New’s Story: Grand Portage, Grand Adventure

In June of 1965, I began, along with 39 others, a 900-mile canoe trip from Thunder Bay, Ontario – which was then called Port Arthur/Fort William – to Winnipeg, Manitoba, a distance of 900 miles. I was a student at St. John’s Cathedral Boys’ School, a boarding school partly founded on the principle that the standard education curriculum in Canadian school was far too easy. (The other part of the equation was religious, but that didn’t really click with me).

At St. John’s, character was tested by snowshoe races across the Canadian prairie in winter, and paddling across parts of Canada in 8-man ‘war canoes’ in summer.

Without looking at a map, I know the route by heart: from Thunder Bay, paddle south-west along the shore of Lake Superior for about 30 miles to Grand Portage, Minnesota. Portage (verb) 9 miles north to the Pigeon River. Paddle up (against the current) the Pigeon, which was also the border between the U.S. and Canada (on any given night, we would sleep either in Canada or the US). Through the smaller lakes: Moose, Mountain, Gunflint, Saganaka. At some point, on a portage (noun), we crossed the Laurentian Divide, which meant it was all literally downhill from there. Rainy Lake, Rainy River, Lake of the Woods, past Kenora to the Winnipeg River (and its many rapids) to Lake Winnipeg. Crossing Lake Winnipeg - a shallow monster of a lake - during a wind storm to the mouth of the Red River. Up the Red to the actual school near Selkirk, Manitoba. On the morning of the last day, we took a picture of the young voyageurs on the banks of the Red before we paddled (without a ton or so of tents and supplies) from Selkirk into Winnipeg, 5 battered canoes, 40 intrepid explorers, 23 days after we began.  

That’s the short version of the trip. A longer one would include the hordes of mosquitoes descending every night, the beauty of Quetico Provincial Park and the wilderness in general, the grind of carrying a ton of supplies and 400 lb canoes over 55 portages (ranging from the 9-mile Grand Portage to a couple that were little more than 20 feet), the mind-numbing repetition of paddling, paddling, paddling for 10 hours a day (14 hours as we approached Lake Winnipeg).

And most important, we learned about ourselves and how to handle challenges in the way you think and act, which was, of course, the whole point. How on earth do you get there - across two provinces and two countries – from, here? Short answer is embedded in the long answer – you put your paddle in the water and stroke. Then do it again. And again. And again. Have a big job? Start it, then little by little whittle it down to nothing. Then start the next one.

So, sixty years ago. A different time, a different person, a boy becoming a man. Still am, as far as I know.

Tom New June, 2025