Selwyn House School - Yearbook (Montreal, Quebec Canada)

Page 28 text:

SFLWYN HOUSE SCHOOL MAG.-XZINI-I i Un Sunday we paddled up the rest of Lac Long and made three short portages into l'etit Lac Traverse. We paddled into Grand Lac Traverse from which we portaged to Lake Sansinagog. We paddled up the latter without event except that there was a strong headwind that drove the waves up to three and four feet. We then made two short portages into a little lake called Lac Trap, from which we went on to Kempt Lake, the one on which the Post is situated. We camped there on Monday night, which endedithe fourth day of bad weather. On Tuesday morning we started up Kempt Lake against another very strong head- wind. About noon we stopped on a point where we had some chocolate and then started across the Baie de Poste, a huge windswept bay with Manowan seven or eight miles ahead of us. We arrived there at live o'clock, and, needless to say, I appreciated a real bed that night and a chance to dry my clothes and myself. We stayed in the Visitors' Lodge for the rest of the day, standing around the stove and keeping as hor as we possibly could. It is surprising how wonderful heat feels after being cold and wet over a period of days. The next morning we spent quite a time in the store, a building with all sorts of supplies for the Indians to trade for. A sack of Hour for the skin of some animal and so on. I bought a pair of moosehide moccasins, some mitts of the same stuff, and a pair of long woollen socks, all for amazingly low prices. After that we crossed the lake to the Indian village, a collection of small, squalid huts, each housing perhaps, a family of ten. There was a Catholic priest living there, and a new church was being built by some Indian work- men. W'e took pictures of some Indian boys, and on the way down to our canoes as we were leaving to go back across the lake, one of them tried to take my diary out of my back pocket. The morning had been fine, but, just our luck, it began to cloud over again about four as we started orf on our return journey. The Baie de Poste was much calmer than the hrst time we had crossed it, and what waves there were, were behind us. From Kempt Lake we reached Lake Sansinagog by way of Lac Morealis, a small and rather uninteresting body of water with thick bush around the edges. We camped that night on a windy point where we had stopped for some chocolate on the way up. Mr. Greenlees and Mr. Doak cooked some pudding that night with the remains of the bread, and it seemed to be about the best pudding that I had ever tasted. From then until the end of the trip we used biscuit which we had bought at the Post as a substitute for bread. df 292 Pk The next day was Friday, and as we intended to make the island in Lac Long that day, we tried to start early, but that didn't work. Somehow we never seemed to be able to break camp before ten-thirty or eleven o'clock. We stopped for a meal at the beginning of Lac Traverse and unfortunately stayed there too long, the result being that we had to make the three portages to Lac Long in semi-darkness, and when we reached the island it was as black as pitch. l26l

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FOR THE SCHOOL YEAR I9-f24l9-13 The next morning we saw two men paddling towards the island. As they neared us we concluded that they must be fire-rangers, as they had the words St. Maurice Forest Protective .Association painted on the bow of their canoe. They stopped and told us that they were from St. Michel and were going to the fire-tower overlooking Lac Traverse. VVe offered them some tea and had quite a chat while they were drinking it. Mr. Greenlees did most of the talking as it was all in French, but we all could pick up the general meaning of the conversation. is Ik as After they had left, we paddled about half the remainder of Lac Long and made several portages to Lac Clair. YYhen we came to the end of the last portage we found a marvellous raspberry patch so we ate heartily for fifteen minutes when Mr. Doak an- nounced that it was time to get going . We were in a long inlet of Lac Clair so we paddled to a point at which we stopped to have a look at the lake. There was a gale blowing directly in our faces and, as it was getting late, we decided to camp there. The next morning, to our great surprise, the whole lake was as smooth as the pro- verbial mill-pond. Vfe paddled the length of Lac Clair before noon, some twelve miles, to the headwaters of the Post river, where there was a fire-rangers' depot at which we stopped with the purpose of buying some oatmeal. It began to drizzle as we started down the Post, which kept up all day. VVe made two portages at the beginning and from then on we shot rapids, during the process of which I was quite thrilled, never having done it before in my life. We intended to make Camp Salle, an old lumber-iacks, camp fairly near the mouth of the Post. As we came to the last rapids before reaching it, we in our canoe had a little argument to decide whether we should shoot them or not. We finally decided that we should, and, being very fast ones, we did virtually shoot down. After we had gone about two-thirds of the way however, the canoe struck a big rock just under the surface. It must have been a smooth one, for, as we discovered after collecting our wits, there was no gaping hole in the bottom of the canoe that I had had visions of. Anyhow, the shock had tipped us, and we found ourselves clinging to the upturned canoe and being swept down the rapids at an incredibly rapid speed, all the while our legs hitting the rocks underneath. We finally reached calm water and made a short portage to Camp Salle. That night Arthur and I slept in the same sleeping-bag. The next day was IlOt such foul weather and we made the last two portages down the Post into Lac Toro and paddled the length of that without event, and arrived in St. Michel at about nine o'clock. We slept in the hay-loft again that night, and arose the next morning at six, had breakfast at the Manowan Hotel and left in the bus at seven. VYhen we arrived in Camp all the little boys crowded round us asking all sorts of questions, to which we replied, Go away . By the end of the day they had exhausted their supply of questions and got no answers, so that the next day our presence in Camp was taken as a matter of course. So ended our canoe trip. G. YY. L., Form 6. l 27 l