I Love Paddling

Christopher Bell, a Jamestown, New York-based folk musician, is using a canoe to travel from gig to gig on his six-week, 11 engagment tour of his home state.  The 22-year-old “canoebadour” pushed off into the Niagara River yesterday with plans to finish his tour in New York City on September 4.  Bell intends to cross the state from west to […]

Duluth’s Northland’s Newscenter television stations have begun broadcasting a series of stories on the effects of the 1978 Boundary Waters Act on the city of Ely, Minnesota, one of the gateway communities to the million acre wilderness area.  Three decades after legislation created the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, hard feelings still exist between locals, […]

William Hafford and Eileen McCue recently paddled the length of the Northern Forest Canoe Trail in a wood-canvas canoe Hafford built himself. The recent college graduates completed the 741 mile trip in 51 days. The Kennebec Journal of Maine recently published THIS story about the pair. “It’s a very powerful thing (being in a boat […]

Minnesota’s Mankato Free Press recently introduced its readers, HERE, to Joe Michel, a local resident who has spent thousands of hours paddling the nearby Minnesota River. The 72-year-old retired electrician has paddled rivers in more than a dozen states, but prefers the one he grew up on and still lives along. ““I like the peacefulness, […]

The 2008 Thompson Bridgade canoe flotilla is set tomorrow to complete its 2,200-mile, 63-day trip from Rocky Mountain House, Alberta to Thunder Bay, Ontario. An armada of 11 north canoes paddled by 150 hardy travelers plans to land at historic Fort William at 2:00 p.m. CKPR radio of Thunder Bay has THIS story about the […]

North America’s longest non-stop canoe race seems to be getting more popular. The 2008 Weyerhaeuser AuSable River Canoe Marathon, scheduled for July 26 and 27 currently lists 72 entrants. THIS story in the Gaylord Herald Times reports that the 68 entrants registered after the July 4th holiday was ahead of pace for a record field […]

The Vancouver Sun just posted THIS story to commemorate Simon Fraser’s 1808 canoe journey from Fort George, British Columbia (now Prince George) to the mouth of what is now the Fraser River. Working for the North West Company, Faser was charged with exploring travel routes and establishing posts in the Canadian Northwest in the wake […]

We enjoyed THIS recent photo and story in the Minneapolis Star Tribune about the canoe Harry Mixer courted his wife Delores in back in the 1940s. Paddles down the St. Croix River in a 1917 Old Town canoe with a wind-up record player did the trick.