Paddler's Guide to Happy Camping

Lost Paddle Update

• Posted on June 2, 2008 at 2:19 PM
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Hey, look at what we found!

Where's My Lost Paddle Now

Last season during a canoe trip with my wife and 3-year old daughter in Ontario's Chiniguichi areas I lost my paddle...and then found it again in a very, very odd way (thanks to paddler, Brian Round). The story below tells the tale. A very exciting update to al this, however, is that the first owner ofhe lost paddle gave me the first story of where that paddle was used and I've placed it also below. It's cool! Very cool! And even more cooler then that, is that I gave out the paddle again to be used this summer. It was handed to a family in the audience during my spring presentation at Adventure Guide in Kitchener/Waterloo. As soon as they send me their story, I'll post it as well.

Lost Paddle

I like to keep a relaxed pace when I trip, but that afternoon we couldn’t get our dawdling daughter through the portage quickly enough. The curious black bear seemed as interested in us as I was in it, and to add to the anxiety a column of storm clouds was collecting upwind. Our push-off from the portage was hasty. It wasn’t until we were halfway around the lake, losing ground to the storm, that I discovered our spare paddle was missing. I knew exactly where I had left it—tucked into the marsh grass in the muck that sucked at our boots as we hurried into the canoe—but I wasn’t going back. Alana and I had our two-year-old daughter with us, and you have a maximum of an hour-and-a-half of grace time while paddling with a two-year-old. We were already in too deep. Besides, the storm would soon be on us, and the bear was probably licking his lips in a carefully selected ambush spot near the paddle. So I left it. Alana questioned the decision, but I assured her I’d put out a request for the paddle on some canoe website chat forums. I remember being surprised she thought that would work. It took me a while to post the message, but I received a response the very day the notice went up. A maintenance crew had found my paddle and handed it over to an outfitter. After a moment of marvelling at how honest, close-knit and web-addicted canoeists are I called the outfitter. He told me he had been handing it out to clients to use as a spare paddle. I had to wait for the last group to come back before I could retrieve it. I admit I was worried to hear my paddle was being abused by other canoeists. But then he listed the trippers who had used the paddle already: a mother on her first trip with her two teenage daughters, environmentalists campaigning to save a stand of old-growth forest and a solo paddler trying to escape reality (didn’t work). That’s when I saw the bigger picture. I may have lost a paddle but I had found a way to gain a wider perspective on the reasons people take paddle in hand to canoe. To me the stories of why the canoeists ventured into the wilderness were more valuable than a spare blade. In the end I told the outfitter to keep handing out my paddle to his clients, but only if he would report back to me about the paddlers who had used it and why. Who knows what will come of it: a book idea, an immensely lucrative magazine article, or just enough positive energy from other paddlers to remind me to paddle as much as I can—spare paddle or not.

Hello Mr. Callan,

My name is Sarah MacRitchie and i had the pleasure of using your paddle last summer while traveling along the Chiniguchi river. i remember the owner of the lodge that we were staying at (sportsman’s lodge) told us that the paddle belonged to a famous writer and that he had found it somewhere..? unfortunately, i don't remember the details.

i read the e-mail that my mother received about needing a story about the paddle. well, i can for sure provide you with one. my favorite story, definitely, is when myself (including the paddle), my mom and my brother paddled for a whole day in pouring rain, becoming soaked to the bone, and then finding, later that night at the campsite, that everything, and i mean EVERYTHING was wet. all our supposedly 'water proof' bags had soaked through. during that day, we paddled several kms, hiked over 7 portages and got lost while attempting to go north, but instead going south. not to mention that our packs became steadily wetter and so therefore heavier as the day went by. your paddle and i bonded over the length of that day, as both of us paddled through the constant rain and portaged through the wetness.

i hope this story is long enough, and if not, i will gladly write more about the accomplishments that paddle and i went through. by any chance, did you ever get the paddle back? sincerely, Sarah MacRitchie