(For new immigrants, moving into a new
country can sometimes be a traumatic experience. This can be particularly so
when there is no safety net in the form of friends from the old country already
there to cushion some of the anxieties that surface from time to time. Our experiences in Northern Ontario can
only be described as positive. From our newly made friends here, we learned a
whole lot about Canadian living which strengthened us and equipped us with
strategies to face life and to accept those things that we could not control
but exploit to our advantage and benefit those opportunities that did come our
way. In this sense, Canada has been good
to us!)
When
I first arrived in Canada, I landed in Northern Ontario in the summer.
It was fascinating flying from Toronto to
Sudbury over the massive Canadian Shield.
Geographically, and to the uninitiated, the Canadian Shield is simply a
vast area of rock covering most of Ontario and parts of Quebec where the
greenery is made up of struggling Pine, Cedar and Poplar trees trying
desperately to survive by sending their ambitious and thirsty roots through
cracks in the rocks, or propping themselves up by letting their searching roots
travel on the surface of these rocks so as to support the massive infrastructure
that it was intended to nourish. It
reminded me somehow of the country I just left behind where many people tried
to raise their large families with so little.
You also flew through areas that
closely resembled the surface of the moon and it simply looked hopelessly
desolate and terribly lonely in its isolation. It was no surprise therefore
that those American astronauts were flown into this area before their flights to
the moon to give them a taste of what to expect on the surface of the moon.
Since
the ice age, the Canadian Shield has been punctuated by lakes, thanks to the
glacial withdrawal centuries ago which scooped up large tracts of land and
inundated them with melt water forming lakes and eskers (the largest one being
in the Sudbury area), as it withdrew towards the North Pole. It was not uncommon therefore to see these
sparkling blue water bodies of various sizes and shapes that appeared like they
had never intended to be there in the first place, but that they had accepted
their status as being an historical oddity.
They did, however, brighten up the landscape and provided a new Canadian
like me some hope that things further up would not be as eyebrow lifting and
emotionally discouraging as they appeared.
My
final stop was in the French River District which was twice removed from the
City of Sudbury, a mining town that produced among other valuable resources
like diamonds and gold, massive amounts of Nickel. The French River District was better known
in the United States than it was in Canada.
It was in the warm summer months that American tourists poured into this
area which was well endowed with modest fishing camps and holiday resorts. I was very much at home in this enclave since
I was always a fishing fiend and I landed in an area that had fish that
infested the French River, the Murdoch River and the many lakes all around us.
When
I first got to this beautiful part of Ontario, I would walk along the rugged banks
of the Murdoch River (always looking over my shoulders for bears that had just
come out of hibernation) just beside a large lumber camp where large trunks of
trees were hauled up from the river to the sawing section of the mill and then
cut into various board sizes for sale to builders all around the Province. But my presence there was to do some fishing
and it was so refreshing that every cast brought up a large Grass Pike. They were not considered a good eating fish
by most Canadians in the area. The prize
fish were pickerel or “Walleye” as the Americans called them. Pike were known to be bony whereas pickerel
were not. However, pickerel were deep
water fish and one needed a boat to get to the choice spots to catch them.
My first priority was to pay off the mortgage
on an old crumbling house that I bought that was badly in need of a make-over
in order to become really habitable. With the help of my teacher friends and
colleagues who were skilled in carpentry and who were also my buddies at work,
the house eventually became the best looking one in town and the inside looked
like a something from a Good Housekeeping magazine.. The purchase of a boat,
however, still had to wait.
Before
you knew it, winter set in. It was to be
our first winter in Canada. When the
first snowfall started, my children, who were full of excitement at the
spectacle, stood outside our house their mouths wide open to catch some of the
flakes and in awe at the rate at which the snow came down. In fact it was our first experience with snow
and we loved every moment of it. In a
short time the entire town was white but we were soon faced with the reality of
northern living. It was getting mortally
cold. At night, the temperature went
down to minus thirty Fahrenheit. We made
sure that the oil heated furnace was turned up to tropical temperatures as we
settled in for the night. The extreme
cold must have caused our roof to utter cracking sounds which we found quite
disconcerting until we were reassured the following morning by a neighbour that
it was normal and that we should expect more of it as the winter months went
by. It was caused by the expansion and contraction of the roof boards due to
temperature changes. We also had to get
used to the fact that the sun set around four in the afternoon and as the
winter months went by the days began to get longer.
To
me the winter months presented other challenges. I heard so much about ice fishing and I could
not wait to learn how it was done in Canada.
I befriended a French Canadian senior who lived down the road. He assured me that he would be happy to
introduce me to the sport. When the ice
on the lakes had frozen to about eight inches it was considered safe enough to
drive ones car on the lake. I was not
brave enough to drive my newly acquired Chevrolet Belair on any lake so I
parked my car on the banks of Mercer Lake and we walked about two hundred yards
onto the frozen lake. My friend Mr.
Bolieau brought along with him an ice ogre which resembled a massive hand
operated drill with sharp blades that did the cutting and he began making holes
in the ice. The drill went through as though it was going through pudding. The moment water started running out of the
hole it meant that the hole was now ready to accommodate a fishing line. A line was baited with frozen smelt (a fish
resembling a sardine) and sent down to the bottom. It was then fastened to a stick which was
secured by pressing ice shavings against it.
After six holes were dug and baited lines dropped to the bottom and
secured on top, the waiting game began.
While we waited for some action on the lines,
Mr. Bolieau walked to the opposite shore and brought back a whole lot of dried
firewood. Using the white bark that he
scraped from the poplar trees, he placed some small twigs over the bark, lit the bark with his lighter and it simply
amazed me to observe that the bark lit up as though someone had put some
kerosene on it. Before long the twigs
caught fire and then he steadily added larger firewood to it until he had a
roaring fire going. Though this fire was
burning fiercely right on the lake, it was so cold that the ice would not melt
under it. We then sat on stools around
the fire to keep us warm as we watched the lines for action. Before long, one of the sticks would start
bending towards the hole and there was a mad rush to set the hook as the fish
flirted with the bait. The fight was
then on and before long we had a large six-pound pickerel out of the hole. It took roughly four minutes and the fish
froze like solid a rock. This was an
indication of how cold it was and how important it was to be out there with
appropriate clothing to keep warm. Within a couple of hours we had our quota of
fish. By
three o’clock in the afternoon it was time to wrap up our lines and make our
way home. The sun was setting and the
air was getting so cold that it was becoming increasing hard to breathe.
Once
I had learned the art of ice fishing I became a frequent visitor to the lake
particularly on weekends, but I always felt that it was safe to bring Mr.
Bealeau along with me because there was always safety in numbers. Besides, Mr. Bealeau was a guide in his
younger years and he knew all the spots where fishing was at its best. For example he once steered the boat that we
rented to the “Five Fingers” on the French River. In order to get there one had to negotiate a
network of narrow streams and it was easy to see that one could very easily get
lost in the maze of entries and exits to get to the Five Fingers where fishing
was at a premium. (Five Fingers: Rocks shaped like fingers in the center of
the river allowing the river to run through each of the fingers.)
Hunting
big and small game was also a popular sport in the North. Moose hunting
attracted the more seasoned hunters and required hunters to go further north
and deep into the forest to look out for them.
I was definitely not prepared for that.
I therefore invested in a .22 and
did most of my hunting for partridge which were plentiful in the countryside
all around us. Hunting for partridge was
best done early in the morning.
My
first nation friends also introduced me to trapping rabbits in the winter. I was not sold on the method, but it was
their way and it was to be respected.
All that one needed was thin wire that was tied into a noose. As soon as you came across a path beaten by
the rabbits the previous night, you hung a noose across the path made secure by
the brush growing on either side. A
noose was installed every ten feet from the closest one. The tree closest to
the noose was chipped slightly with an axe to mark the spot in case there was a
whole lot of snow during the night and to locate the dead rabbits. Once this was set, you returned the following
morning to find each noose with a dead rabbit lying in the snow with the noose
tied tightly around its neck. Apparently rabbits will use the same path in
search of food when they are out at night. I must admit that I found this method of
hunting a bit obnoxious but I could not help thinking that if I was lost in the
wilderness this would have been one way of surviving.
In
the spring there was a lot of talk around town of the “Smelt Run”. Smelt were like sardines and every spring
they came up the Magnetawan River to spawn. The run usually took place around midnight but
Smelt fishermen usually arrived early enough to get a good spot close to the
river. When it got dark, the river banks
were a hive of activity. Every group had
a battery operated light, and some groups had a fire going so that they could
have a fish fry as soon as the first lot of smelt were scooped out of the
river. It was as though the entire
community was out on a picnic. By midnight
the run began. Millions of smelt came up
and were to be seen bank to bank. One
person did the scooping and at the height of the run it took merely two scoops
to fill one garbage bag. My main
interest in obtaining smelts was to freeze them so that they could be used in
the winter as bait. Smelts also made a
handsome and tasty snack. When we got
home we were able to share our booty with our elderly neighbours who remembered
the good old days when they were able and fit to do their own fishing.
After
five years of a wonderful and productive life spent mostly outdoors in the
North, it was our decision to move closer to Toronto where opportunities for
our growing children, particularly when it came to choices for an university
education, cultural events and job opportunities were at a premium, we said
goodbye to this pristine part of Canada (sometimes referred to as the “Real
Canada”) where we had made some good friends and where we were put on a path to
developing love of country which has been Canada for over forty years.
.
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