KILLARNEY

Gustav A. Richar KILLARNEY Travels to, in, and around the Wilderness Park For twenty years my wife and I have paddled aboard our canoe Matonabee through the island world of the northern Georgian Bay. Once we voyaged along these islands for thirty days—without reprovisioning. During these twenty years we have also hiked all trails in the area and are hiking to The Crack at least three times annually. These essays, a compilation of our experience on water and land, reflect our enjoyments which Nature is offering us. Here are a few excerpts from these essays: Through a troughway we slid the canoe into the openness of the Bay to face Point Grondine. Never boring, the great lake, at times terrifying and deluding, slumbered in glass, mirror, and silk. The flat, broken granite islets and plates were buried tuning forks that would sound in a heavy swell. Here, where we were now standing amid and atop the stone slabs, soaking up the early sun, where our reflections were as pure as air, where our long shadows pointed west, we could only imagine the crescendo and diminuendos of the breakers’ roar, screams, and yammers. [From To Killarney] . . . to stay with the sunshine by vigorously swinging our paddles. Suddenly the wind switched, blew from the north, and the cloud shadow overtook us and hastened across the Bay. Fat drops hit us and shot into the water around us. We headed to a nearby island which had a slowly rising, slippery shore where we struggled to land. Standing on shore, we glanced north to the onrushing storm that stalked on lightning bolts towards us like a black widow on glowing legs. No doubt, in the vastness of water and flat islands, we were lightning rods. Since neither of us wanted to be electrocuted, we quickly dumped our bags, buckets, and sacks onto the shore. Four steps from the water's edge, along a metre-high rock ridge, we flipped over the canoe. The storm brawled towards us with agitated speed and power. Thick drops pelted me. Rike, already sitting under the canoe, urged me to stretch the tarp over our two aged travel bags. Knowing that water would penetrate the permeable material of our bags, I also knew that all items inside were packed in plastic bags. I grabbed Rike's small backpack, which contained all her personal gear, and pushed it in beside her. Then, like a scared woodchuck, I crawled under the canoe. Often during a thunderstorm we had sat under the canoe, evaluated the storm's ferocity, severity, and duration, held our breaths when lightning and thunder almost twinned, and then exhaled, grinned—relieved . . . we, denizens of the wild. But this time I could not sit under the canoe. Insufficient headroom. I lay on my left side, one seat cushion under my hip, another under my elbow. A strenuous position. Still, we were happy to have a roof over us. I knew that Rike sat close to my feet, but I could see neither her nor the outside world. In front of my eyes was the inside skin of the canoe across which a small spider walked, and, if I glanced down, I saw the gunwale resting on the rock. Suddenly the wait and the moments of gazing ended. The opening gusts of the storm tried to lift the canoe. In our dark capsule we held onto the seats, kept the canoe on the ground. Along the edge, where the straight gunwale rested on the fissured rock, a bright light flickered, which must have been the reflection from a curtain of lightning. Thunder exploded around us, resounded under the canoe as if a battery of ancient timpani drummed in fortissimo. It did not rain; it bucketed. Hail drummed an inferno of fear on the canoe. Rain gushed off the rock ridge behind us and ran under the canoe towards the lake; the Bay's waves licked ferociously against the gunwale. The din pained our ears. Oddly, I would have felt much more secure, had I seen the lighting. [From To The Chickens — Rike] Here, at the shore of Little Mountain Lake, a tarn carved out of bedrock by the retreating glacier some ten-thousand years ago, and now surrounded by a chain of hill tops, sunset came early. Nothing stirred in the hemlocks, firs, and pine stacked to the rim of the cauldron. Linda and Nestor sat in a rock nook on the shore and leaned against the quartzite. Stillness surrounded and moved them. A raven called in a haunting but longing way, deepening the silence. [From Trekking La Cloche Silhouette Trail] Nature's harmony, quietude, and relentlessness floated down the slopes, soared over lakes and swamps, tree tops and bushes, cattails and ferns—stretched, rested, and slumbered along the islands of the shore, across the water, and beyond the Bay. Shadows of clouds sailed over the blue and silver-scaled liquidity. Does one have to long for solitude and loneliness or must one already love them? Regardless, he enjoyed sitting there, watching the day move above the land. [From Views from Silver Peak] We were setting up our camp when the cloud cover moved southwards like a lid sliding from a pot. Obviously a cold front was clearing the sky, leaving behind the evening sky where stars soon appeared. Behind the campsite, in a ravine where spiders, woodlice, and roaches lived, I found plenty of dry and easy fire wood. We cooked our evening soup as pilgrims had done for centuries, ate with pleasure and satisfaction, felt the rising happiness that seemed to wait for us whenever we seek in our simple way the loneliness of nature. Till the waning moon rose, we kept a small fire. Rike played songs about moon, stillness, and longings on her mouth organ, while I followed dreams created by embers, flames, and sparks; and we knew the warm evening was perhaps summer's last goodbye. [From Following the Call] Such and similar impressions and adventures are part of the travel essays in the book.