We have lived in Montreal since the pandemic began and, like most Montrealers, have spent most of that period indoors.
After a decade spent largely on islands, the transition was significant: a curfew lifted only at the end of May, screens all day, and a view of the building across the street instead of the ocean.
This summer was therefore an opportunity to return to canoe camping: loading the canoe, heading out on the water and remaining practically unreachable for a few days. The experience proved as familiar as ever.
Why is canoe camping growing so quickly in Quebec?
Because the lakes are the one place that never closed. Many activities remain closed, partly open, or accessible only with a reservation, a mask and a line. Travel abroad is largely ruled out for Canadians, and restaurants have opened and closed with every wave.
The lakes, however, have remained accessible.
Many people have made the same choice. The outdoor rush began last summer and has not slowed. Park reservation sites are overwhelmed as soon as bookings open. Canoes for sale have become scarce. Campgrounds that used to have space on a Tuesday are now full. The number of car racks at boat launches on weekends bears witness to this.
This trend is one of the few positive outcomes of the current period. Many city residents who had never slept in a tent are learning how. Some will not take to it; others will make it a lifelong activity.
What has changed in thirty years of canoe tripping?
Our first canoe trip took place in Algonquin Park, about thirty years ago, with paper maps, a compass and a sense of adventure that probably exceeded the group's skill level.
Algonquin is Ontario's oldest provincial park, established in 1893, and for many Canadians it is where canoe tripping begins: lakes linked by portages, and a map that shows the trail but not its condition. It is where you learn to read a shoreline, anticipate the wind and plan around the weather, since there is no one to ask for advice.
What stands out on returning three decades later is how much has stayed the same: loons at dusk, the smell of a campfire built with wood that is slightly too damp, sore shoulders at the end of the first day. The water does not change with the years.
What has changed is almost entirely in your pocket: GPS on the phone, weather radar, satellite messengers. This subject will be covered in a separate post.
Do skills return after a long break?
Yes, faster than you might think. After a long absence, it is natural to wonder whether you will still remember how to steer the canoe, pack it so it sits properly, or rig a tarp so the rain runs off rather than collecting in the middle and pouring down at two in the morning.
The skills return, neither perfectly nor all at once. The first hour on the water is hesitant, with a sometimes winding course. By the end of the day, however, the paddle strokes feel natural again.
This observation extends beyond canoeing. It is often assumed that a skill unused for years is lost. Most of the time, it is simply dormant. All it takes is a little patience and a willingness to be a beginner for a morning.
The same phenomenon can be seen in diving, among people returning to the activity after a long break: nervous on the first dive, comfortable by the third. The same applies to business owners who say they are not good with computers. Most are more capable than they believe; they simply have not had a reason to try.
What are the benefits of slow travel?
A canoe moves at roughly walking speed, and that is precisely its value.
At this pace, details become noticeable: the way the light changes on a lake between six and eight in the evening, how long a storm takes to cross from one shore to the other and how quickly you must get off the water when you see it approaching, or the experience of an entire day without a single notification.
This is not, however, a wellness retreat. Canoe camping also involves insects, wet socks and portages that are clearly longer than the map suggested. Nevertheless, after two or three days outdoors, mental noise subsides. You sleep when it gets dark, eat when you are hungry, and decisions become simple: where to camp, when to cross, and whether the wind will allow it.
After sixteen months of screens, this rest proved more necessary than expected.
What do small outfitters need this summer?
This return also offered a fresh perspective on the businesses that make these trips possible: the outfitter who rents the canoe and barrels, the family-run campground at the end of a gravel road, the person who runs a shuttle to the put-in so you do not have to paddle back to your car. Most are very small businesses, often run by people who would much rather be on the water than updating a website, which is entirely understandable.
This summer, however, they are receiving calls and messages from a wave of new customers who have never done this before and who look everything up on their phone first. Yet many of these businesses have a limited online presence, or none at all: a Facebook page last updated two seasons ago, or a phone number that goes to voicemail because the whole team is out on the lake.
Those with even a basic site, showing prices, a map, what to bring and how to book, save themselves a large number of phone calls. For many of them, simple small business websites would be more useful than any sophisticated solution.
For anyone who has not been out on a lake in a long time, renting a canoe for an afternoon is a good starting point before considering a full trip. The skills are still there.