unlike a standard beaver tail, this “Larry Bowers” custom shape (on the left in the picture above) has the long straight sides of the Cree style with the pleasing tip of the beavertail. I decide on this blade shape for my second paddle. It seems to defy the logic associated with the Algonquin blade, and while my rational mind is warning me to reconsider the choice I have a strong intuition telling me there is something right about the shape. I wonder if I am being drawn in by the novelty of it or maybe it’s aesthetics, but secretly hope there something I don’t know yet about this design that makes it a winner.

Next we talk about shaft length. I produce from the vehicle an old cheap beavertail paddle which I inherited from my father and found to be just the right length for the low paddling station of my Placid Boatwork made Spirtfire pack canoe. For the Algonquin blade I request the shorter shaft length creating a 58 inch paddle with 25 inches of shaft and 27 inches of blade, 3 inches of throat, and 3 inches of grip. I learn later that this is a very close to the average for historical paddles that Doug Ingram reports in his online article, Historic Paddle Reproductions (http://www.redrivercanoe.ca/Historic%20Paddles.htm).

I order the Cree blade in the dimensions that Larry recommends, trusting this craftsman’s experience and familiarity with the material. At 59 and ½ inches it will be longer than any of my other single blade paddles and I plan to use it primarily with the Solo+.

John Bell of Red Tail Paddles states, “Probably 90% of all adults can use a 54 inch paddle with a 20 inch blade,” though Bell does make paddles up to 63 inches long. His comment worries me, causing me to wonder if the Cree paddle will be too long, but then when I browse pictures of old voyageurs in their canoes and recovering from the day’s paddling in their 19th century camps, I notice how long and thin their paddles are. The voyageurs used various lengths of paddles but almost all of them had thin blades because they paddled hard and fast. Such hard fast paddling put tremendous strain on the paddles and ones made of spruce, though light, broke often. Therefore the Voyageurs chose hardwoods for their paddles, and made many of them, often on route.

The paddles Larry makes for us are a combination of spruce and yew (Spruce on the left above, and Yew on the right). The spruce is Sitka Spruce, a clear springy wood from the noble giants made famous on Vancouver Island as part of the sky garden ecosystem studied in the Carmanah Canopy Project.

The Sitka Spruce tree grows with a very straight trunk and is one of the tallest on the coast, only surpassed by the Douglas Fir and Western Hemlock. The light straight grained wood is used for everything from guitars to boats and contains pleasing mottling where the wood is rounded. The yew wood used in our paddles has a pedigree.

Sometime before his death in 1944 my grandfather strode into a forest near Nelson and cut down some yew trees. As a woodworker raising a family through the great depression he made a wide assortment of wooden objects for people, from cabinets to houses. The Yew he prized for rifle stocks. Two pieces of yew were carefully dried and stored for future use. The years passed and my father inherited the wood and stored it in our woodshed where I saw it from time to time while growing up. When my parents moved to a smaller house upon retirement the yew wood passed on to me. It sat in my woodshed for another 10 years.

Larry explains to us that he regularly uses the hard and durable yew wood laminated onto spruce to create a resilient and responsive paddle. Larry demonstrates by leaning hard on his own laminated spruce and yew paddle so that the paddle bends dramatically and springs back. Yew was a choice wood for archery bows for centuries and is still used today for this function.

A few months after we placed our order Larry calls to tell us the paddles are ready. We head to Campbell River to pick them up. They are beautiful hanging in his shop and I can’t help grinning as we examine their beautiful smooth surfaces and deep natural colors.

After chatting with Larry for awhile we stop only briefly for cheesecake at Cheescake 101 a short distance from Larry’s shop, before beetling out to Echo Lake to try out the new paddles. Larry has also given us to try a paddle he just made for himself, along with a much shorter paddle that James spied in Larry’s shop.

On the water I notice immediately that the paddles feel too long for the pack canoes, but a curious thing happens. The very long Cree style paddle has an interesting quality. Trying to lift the long blade clear of the water proves to be a little awkward but keeping the blade in the water and knifing it forward in an Indian stroke is enjoyable and effective. The power in the correction is impressive as the long blade rises almost vertically at the end of the power stroke before slicing forward for the next stroke.

I look over at James and notice that he is trying different holds on Larry’s paddle, abandoning the high grip and grasping the paddle at varying heights along the shaft.

I switch to the shorter Algonquin blade that I had designed specifically for this boat and appreciate immediately the familiar shaft length from my Dad’s old paddle. Interestingly, however, the paddle does not function as well on the Canadian stroke. I adjust myself accordingly and find the Indian stroke works extremely well with this paddle. James passes off Larry’s paddle to me and I pass over my paddle with the shaft length 3 inches shorter than his. He tries them both and decides that for his Rapidfire a shaft length somewhere in the middle would be perfect.

The following weekend I take my Wenonah Solo+ to Westwood Lake, the water jammed to overflowing with Nanaimoites seeking relief from the 37 degree summer hot spell. I paddle to the far end of the lake, trying my two new paddles and comparing them with my shorter Redtail Ottertail as I go.

The Redtail is 53 and ½ inches long, a full 6 inches shorter than my new Larry Bowers Cree, and a mere ½ inch shorter than John Bell’s recommended average. The Redtail Ottertail and the new Algonquin are almost identical in blade shape, the Algonquin blade being about 3 and ½ inches longer with a ½ inch longer neck transition. They perform similarly, but the slightly longer blade on the Algonquin gives a notably better grip on the water, and the bobbled grip allows me to spin the paddle effortlessly while performing the Indian stroke.

The Cree surprises me by feeling less substantial than the Algonquin in the Solo+ and I compare the blade shapes and discover that while they are identical in length, the Algonquin is wider in the middle. This slight difference is noticeable on an extended paddle around the lake. Both blades whistle nicely on the forward underwater slice and the do not seem to resist as much as the Redtail.

Sure enough, on examining the blade edges Larry’s paddles are more knife-like at the edges and the blades are noticeably thinner. I spend about an hour sculling and testing pries, jams, and reverse sculls. For all these actions the Cree style is superior, though challengingly exact in a bow jam, perhaps because of the long length and the Solo Plus’ minimally rockered hull and sharp entry lines.

I find a private bay on the south western end of the lake and practice maneuvering between the many deadheads and dead trees there. The limitations of the Solo+ in such situations becomes apparent. This straight tracking canoe with it’s excellent secondary stability is not easy to spin, even when heeled.

The surprises of the paddles and my continuing curiosity over the blade shapes drive me to research. I get the best book I can find on the subject out of the library — Graham Warren and David Gidmark’s Canoe Paddles: A Complete Guide to Making Your Own. On page 12 of this detailed and informative work I see a diagram of a Passamaquoddy paddle which is very close to the “Cree” design Larry showed us. On the same page the Algonquin shape is clearly illustrated. The Cree paddle diagram on the page is similar, but has a clear transition at the neck, but on the next page is a Western Cree paddle that has less of a distinct transition. I study the drawings in detail and decide that Larry’s design in a cross between the Passamaquoddy and the Cree. It has the long blade and straight taper of the Cree, with the smooth neck of the Passamaquoddy.

A few days later I am browsing Bark Canoes: The Art and Obsession of Tappan Adney by John Jennings, when I come across, on page 80, a paddle blade that almost exactly matches the design. It is an Iroquois paddle (pictured above). Later in the same book, page 127, is another paddle that looks similar leaning against an Ojibway Style Tetes de Boule canoe that Abney found in Grand Piles Quebec in 1925. (see below)

Warren and Gidmark put Iroquois blades in three catagories: Beavertail, Elongated beavertail, and Straight-sided rounded. Ojibiway paddles turn up under Elongated beavertail and Straight-sided rounded, as well as Ottertail.

Of the 10 basic categories Warren and Gidmark sort all historic blades into, 5 have the widest part of the blade near the middle of the blade, 2 have the widest part near the neck, and 3 have the widest part near the tip. Clearly the majority of blade shapes from indigenous tribes of North America place the widest part of the blade near the middle to take advantage of the mechanics James had described to me earlier.

I finally decide that the 9th category most closely fits my Cree style blade, what Warren and Gidmark call the “Straight-sided, rounded” blade.

A search online of the major paddle manufacturers reveals that most produce a version of the Ottertail, Beaver Tail, Elongated Beaver Tail, or the contemporary White water paddle (large surface square bottom). One company, Shaw and Tenney, has a paddle they call the Racine. They explain that it is a replication of a paddle originally sold by the Racine Canoe Company of Wisconsin. The paddle was offered with the sale of each Racine Canoe Company wood/canvas canoe sold until the company went out of business in the 1920’s. Shaw and Tenney report that the Racine is becoming their best selling paddle with many repeat orders. They claim that it is a very quiet paddle, and, because the blade is only 5” wide, lends itself well to the North Woods stroke as well as to solo paddling. The Racine is available in the two original lengths, 58-1/2" and 63-1/2", which they say seem to work perfectly for everyone.

I can find no other paddle on the market that matches the profile of Larry's Cree design. Even the Racine is closer to the Algonquin design with its very slightly tapering tip. Interestingly the majority of traditional wooden paddle builders (Turtle, Kettelwell, Redtail, Greyowl, and Shaw and Tenney) sell version of the Ottertail or Algonquin, usually with a Beavertail or two to round out the selection. A few, such as the noteworthy Whiskyjack, almost exclusively produce modified white water blades. Still others such as Anderson, Carlisle, Cricket, Foxworx, and Sawyer, produce beefy versions of the ottertail and Algonquin along with a plethora of square bottomed whitewater styles.

Beefy blades with areas larger than 140 square inches are generally recommended for short tripping, white water, and sprint racing, as well as dragon boating and stand up paddle boarding. The larger area provides greater thrust. Thrust is proportional to blade area according to Warren and Gidmark (blade area x (stroke rate)2 and sustainable stroke rate is proportional to 1/(blade area). Stroke rate has a greater effect than blade area does because its contribution is squared. Aspect ratio is another important factor in beefy blades. Short fat blades exhibit more drag than long narrow ones of the same surface area. So in effect you get more bang for your buck with a short fat blade. Shorter blades are also easier to handle when the blade is lifted out of the water while paddling or when switching sides. But short fat blades have a few drawbacks. Firstly they are more difficult to keep close to the hull when paddling and secondly they splash more on entry. Also they flutter more when doing a below water slice and tend to catch and veer more in the hands of a novice.

The lower aspect paddles, on the other hand, while providing less overall drag, go deeper into denser water, slice better, and enter the water with less splash. Low aspect paddles are longer, and therefore less effective in shallow water but more effective for long reaching braces. A low aspect paddle with a blade that concentrates more area farther away from the paddler’s fulcrum (like my Cree style paddle does) provides more leverage making it better for sculling and steering. Doug Ingram of Red River Canoe & Paddle is a paddle builder who helped clarify for me the great diversity in Paddle blades. Ingram produces the widest range of blade shapes on the market and his Cree replica convinced me that Larry was, not surprisingly, right to call my paddle a Cree design.

Ingram writing about historic North American paddles says, “Amongst the many different blade shapes that have been conceived, traditional blades can be loosely categorized as being either straight-sided or round-sided. Surface areas are concentrated near the throat, evenly along the length, or near the tip. Tips are pointed, rounded, or blunt. I began to wonder what, then, are the constants of these traditional designs. Blade length varies, but averages in the 27- to 30-inch range. Width also varies, but blades are rarely wider than 6 inches.” Ingram’s conclusions were that trial and error sifted out the lengths and blade shapes that survived.

Ventilation seems to be an important factor in this sifting process. Large blades with abrupt transitions at the throat allow air to enter behind the paddle, making them inefficient if paddled too quickly. The other factor that creates ventilation is when the blade is not fully immersed in the water. The short fat blades lose most of their aspect ratio advantage if the blades are not fully immersed while paddling.


Intuition and time on the water teaches most people this lesson, and I notice when teaching new paddlers that I often have to encourage them to get their blade hand close to or in the water. This advice does two things. It fully immerses the paddle blade and lowers the paddle overall, bringing the grip hand lower as well. Many photos of people paddling, including two of the 4 pictures on the inside cover of the instruction booklet that comes with every Wenonah canoe, show paddlers with their grip hand high in the air, sometimes over their heads!


The optimal position advocated by many instructors is to have the grip hand move in an area between the shoulder and the lower ribs. Never higher than the chin. Doug Ingram introduced me to several helpful ideas in his article. Most important was his description of the “Northwoods Stoke” which seems to be a modified Canadian stroke that keeps both arms low to the gunwales. The lower the arms, the less energy is used holding them and the paddle in the air.

I now finally understand the purpose of the large grips on so many traditional paddles. The way of holding the paddle grip in the Northwoods Stroke had never occurred to me but I plan on experimenting with it in the future.

There is not a lot of information out about the Northwoods Stroke online but Ingram’s own photos are clear, and several helpful discussions exist on various forums about the style. Another idea introduce to me in Ingram’s article is that of the round Cree grip. This is perhaps the best article on the internet about historic paddles. I encourage you to read the whole piece at

http://www.redrivercanoe.ca/Historic%20Paddles.htm

For additional images of my new paddles go to the photo album: http://www.stillinthestream.com/files/Paddles/index.html