By Ray Goodwin
2019
Our launch spot was Barclay Bay on Missinaibi Lake. We arrived late afternoon, after a five-hour drive, from Timmins. All our canoes and food were delivered by the excellent Missinaibi Headwaters Outfitter. Permits were paid for and we camped up for the night.
Ray Goodwin’s website: www.RayGoodwin.com
Ray is using gear from NRS.
Ray’s YouTube Channel is: www.youtube.com/c/RayGoodwin
There is a film of the 2019 trip on Ray’s YouTube channel @: https://youtu.be/lWkCFYjIV_E
Information:
For canoe trips in Canada, Ray teams up with his good friend Paul Kirtley: www.Frontierbushcraft.com
Our outfitter for this trip was https://mhoadventures.com
On February 13th, 2019, Ray was awarded the MBE for his services to canoeing, at Buckingham Palace. Here’s Ray pictured in his finest with family, Maya and Lina.
Ray Goodwin’s Missinaibi River to Mattice
The morning brought a flurry of activity as Paul, myself and customers busied our final packing and carried our gear down to the slip. I had teamed up with Rosemary and we started the first pack of the trip. Others were quickly on the water and asking for me to check their front to back trim. We were well loaded, between us, with seven barrels of group food along with a wannigan containing all the cook gear. The wannigan was a plywood box which would be carried via a traditional tump line across the head on all portages. I was glad when Roo and Graeme volunteered it a place in their canoe.
we worked shelter to shelter along the lake. On a distant shore we spotted a black bear foraging before it noticed us and calmly disappeared into the woods. We lunched at the narrows and then paddled into the end of the lake and the start of the river.
The river was low and most rapids were a bit of a scrape but still with enough power, when the water was confined, to deserve caution.
Our second day had us down to first Long and then Sun rapids. The latter with a couple of awkward rocks right in the main flow at the end of the rapid. A quick decision was made by Paul and myself and it was the whole team out to line down. As this was the first use of the ropes it took a whole lot of attention on our part both for the safety of the boats and the making sure the team moved carefully across the boulders. The caution was emphasised when we inspected a wrecked canoe from another party – indeed, within a kilometre, we came across another canoe wrapped high around a rock. These are not places to chance injury or losing a boat!
Filming with Ray Mears and the BBC 2004
Using a bow drill, fire by friction CREDIT: Courtesy of Ray Mears
Barry Foster was the cameraman on the first part of the trip and seemed to have an unbridled faith in my ability or at least my decision making. He asked if I could run a rapid with him filming? I pondered before saying yes. The boat would be heavier and Barry would have a weighty camera on his shoulder. He climbed into the canoe and stuck his legs under the seat, facing back at me. I got him to get the legs out in case we took a spill. He looked at the camera and back at me: we couldn’t afford to get it wet.
I ran the line and Barry got his footage and nowadays it always seems a bit of cheat just attaching the GoPro to the bow.
2019
As we approached Peterbell we could hear the steady rumble of a goods train. It, as usual was a real monster with four or locomotives pulling from the front and a massive trail of flatbeds with containers stacked two high. It took a long while for this rumbling behemoth to cross the bridge and even longer for it noise to disappear into the distance. Many folk miss out the lake and the first rapids to start their trip here. Yep it is possible to book the canoes and group onto the train.
Peterbell was established in the 1920s and operated for some 50 years before first being abandoned and then demolished with little of interest remaining. We passed on by.
A bitter wind from the north picked up as we headed to the marshes and our chosen camp. Adding to our discomfort rain now lashed down. The camp is on a rocky knoll overlooking the marshes, but we struggled to find enough water to get through the reed beds protecting the lagoon at its foot. Wading in the mud and vegetation we teamed up to drag each boat the ten metres or so until we could paddle again. Standing for the first time in hours, the low temperature hit me hard and like several others I started shivering.
A 100-metre paddle and we were at the awkward landing at the foot of the knoll, where only one boat at a time could unload. I grabbed my pack and leaving everyone else unloading got up to the camp area. My priority was to set a group tarp up, so there would be some respite from the rain. Soon the kit was up at the top and most were off to gather whatever dry wood could be found. Paul had the fire going quickly and the first water was on for a brew. Anyone can walk into the woods on a dry day and set up but it is in the wet and wind that your skills are proven.
Filming with Ray Mears
We were being plagued by mosquitos and we needed a place clear of marshland for a day of bushcraft. On my suggestion we pushed ahead to the site on Allan Island. Ray wanted to carve a paddle and I wanted to be taught how to use a bow drill for lighting a fire.
I collected a log for the paddle and watch with interest as Ray split it with wedges to create a plank and then started marking out a paddle with charcoal. Bit by bit the paddle emerged from the wood with a small amount of work by me. Ray was concerned I would be over keen and I was soon regulated to observing. The footage of me working on the paddle would be edited in with my later work carving a spatula to give totally the wrong impression – yep I had been stitched up. It still makes me smile to this day and both spatula and paddle have pride of place on my wall.
It is interesting to look back of the footage of me using a bow drill. I had never attempted it before and for more than an hour I struggled to get the coordination to get a smooth action. A slight change in pressure, angle or just general incompetence and the peg would go shooting off in all directions. I was into my final attempts as my energy waned but I got a smooth run and smoke started pouring from the bottom board and an ember formed.
Ray cautioned me to slow down and not to allow the copious sweat from my brow to drop on the ember. I bundled it up in the tinder and blew on it. Within seconds a flame appeared, slightly more and the bundle burst into flame – I had done it! For an hour I had been a novice rather than an expert and the coach within me had been fascinated by the process.
2019
We portaged past and then camped at the bottom of Wavy Rapid. A rather spacious site with a great sandy beach perfect for swimming and after a comfortable night and it was on down to Greenhill.
Greenhill Rapids
Back on my first trip in 2003, I approached this with some trepidation. Hap Wilson’s guidebook included dire warnings about this 1,400-metre rapid, “Impossible to scout… meaner than a junk-yard dog… a real canoe cemetery.” That first time I had my friend Jon as bow paddler and that led to a problem. Great to have on Jon the trip and in the wilderness, he was however inexperienced as a paddler. We started working down from eddy to eddy never leaving one until we had a definite line and a plan to get to the next.
Alun and Jamie were steady in the other canoe. Eventually we ran out of good eddies and I wasn’t prepared to cut loose and run. We lined down a section until lines and eddies became more obvious.
Greenhill Rapids 2017
We had reached the top of Greenhill and Paul and I were in agreement that the team should portage. The river was higher and there was less experience in the group. However, I would run it solo with a loaded boat before helping with the portage of some 1,400 metres. The portage cuts across way from the river so I would be on my own. Again, I worked myself down it eddy by eddy. Sometimes running the boat aground in shallows to slow down and get a look downstream. So, with a mix of tactics I worked my way down. By the time I got to the bottom Paul had already dropped a load at the end of the trail and was on his way back up for more.
Greenhill in 2019
This time the river was very low and because of the width there was little power in the water. We alternated the lead between boats and dodged and scraped our way down. All were enjoying it and the manoeuvring necessary upped everyone’s game. A real joy to watch the team in action.
Filming with Ray Mears
We had got what we needed. Then the news came, not unexpected, that Ray Mears’ dad was seriously ill. We needed to finish and get out. A few calls to the outfitter via satellite phone got a float plane extraction arranged.
We paddled down and waited at the agreed point. The plane did a fly through to check the section of river before coming back for a landing. Ray and gear were loaded on and flasks of coffee and fresh pastries were passed to the rest of us. The plane could only take one passenger and one canoe on trip.
It was an interesting take off. The straight wasn’t long enough so the pilot was starting from further upstream. Coming around the bend with speed then accelerating again to take off. As soon as we were airborne the pilot banked to the left to avoid the hillside ahead, it was intimidating, before climbing up above the forest. By the time we got back to Timmins, Ray was already on a flight back to Toronto and onto the UK.
2019
We had a two night stop in the camp below Thunder Falls. A chance to clean clothes, read, rest and fish.
Paul and I were keen to take the portage over into Brunswick Lake. It avoided a long flat section of the Missinaibi but more importantly this was the historic fur trade route. The Hudson Bay Company had, due to competition from the North West Company, started to move inland its posts around Hudson and James Bay. For a time, Brunswick House was the southern most HBC post. It had been sited on the lake so that it could be more self-sufficient in food with easier fishing and hunting along with the crops it could grow. It operated from 1788 until 1879. Back in 2017, we spent an hour or so wandering what we believed to be the site of the post but with no trace of anything found.
We camped at the start of the portage and carried the canoes across the 1.5 km that same day. The trail is slightly overgrown with a number of fallen trees. Some had teamed up to carry in pairs and some solo. The final part of the portage is muddy and the wood dropped into it to make a dry crossing was appallingly slippery. At this point I gave up my solo carry and waited for assistance carrying the canoe by hand for the final bit.
Next morning most of us did two trips carrying loads across. The launch into a branch of Brunswick Lake was shallow, muddy and lily infested. We laid a carpet of branches to enable us to push out further before resorting to punting through a long section of shallows before breaking through to the main lake.
The island camp on Brunswick is idyllic but an aluminium motor boat was moored up and the camp obviously occupied. A quick conversation and we realised it was two park rangers on a maintenance trip and with plenty of room on its crest they invited us to join them. The newly installed and empty thunder box was a very welcome change. While we sorted the rangers working day had finished and they took off on a fishing trip, reappearing hours later with plenty of filleted fish for all of us.
Morning came with yet more rain out of the north but the wind was low enough for us to head up the lake. Rob’s Australian flag was flying proudly from the stern of his canoe offering one of the few bits of colour on a grey day. Lunch was hurried and we made it to the top of the Brunswick River. A brief view of a moose and we headed on knowing the next campsite was way down on the Missinaibi. The river was low and only passible, in the rocky sections, because an eight-foot wide channel had been cleared for the Voyageur’s 25’ birchbark canoes. At times we had to wade and line where rocks and trees had blocked this old waterway, even a beaver dam briefly hindered our progress.
Back into the Missinaibi we headed on until late in the day and at last we reached the first possible camp, however, two teams were already camped there! One was a university course and another led by Jeff Tindall. We knew Jeff from a previous trip and had bumped into him days earlier before we headed into Brunswick. He quickly invited us to share the site and even use the tarp already set up. A quick scout starting to bring in dry wood and Paul soon had a pot boiling for a brew and then the meal was underway. We scrabbled around for flat spaces but we soon had everyone camped up.
last camp
A couple more days had us down to a last camp at the spectacular Glassy Falls. With plenty of room we again shared the site with Jeff’s team. The students were on a four-week trip on the river and Jeff was very much playing the role of facilitator rather than guide. He even encouraged his students to question us on our roles and experiences.
The final morning again dawned with rain sweeping in from the north. A last rapid was run smoothly and we finally pulled into the town of Mattice. Waiting for the outfitter some ran over to the toilets to get shelter, others of us hid behind the information boards.
Only when in the shuttle vehicles did warmth truly return and recollection soon turned to the joys of the river. You could feel the camaraderie and pride in the team. With views of bear and moose, beaver and otter, loon and eagle we had been part of the wilderness. The Missinaibi had not disappointed.
