Canoeing Labrador’s Notakwanon River

 

•Carolina Paddler brings you Paul Ferguson’s telling of a trip he and three companions made on one of Canada’s premier wilderness whitewater rivers.  Their expedition involved over three weeks of travel and nearly continuous whitewater while on the river.  Carolina Paddler previously posted the initial Notakwanon invitation Paul sent to prospective paddlers.  This report is the realization of that invitation.

An edited version of this article appeared in the Kanawa magazine, August/September/October 1997 edition.

Canoeing Labrador’s Notakwanon River

by Paul Ferguson

November 28, 1995

Table Of Contents

• The Idea   
• Trip Planning    
• Area Map   
• Long Drive North 
• Flying In  
• Crossing Lakes   
• To The Big Falls 
• Portaging The Falls   
• Endless Rapids   
• Beached By Wind  
• Last Big Rapids  
• Into Tidewater   
• Cabin On The Bay 
• Sea Paddling     
• Davis Inlet
• Notakwanon River Profile  

The Idea

The seed for this canoe trip was sown by “Labrador’s Unknown River,” written by James West Davidson and John Rugge, in the April, 1977 issue of Canoe magazine:

    This is a trip that begins with a vow of silence. Harry Collins had just emerged from what he claimed was the most enjoyable wilderness river he had ever paddled. Since Harry worked for an unusual survey team of young Canadians who for the past five summers have done nothing but run wilderness river after wilderness river for Canada’s Department of Parks, we had good reason to be impressed with his testimonial.

    As it turned out, Harry gave us what we’d long been looking for: the archtypical wilderness river. The river flows through country uninhabited since the Indians abandoned it some two generations ago. It begins in an unnamed lake in the barrens and descends through a canyon 1,000 feet deep to an isolated stretch of ocean coast a couple dozen miles from the nearest settlement, itself an Indian village. The highlands are caribou calving grounds. Rapids drop up to one hundred feet a mile and remain runnable in open loaded boats.

James West Davidson and John Rugge also wrote “The Complete Wilderness Paddler.”  This book inspired a group of us to take a wilderness trip to Labrador’s border in 1978 on the Romaine River. Davidson and Rugge’s recommendation, along with the Canadian river survey team, moved this river to the top of my list.

Although they did not reveal the name of their number-one-rated wilderness river, they left many clues, and it did not take long, with the help of a map, to point to the Notakwanon.

I knew of two groups of paddlers who organized trips to the Notakwanon (pronounced No TAK Wa Non) in the early 1980’s. Neither group got to paddle it. Extended bad weather stymied the first group, and the bush planes could not fly. The second group planned a route to avoid flying in by getting a tow across a reservoir and paddling across watersheds into the Notakwanon, but their guide on the big reservoir could not find the correct outlet.

Over the years, I frequently thought about doing a trip on the Notakwanon. Running continuous class 3 rapids with few portages was very attractive. Many paddlers love to play for hours on only a few miles of river, but my personal nirvana comes from running downriver mile after mile with constantly changing rapids in unspoiled wilderness.

There should have been a lot of time to plan since I had wanted to do this trip for many years, but there wasn’t. The idea sprouted in April, and August seemed to be the best month to go. Water should be low, too early for snow, and just maybe there would not be as many mosquitoes and black flies as during early summer.

Trip Planning

The trip is really going to happen. It is only eight weeks until we leave. A note arrives in the mail from Russell Goin:

Howdy Paul,

    Exciting thoughts of returning to Labrador. Sitting around watching, cursing the cloud cover. Swarms of skeeters, hordes of black flies biting your bare butt flashing in the wilderness. Fears of washing over waterfalls, dashed to shreds upon Labrador seaside rocky cliffs. Slaughtered by drunk, drug happy natives.

    It is good to know that age has not diluted the thrill of setting down to an unknown lake with nothing between you and your next pizza but miles of beautiful wilderness river.

    I was checking my camping junk, and I have a very good grate for the fire. Have a big coffee pot. My first aid kit has been pretty much decimated, but it could be rebuilt if necessary.

    For supper time I would be willing to fix a large pan-fried bread. This is for whether we do group or individual suppers. I did it on the Yukon trip, and it was well received. If we are going to do group meals, I definitely have some input to offer. Talk to you soon.   Russell

The plan: drive to Goose Bay, charter a float plane, land on a headwaters lake, paddle one hundred miles down to the Labrador sea, then paddle thirty miles along the sea to the Indian settlement of Davis Inlet. Paddling the sea offered some problems we do not usually face on river trips. The Labrador currents are cold, tides are six feet, and wind could turn our route into a sea of whitecaps. Although the coast is rocky, there would be islands along our route offering some protection. However, we have no information about camping on the islands other than the maps showing them to be very steep.

It is only in recent years that a road connects all the way through to Goose Bay. From Baie Comeau on the Saint Lawrence it is seven hundred miles of mostly gravel road to Goose Bay. The road from Labrador City to Goose Bay is known as the Trans Labrador Highway. Calling this a highway is grossly overstated – it is gravel and the last one hundred-eighty miles is very rough, taking eight hours to drive. Before the roads were opened, Labrador was only accessible by several day ferry rides. Driving all the way will save time and allow us independence from ferry schedules.

Russell tells me he has heard of problems in Davis Inlet, and I find articles in the library to confirm it. If we survive the river, will we meet disaster in Davis Inlet? Here is an excerpt from Maclean’s magazine:

    Davis Inlet stands as the bleakest possible demonstration of what happens when aboriginal and white cultures collide head on. By anyone’s definition, the community of 500 is a frozen hell on earth where drug abuse, alcoholism, sexual abuse of children, suicide and domestic violence run unchecked. It is hard to imagine anything being more of a mistake than Davis Inlet. Warm weather turns the soil to muck and defrosts the piles of garbage and human waste outside the small, sparsely furnished homes where as many as a dozen people live without sewage systems or running water.

I start the logistics by calling bush pilots to get price estimates. I prefer to paddle solo because it allows running more whitewater, but solo drives up the price of a trip – the small bush planes carry only one or two canoes at a time. I hope to find a pilot who will take two canoes and two paddlers on a single-engine Beaver airplane. It looks hopeful, but the information I get on number of canoes and weight carrying capacity seems to change with each call. There is some mix of pilot experience, company policy, government regulation, and financial incentive affecting this, and the mix eludes me. The best options are a twin-engine Otter or Cessna. The twin Otter has plenty of weight carrying capacity, but it can take only three canoes, carried inside the plane. It is possible to take more canoes only if they nest together. The Cessna can carry one canoe, strapped above a pontoon, and one paddler plus gear.

 Trip proposals go to people I have paddled with on previous wilderness trips. With eight weeks left before the trip, three others decide to go – Russell Goin, Larry Gross, and Cleo Smith. We will each paddle solo. I will take a Mad River Explorer, Cleo a Perception sixteen footer, each equipped with a sprayskirt. Larry and Russell will take Sunburst IIs.

I send out copies of the topographical maps and a distance versus elevation chart (at the end of this article.) Everyone’s comments are along the same line – how can such a steep river have only one portage? The river is one hundred miles long, but thirty miles are almost flat. The entire 1500 feet of drop occurs in the first seventy river miles, and maps show forty miles with a gradient of thirty to seventy feet per mile. If there aren’t many portages, the drop will have to be nearly continuous to avoid many big falls or ledges.

The final planning is hectic. Weighing gear, packing group equipment, food, medical kit, and seemingly a thousand other things make the days go quickly. We will have group dinner, but individual breakfast and lunch. I plan for fourteen days on the water including several days for bad weather at sea. For an extra margin of safety, I pack sixteen dinners.

We decide to drive two vans to Goose Bay because we want backup in case of breakdown. The drive will take three days, stopping to sleep six hours a night. I want to have a day in Goose Bay to rest and get ready to fly, but the plane is booked requiring us to schedule a flight eight hours after we arrive.

A few days before leaving, I get a call from Cleo saying he has broken his thumb, but he thinks he can still paddle with a removable cast. The day before leaving, I am paddling in a canoe race and get a fish hook in my scalp when I pass under an overhanging branch. It is only ten hours before leaving, and I am in an emergency room having the fish hook removed and getting a tetanus shot. Are these warning signs of the way the trip will go?

Long Drive North

Cleo and I drive north from Raleigh, North Carolina and meet Larry and Russell in Virginia. We caravan using CB radios to talk between vans. In upstate New York, Larry’s van blows a water pump. We camp at a service station and get a new pump by noon the next day. We are back on the road with no time to sleep until we arrive in Goose Bay.

We reach the turn to Labrador just before daybreak. Larry’s van will not start after a gas stop. Eight arms probe under the hood, and we find a bad connection in the battery cable. On the road to Labrador, we see a sign at the entrance saying the road is closed. I do not believe it (or do not want to believe it) and continue. It is paved here but very winding. Cleo turns a slight shade of green, but there are no motion sickness pills in the medical kit. I am thinking about the “road closed” sign. If it is true, we have a very large problem. After driving an hour, I use an emergency telephone box where I am connected to a guy running the hydro plant. I ask about the sign, and he says the road is open – the sign flashes when the road is closed in the winter. I thank him for the good news, and it is on with the roller coaster ride.

The road trip becomes a blur of miles and stops for gas and food. What day is it now? We remember things by where we ate or where we had van trouble. We stagger into a restaurant for breakfast and coffee. The staff speak only French, so we do a lot of pointing. The road turns to gravel, but it is good going – we can do forty-five miles per hour.

We reach Churchill Falls, the start of the worst section of the Trans Labrador Highway with no gas or services for almost two hundred miles. We gas up, and I ask the guy in the last-chance service station about Goose Bay. He says we can expect to average only twenty-five miles per hour, and he adds, “It is not the end of the earth, but you can see it from there.” We will be in Goose Bay at three a.m. with a ten-thirty flight time. Aren’t vacations supposed to be restful and relaxing?

The road proves to be worse than I thought. Dust streams behind our van as we bounce and rattle along. It is like a two hundred mile West Virginia shuttle road. I go over a mound and into a deep rut. I radio back to Larry and Russell to be careful of the ski jump. I do not see any car parts behind me, and Larry navigates the hazard safely.

Flying In

We arrive at Goose Bay and grab a few hours sleep. We know we can fly three canoes, all paddlers, and gear in a twin-engine Otter, but I hope to squeeze in four canoes. I call the Cessna pilot who is scheduled to fly our fourth canoe. His wife says he will be delayed until after lunch, but to “leave your canoe on the dock, and he will come and fly it to you. He will find out where you were dropped off.” Great plan if he does not come, we get to sit at our put-in and wait and wonder – for how long?

Air Labrador says the weather is good. We weigh all our gear and the crew starts trying to jam four canoes into the twin-Otter. Three canoes fit nicely, but the fourth eliminates any clearance for passenger seats. The pilot says he does not have any more flights today, so we should take our time and disassemble the canoes to nest them together. That is the only way they might fit; however, it does not look like they will nest well. Larry insists we try it. A Sunburst fits in my boat when my seats, thwarts, end plates, and paddling block are removed. The other Sunburst does not nest well into Cleo’s boat because it is a bit smaller than mine, but we are now able to push all canoes in and still have four seats.

The plane takes-off and it is obvious this twin-Otter has power to spare. The scenery is a maze of lakes and rivers. We check a large scale map trying to determine where we are as we fly, but the map is not adequate.

It is fortunate we got all canoes into the Otter. I had called the Cessna pilot many times over the past few months. A week before we left, he changed the price by adding a canoe strap-on charge in addition to a per-mile charge for the canoe. I reminded him that he had never mentioned this charge, and it did not seem fair since he had neglected to tell me. We discussed the price several times. His reply was, “You should have known because this is standard. You don’t have to fly with me.” He was right – I didn’t have to fly with him after all.

Our pilot reaches the put-in lake and dives for the water. He knows what he is doing. The plane stops quickly and the copilot hops out and anchors the plane on a large island. We unload all the gear, and ask the pilot to show us where we are because we did not get a view of the river during our flight. The river is eight miles away through a maze of small lakes. We wave good-bye as the plane flies over us, and it is the “moment of truth,” when you know you are really committed to the trip. We expect to see no one until we hit the sea.

Camp is on the windward side of the island, thwarting the mosquitoes and black flies. It is only two-thirty; but we cannot paddle because we need to put the canoes together, glue-in paddling-blocks, and get some rest from our long drive and nights of little sleep.

We cook over a wood fire, and Russell’s fresh-made bread is very good. Tonight our appetites seem small, and there is plenty of spaghetti left. We are tired more from lack of sleep than hard work.

Crossing Lakes

At our first camp breakfast, Russell makes a very troubling discovery. Larvae are in his oatmeal and float to the surface of the boiling water. He keeps looking at the mess while muttering, “Oh yuck!” He digs into his gear and dumps out a mound of oatmeal packs. Instead of pitching all the packs into the fire, he decides to carry them down the river and burn some every few days. This gives him the pleasure of killing the larvae, but leaves the option to eat the oatmeal if food becomes scarce.

There is still wind at our backs. We load our canoes for the first time. I notice everyone has Norse paddles. There are no graphite or wooden masterpieces here. Just big paddles that are relatively heavy and very difficult to damage. It’s a sign of a group of guys who started paddling twenty years ago and have not kept up with equipment trends.

We cross several lakes, arriving at some rapids which connect to another series of lakes. It is our first test of paddling our boats in rapids with full gear. The channels are narrow and the water fast. I had heard water on the northern Labrador rivers was low, but it certainly does not seem low now. Russell does not appear as we wait below the last rapid. He finally comes and says he took a lot of water over the bow. This is supposed to be the easy stuff!

 Russell and I have our map and compass out as we paddle through lake after lake and around islands. The small waves and wind make it difficult to go anywhere except downwind. The eerie call of a loon sounds over the wind, and we see it swim away with its babies as we approach.

At lunch on an island, we lie in the sun and have the usual discussion about exactly where we are. It should not be so hard to know, but with the fierce wind we have not been able to spend as much time as we would like watching our position on the maps. There is no detectable river current anywhere because the water is being blown about. The consensus is we should fight the wind and go back a few hundred yards to get to a channel farther right.

We keep working right, but seem to be running out of water. Several times we have to turn back. I curse the wind that has helped push me here. We arrive in another dead- end channel. It is time to scout for the river on foot. We go up a small hill, but there is no river. After a half-mile walk to a higher hill, we finally see our river. We have driven too far right and missed the main channel. It is not obvious how to get back to the main channel, but we see a cut leading to the river that will probably require dragging the boats. It seems too late to try it today.

One of our few rules is the “five o’clock rule”: we must get off the river by five. This prevents a search into the night for the perfect campsite or the urge to make just one more mile. The rule is invoked as we look for a camp nearby. We paddle a quarter-mile up wind to a high island where there is firewood and protection from the gusts.

To The Big Falls

We get up early and check the wind. It is down a bit, and we do not have far to paddle before we are into the shelter of the cut leading to the river. We find about half of the route can be paddled at this water level, but the rest requires pushing, pulling, and bucking our canoes over rocks. Finally, we come into the river. Current and deep water! We ride downriver on constant class 2 and 3 rapids for miles.

We know there is a hundred foot falls ahead of us. At each turn we look for it, and make sure we can see our next eddy. Suddenly, we are close. The landscape in the next half-mile drops away rapidly, and tall white spruce tree tops disappear. Larry pulls over on the right bank and the rest of us go to the left. Walking the banks is typical of Labrador: big boulders along the bank and boulders covered with caribou moss in the woods. It is a few hundred yards down to the falls. Black flies are swarming in the woods. Where is that wind when you need it? The left bank does not look like a good route for a portage, unless you go far into the woods to reach higher ground.

The falls take a ninety-degree turn to the right in a small drop, then another ninety degree turn to the left to go over the big drop. The water splits into two channels. From here the river runs down a steep, walled canyon for a half-mile and then abruptly turns right. The rapids below the falls are class 2-3, but we do not know what is waiting around the bend. The usual portage is from a quarter-mile above the falls on the right, up to the ridge and down to the point where the canyon turns right – about a mile and a half total.

Larry finds a steep slot in the rock wall on the right bank upstream of the falls, dropping down to a pool. The pool is just upstream of the bottom of the falls where water comes in when the river is in flood stage. It appears we can lower boats and equipment down the slot using our rescue ropes.

Our boats are a quarter-mile above the falls so we scout the rapids to see how close we can get. There are a few larger drops and holes, and the penalty for a mistake would be disastrous. Larry finds a way to avoid the worst of it by canoeing to an island, lining to the backside, and paddling for the right bank just above the falls.

Cleo, Russell, and I talk about the route. There is a light rain now. We do not feel comfortable committing to Larry’s route because we do not know what is around the bend at the end of the canyon. If we are going to do the long portage, it might be best to start from where we are. We decide to walk to the canyon bend and see what is around the corner.

The walk is easy, but it would be a long haul with canoe and gear. At the turn in the canyon we find only easy rapids. We get back to our boats after four o’clock and decide to pitch camp. The wind is howling, blowing the bugs away. We put two canoes sideways as wind breaks, and the gusts are moving our canoes. It is difficult to get the fire going even though we build it in a large hole. It is freezing if you do not stay out of the wind.

 Russell and I both inspect the damage the black flies have inflicted on us during the scouting. There were few of the pests, until now, due to wind; but in the heat of scouting, we forgot about exposed skin and putting on DEET. Our penalties for relaxing our guard: a line tattooed around my waist and Russell’s legs peppered above his short socks.

Portaging The Falls

We are up at six. The wind is still strong, but not like last evening. We decide to follow Larry’s route: paddle to the island, line to the backside, and paddle to the right bank above the falls. Everything goes smoothly, and we ready to make the short portage to the sloping crevice.

With two rescue ropes tied together, we have a line long enough to lower equipment. We try the first boat with the gear still inside. Russell is positioned about halfway down where he ties the boat off when it gets to him. He shouts that the boats are too heavy with gear inside. We have to lower the rest of the boats empty, then lower the gear bags.

After an hour, we are eating lunch at the pool about ten feet above the base of the falls with a beautiful view of the cascades and spraying mist. We pull our boats over the slippery rocks to the base of the falls and prepare to get back in the river. Larry paddles out and pierces the big eddy line, gets tossed about, and pulled toward the falls before he breaks free. The rest of us line our boats over the eddy border.

The big drop is behind us. We enjoy paddling down the canyon; and after paddling another mile of rapids, we come to another horizon line. I remember the quotation from the Canoe magazine article: “Only once was the pace interrupted and that by the falls.” But what is this fifteen foot drop? Maybe there was a way to run it at a different water level, but we see only high risk routes. We do an easy portage of a hundred yards on the left bank. Since we have all the gear unloaded, and the camping looks good, we set up here.

Russell is the only person packing fishing gear. He tries his luck and quickly has a monster fish jumping in the air. After a brief battle, the lunker straightens the swivel on his six-pound test line. A few minutes later he hooks another big fish, but this one is not jumping. It is bending his rod and taking lots of line. Russell plays him for thirty minutes and finally lands a two and a half foot Arctic Char. He cleans it, and we are soon eating grilled Arctic Char steaks with bread, peas, and mashed-potatoes. Fish doesn’t get any fresher.

Endless Rapid

We are late waking, but we get a fast run down the river as we paddle mile after mile of nice class 3 rapids. We keep looking for a bend where the river turns north. I had talked to a guy who ran the river a few years ago. He said after the falls, they found that where the river turned north, the rapids became difficult and caused them to spend a day or two lining boats around big rapids.

We come to a drop that has a penalty if you blow it. We line two boats and carry the others over the boulders. Soon the river swings north at a large island. It is steeper than the sections we have been running today. It is only three-fifteen, but we decide to camp on the island and scout where we will run or portage the rapid tomorrow.

Our camp is shielded from the light wind, making the bugs worse than at any of the previous campsites. I paddle out to some rocks to take a bath, but it is a very brief one because the black flies are attacking. In spite of the bugs, it is a beautiful camp with high hills all around. It is chili-mac and cheesecake supper capped off by light rain most of the night. In the morning it is still sprinkling, so I stay in my tent until seven-thirty hoping it will stop. It does not, so I crawl out of my tent and find the black flies are waiting for breakfast. Enduring rain and bug attacks in an outdoor toilet makes me question why I am here

We plan to run on the right side of our island camp, but there are two choices. Farther out is a small, narrow island with little water going behind it. The drop behind the small island looks much more even, but I cannot see very far. Cleo and I choose to line the first one hundred feet of the rapid in the big channel while Larry and Russell go behind the narrow island. Their choice is better because they find they can bump and grind over a few low spots and cut through to the channel, ahead of us. Russell notices aluminum canoe marks on some of the rocks.

Time goes quickly now as we run seven miles of class 3+ rapids. We eat lunch on a small beach where Larry builds a fire. It is still cool with a slight, misty rain. From here we do three to four miles of easy rapids with lesser gradient.

The river turns east and widens into many wide channels making the water very low as it spreads out. We have to stand in our canoes in places to find water deep enough to float. The perfect campsite search fails, but we find an acceptable one on a large gravel bar before the five o’clock rule is invoked. The landscape is big mountains all around us. It looks like a scene from the western U.S. We ran seventeen miles and dropped four hundred feet today.

Russell shows us his black fly bites. He has developed an obvious allergic reaction because the bites from days ago are still bright red, but now the size of quarters. His leg is swollen, but he decides to tough it out and avoid taking any pills from the medical kit.

Beached By Wind

We leave our gravel bar camp and pick our way down the channel with the most water. The wind starts again and blows at our backs. The force steadily increases and we are trucking now as the river channels converge into one river again.

The wind is getting wild. I am way out in front being blown like a sailboat when I come to a lake with deep water and big whitecaps. My canoe is surfing over four foot waves. The boat blows sideways, and it seems to take forever to wrestle it to point downriver.

I see whitecaps for at least a mile ahead. If someone turns over here they will be flushed down river with little chance of anyone helping. I look for the first opportunity out and start working toward the left bank. Russell and Larry are a half-mile behind and they too head for the shore as they approach me. We stand there leaning into the wind looking for Cleo. He is coming down the right side of the river, and we can only see the top of his hat when he is in the wave troughs. He heads toward the left and beaches about fifty yards below us.

We lie in the bushes and wait for the wind to subside. On the beach everything is being sandblasted. The gale seems to get a little stronger, then briefly slackens only to pick up again. We are but a mile from the end of the lake. If only we could make it into the narrow river, we could find a little protection from the wind and get away from the whitecapped lake.

It is late afternoon and five o’clock is looming. Hoping the wind will die during the night, we vote to make camp and get up early. Cooking is a challenge as the fire whips about and sparks fly toward tents. Sand, by the bucket load, gets into everything.

I go to my tent, and after a few minutes I hear Russell shout, “Northern lights!” I pop out and see columns of clouds, but the clouds suddenly move and change colors. The magic show in the sky repeats several times. At one moment, the clouds look miles away and then they seem to jump close to us and fade away.

We are up at six to get a jump on the wind. It does not work. Whitecaps are still dancing. We are on the water at eight, and it feels a bit dangerous to be paddling when my boat goes sideways. My fingers are numb from pulling to swing the boat around. Finally, it swings but due more to a momentary slacking of wind rather than my strength. The waves are big and I accelerate down them.

I reach the end of the lake and get some protection in the river gorge. While paddling the gorge, I start feeling cold from wind chill. Pulling over to the bank and changing into a dry-top is a major effort, but worth it.

Last Big Rapids

The gale keeps pushing us down the river. We pull behind a big boulder to have a sheltered lunch. We are now about sixty miles down from our put-in and not far from the last section of steep gradient, where topographical maps show a section with a drop of seventy feet per mile for a mile or two.

At the start of the first section, it does look steep, but we’re able to boat scout from eddies. There is flatwater, then another section of drops like the first. Soon, we come to a third section that is longer and steeper. There is a smooth sloping rock wall about thirty feet high near the end of the drops on river right. The wall seems to extend for a quarter- mile. Cleo and I stop on rocks on the right a hundred yards before the beginning of the wall, and Cleo goes to scout the drops. Larry comes by, walking his boat in shallow water, saying it looks better on the left side; but it is too late to get over there. He says he is being blown about by the wind and having trouble.

Cleo returns with a scouting report: the wall is difficult to walk on and paddling the water on the right side looks risky. He thinks we can ferry to the left side of the river and run on down. I look at it carefully and see a jumble of rocks in a channel one hundred feet wide with fast current and wind. It does not look good, but we go for it. The wind is blowing against us helping our ferry. The current is not as strong as it looked, and we reach the left bank with ease.

Larry is lining his boat while walking the wall. He has some trouble keeping the water out and finds the wall slippery. Cleo and I scout the left drop, and Cleo finds a chute through two rocks that avoids the big water on the right side. If we make it, we can run left of center down to the end of the rapid. Cleo gets out his camera to take a picture of my run, but sees Russell in trouble lining his boat down the edge of the wall. The boat is filling up and the slippery wall makes it difficult to do anything but hold the boat and not be pulled in. Cleo blows his whistle to get Larry’s attention. It takes Larry a moment to understand, and he comes back to help Russell wrestle the boat up.

 I run the left drop with no problems and paddle down to the end of the wall. Cleo walks back to help Russell and Larry portage packs. Cleo seems to be the only person getting good traction on the wall.

There is another section of whitewater directly below us where the river becomes very narrow for a hundred yards with big waves and holes down the center and left. Cleo scouts again and pronounces the right side to be “OK” as long as you don’t get into the center. Cleo, Larry, and I run it and get out cameras for Russell’s run. Cleo motions Russell a little to the center to avoid a rock, and Russell goes into a big hole but hangs on. Cleo swears he was not setting Russell up for a Kodak moment.

Immediately below the last rapid, we find a nice campsite where a little stream flows. There are bear and wolf tracks on the beach. Russell goes fishing again and quickly returns with a salmon and three trout, each about a foot long. We eat another great fish dinner and watch northern lights appear about ten-thirty. We are now at an elevation of only one hundred feet.

Into Tidewater

It is next morning and we paddle a few class 2-3 rapids before dropping to an elevation of thirty feet. It is a long, flat paddle from here to our camp on a sand bar. High banks on the river sides show signs of caving in from high water and heavy rain. Russell thinks the firewood is hard to get at this site because most of it is up a bank. With a little more effort than usual, we have a big pile of wood. Fresh garlic wafts in the air as we cook red beans and rice with summer sausage.

A light rain drives us to our tents after dinner and continues during the night. We are finished with the rapids, and now my concern turns to the sea paddling we will reach after a day or two of flatwater.

Usually Larry has a fire going before seven. It is seven-thirty and only Cleo and I are up. We get a late start and paddle miles of flatwater through big bends in the river. It is still a beautiful setting. We have lunch on a very large, flat beach that looks to be a quarter-mile wide. The weather is nice, and there is a little wind. I decide to take a bath, since I missed many other opportunities due to black flies hanging around.

We fill up our five gallon water jugs here because we need to carry water for the saltwater paddle. I am sure we could go farther before we hit tidewater but not sure exactly how far.

Camp is a few miles before the river mouth at Merrifield Bay. We pitch our tents and start dinner, wondering how high the tide will get. We have tide charts showing a variation of six feet, but we don’t know if there is much delay in the tide coming up the river to our camp. Russell and Cleo plant sticks in the sand in a contest to see who can predict where the high water mark will be.

The sticks go under as water keeps coming in, and we move our boats up higher, and start worrying about it reaching our tents. Russell pulls his canoe into the bushes, ten feet above the river level, and looks for a higher tent site. He is leveling out a spot in the sand as high as you can go up the bank before the bushes. As I am looking for a better site, Russell says I can have his new spot because he is going up into the bushes looking for an even higher camp.

Finally the water reaches its highest point only a foot or so from our campfire. Our tents are safe.

Cabin On The Bay

 I wake up to a light wind and thoughts of sea paddling. During breakfast, we hear a shotgun from a duck hunter about a half-mile away. He comes toward us, and we see an Indian family in a freighter canoe powered by an outboard motor. Roland Dicker from Davis Inlet steps ashore to greet us. He has a cabin a few miles away, and he is on a weekend outing up the river to camp and hunt. A cool drizzle is falling and the wind is picking up. Three kids wear woolen ponchos and seem to not notice the bad weather.

 Roland tells us the bay has big waves. He looks our canoes over, and says we should stay where we are because better weather is coming tomorrow. I tell him we want to move to the mouth and will stop there. He says campsites are good, and we can stay in the backyard of his cabin if we want.

I ask how many groups they have seen coming down this river. His wife says about one group a year comes down, and we are the only group this year.

Roland says there is a “rattle” straight ahead. A rattle is a small outlet to a large bay where moderate tides can push through fast, breaking currents. I show him the course we plan for paddling to Davis Inlet. He says it is a good one, and we will find camping fine at many of the mountainous islands. They are not all steep near the sea. We thank them and start for the bay.

As I paddle around a bend, the wind is much stronger. We want to hug the right bank, but we cannot because the tide is going out and sand bars are being exposed. We keep getting forced left to find deeper water. It is a tiring, cold paddle as we fight the wind and choppy water. As we come to the mouth of the bay, a mile and a half wide, we see a cabin on a high point. We paddle for it to stop and survey the open water conditions.

When we stop and begin walking up to the cabin, Russell and I notice how cold we are. Paddling hard has been warming us, but now the wind saps our heat. The cabin is littered outside with trash, and there is a sign scrawled on the door:

Inside it is only one room with an old wood stove and a bunk bed without mattresses. We get the stove going and soon the room is warm. Through the window we see a windblown sea with the tide getting lower, exposing more sand bars.

The sea beyond does not look too bad, but it is rainy, windy, and cold. This cabin is very comfortable. We eat lunch and talk about whether to paddle on or stay the night in our little hotel on the point. We remember Roland’s words about better weather tomorrow, and we all vote to stay put.

 It is warm all night, but four guys confined to one room can give you cabin-fever. I miss the freedom of pitching my tent where I can snore and not be bothered by the cacophony of others.

Sea Paddling

We leave our cabin and find Roland was right about the weather – the sea is flat. We had planned to hug the islands and avoid the couple mile expanses of open water, but it is so calm we paddle a straight line course. Seals pop their heads out of water to observe us. Jellyfish float past us, and kelp-like plants and many sea urchins are in the clear water. I find looking down into the transparent sea as I paddle makes me feel as if I am losing orientation and falling.

Russell and I had talked about going all the way to Davis Inlet today if possible. It is about twenty-five miles. We thought we might make it to a specific island for lunch. It is almost two when we get there and I know we cannot make Davis Inlet tonight without paddling very late.

We have read about the Daniel rattle, a narrow channel behind the island that Davis Inlet is on. Davidson and Rugge said they paddled far above the opening to avoid the strange currents. Our camp is on an island across the bay from the rattle. The ground is rock, covered with a thick caribou moss that feels very spongy. Larry and Russell hike up the hill where the top looks to be seven hundred feet high.

A motorboat comes by with some Indians from Davis Inlet. They stop to talk, and I ask one about going through Daniel rattle. He said it would be “OK” but did not know what it is like to come through a second rattle just south of Davis Inlet. We are interested in the possibility because the Daniel Rattle route would shield us from wind and having to go around a point exposed to open sea. His information does not seem very reliable.

I tell them we met Roland Dicker and his wife. They say the woman is his friend, Katie Rich, chief of the village. I now remember reading a magazine interview with her when I was researching conditions in Davis Inlet. The article mentioned arguments she and Roland have because he does not want her to carry all the tribes’ burdens.

They ask where we started but do not seem to recognize the Notakwanon River. I think this is odd, and Roland did not seem to recognize the name either, even though he was going up the river to camp. Maybe they just do not know river names, but later someone tells us the Indian pronunciation is something more like Not-a-kwan. This was probably why they did not recognize our No-tak-wa-non. The name is an Indian word meaning “river where the porcupines live.”

During the night, Cleo hears a loud noise that he thinks is the heavy breathing of a bear. Cleo scans the woods and realizes the noise is coming from the water where a whale is swimming by.

We get on the water early because it is calm, and there are smooth seas for an hour before we notice fog rapidly moving in from a few miles away. The wind picks up quickly, and we are surfing over waves and staying near shore trying to avoid being bashed on the rocks jutting out of the water. The waves get bigger, and we all head to shore.

 At lunch, we talk about what to do. Russell wants to go on, and I understand why he wants to make Davis Inlet today. We have no clue as to how long the wind will last. Will it get worse? Could we be stranded here for a week? As I look out to sea and watch the whitecaps, it soon becomes apparent the wind has slackened. We get back in our boats. Rounding the point of the island a few miles away, we find the tide pulling us, and we have to fight hard to keep from being pulled toward the sea.

Davis Inlet

We arrive at Davis Inlet wharf just after five. I ask an Indian where we can talk to Air Labrador. Our reservations are not until two days from now because we have not used up all of our buffer days. The office is back in the little metal hut serving as an air terminal near the airstrip we paddled by. The Indian tells us the woman who works at the airport lives in a house on the hill. As we walk toward the house, many Indians are getting around on four-wheel all terrain-vehicles (ATVs)

 The woman has gotten word we were coming, and she rides her ATV to meet us. She says there are flights at eight-thirty and one-thirty. They are full, but we can try standby if we have our gear ready to go at eight. It is best to camp near the airstrip on the beach.

 We paddle back to the airstrip and set up camp. Larry is eager to get out of Davis Inlet as soon as possible. He has heard the stories of trouble here and has bad vibes about the village.We cook dinner and pack our equipment. A very heavy dew comes in wetting all the gear. Fog surrounds the islands offshore as we are treated to a beautiful sunset and night fog scene.

The next morning, we portage all gear to the air building. The canoes and most gear need to be put on a freight flight, but we can go on a scheduled passenger flight with forty pounds of baggage each. There is no room on the plane. I call Air Labrador in Goose Bay, and they say they will see about sending some freight up North in a twin-Otter, picking us up on the way back. If we dismantle the canoes to nest, we can ride in the plane with our gear to Goose Bay later this afternoon.

The local hospital allows us to take a very welcome shower. We inspect the town and its little general store. We greet Roland Dicker who is hauling a mattress to the school. He tells us that it was not his cabin we camped in. His cabin is a few miles farther down the bay.

 The plane arrives about five. We load, but it takes a while for the pilots to be satisfied that the gear is secure and there is clearance for our four seats.

 I think about Harry Collins, of the Canadian river survey team, saying this was the most enjoyable wilderness river he had ever paddled. It has been almost twenty years since his trip, but the river has not changed. I can now testify to its remoteness, unspoiled wilderness, clear water, canyons, waterfalls, endless rapids, and rugged coastline.

We head to Goose Bay, and the Notakwanon falls away behind us – another river down, but a difficult one to top.