Category Archives: Manitoulin

Summer Reflections 2: Spirit Island

The largest freshwater island in the world, Manitoulin is considered sacred by the People of the Three Fires, the Ojibwe, the Odawa and the Potawatomi. It has been inhabited for at least 12,000 years and possibly for as long as 30,000. We found it restorative and fascinating, though not a place we could live. It seems to exist in that difficult space in which you have to be born there to be truly of it, yet if you are born there, you may well have to leave to make a life!

Looking out over Mudge Bay from our cottage, the language of legend seemed to seep through me – I saw the wind striding from Killarney across the depths of Georgian Bay towards us, a huge being, throwing down his shadow-cloak as he passed. It is easy here to sit and watch for hours as the light and water shift. It is a place to be still, surrounded by the noisy peace of woodpeckers, blue jays and the constantly changing rhythm of wind and water.


Highlights that remain with me (in addition to Wikwemikong and the cultural Pow-Wow there, which merit a post of their own), include Kagawong’s bridal falls –  much-visited, but still magic; kayaking up river above the falls, existing outside time in the flow; and, to the south west of the island on Huron’s shores, the sweep of Dominion and Carter’s Bays, sand dunes and scrub offering up an ancient, solitary beauty.

For more photos, see our Gallery (Summer Trip 2013)!

Summer Reflections 1: A Watery Affair

Our photo album tells the love-story of a summer’s kayaking . We paddled (and I swam) in three of the Great Lakes (if you count Georgian Bay as the extension of Lake Huron), as well as exploring rivers and marshes. Always, here, good weather lures us outside; now, in the warmer months, I hunger to get out on the water.

Our longest paddle to date took us 12 km down the Beaver River, skirting submerged hazards and occasionally cutting back the dead-fall; all around us was the rich summer-green of early July woodland, wild and timeless. As we journeyed, a relay of kingfishers called their warning of our passage. The sighting of a bald-eagle nest was a truly special gift.

For more photos, see our Gallery (Beaver River and Nicolston Dam)!

A gentle exploration of Gull Lake (Gravenhurst) warmed us up for slightly more challenging expeditions on Manitoulin Island, the biggest freshwater island in the world. On Maintoulin, we circuited Manitouwaning Bay (which opens onto Georgian Bay) from Two O’Clock to Manitouwaning and back across open water. And we paddled up the Kagawong River into Lake Kagawong, fighting the wind back down the lake, then floating lazily with the river’s gentle flow to our start point above Kagawong’s Bridal Falls – time disappears out on the water as the peace, the light and the reflections seep into the soul.



For more photos, see our Gallery (Summer Trip 2013)!

At Canada’s southernmost tip, the marshes at Point Pelee were almost eerie in their quietness (or possibly Erie – sorry, bad pun!) and the light was especially awesome; but it was the paddle from our B&B, with a short portage across a sand bar, into Wheatley Provincial Park that delivered more herons than we have ever seen and a white wonder of egrets.





For more photos, see our Gallery (Essex County – Ontario)!

Nearer to home, from our local beach, a sunset paddle along the shores of Lake Ontario below the Hunt Club amazed us again that we can live in a city yet, with very little effort, feel so far away from it all! And the return view of the down-town lit red and gold still takes my breath away.