Wheaton Herald Reports on Little Churchill Canoe Trip [return to News]
October 12, 1999 Wheaton Herald
Wheaton teen takes 300-mile canoe trip
Click here to read the trip log
While
many of us love nature, the great outdoors and wildlife — few of us have the
opportunity to immerse ourselves in it.
Nick
Anderson, 16, of Wheaton has the love, the energy, the stamina and the luck to
do just that. This born fisherman and avid wildlife photographer positively
glows when he relates his adventures, according to his mother, Heidi, and Terry,
his greatest supporter, kindred spirit and father.
For
six years, Nick has been spending at least one month of his summer at Camp
Chippewa, a small, private boy’s camp near Bemidji, Minnesota. This year was
different and the culmination of all the previous years. After progressing
though the ranks and completing more challenging wilderness experiences each
year, Nick was more than ready for his 300-mile journey by canoe from Manitoba
to Hudson Bay accompanied by nine other campers and two counselors. They spent
15 of the 19 days of the trip paddling, two to a canoe, for 13 hours a day.
“We
awoke at 5:15 a.m. for a quick breakfast, cleaned up the campsite and were
paddling by 5:30 each morning,” he said. “A toothbrush break came at 6 a.m.,
followed by more paddling until 12:30 when we took a half-hour peanut butter and
gorp break. Then back to the canoes until 6 p.m. or until we hit our
campsite.”
The
group paddled glassy lakes, maneuvered rapids and often cleared brush and
vegetation to make a campsite at day’s end.
“When
our journey began, the landscape was picture-postcard Canada with pines and
rocky outcroppings,” Nick said. “We would go to sleep at night and look up
at the sky only to see stars. There just weren’t any blank spots, it was all
stars.”
As
they continued their trek northward, the land flattened out and they encountered
smaller trees and more marshland.
“At
the end of the trip, we heard birds singing all night long because we were so
far north it never really got dark.”
The
diverse landscape allowed the group to see more than 200 different species of
birds including bald eagles and snow geese.
“Because
of the time of year we went, every bird we saw had baby birds with it and we
were oftentimes mobbed by mother birds who felt we were getting too close to
their fledglings in our canoes.”
In
addition to the birds, stars and diverse plant life, there were moose, fish,
seals, the prospect of caribou and polar bears and an encounter with beluga
whales.
“When
we hit Hudson Bay, we went to the Prince of Wales Fort that was amazing in and
of itself,” he said. “But in the distance, we could see hundreds of beluga
whales. Then when it came time for us to go back to paddling, we were literally
in the middle of them. They were at times not more than 3 feet from our canoes.
The adults were 20 feet long and pure white, and their babies were dark gray and
10 feet long. It was scary and incredible.”
Nick
has a ton of photographs and a lifetime of memories and an even greater
assurance that somehow, in some way he wants to make this kind of adventure part
of his life.
“It
was a remarkable experience,” he said. “We stayed out in the wild, and in
many respects, had to fend for ourselves.”
Click here to read the trip log