County Cabs and Kayaks

Launching at Inverhaugh, Ontario

In the first summer of the pandemic, I renewed an old relationship with the family kayak. In the process, I discovered that Ontario’s rivers and streams - one of Ontario’s best kept secrets. My explorations began with modest “to and fro” trips on Oakville’s Bronte and 16 Mile Creeks. Within minutes of slipping into the water on a warm summer morning, you are pursuing a heron through the cattails. The winds breeze through the trees and muffle the sounds of the city. Paddling solo through the valley you are tenderly embraced by its waters.

Ontario’s Grand River – Dundalk to Port Maitland

 On my first river excursion, I rented in Paris, from one of the best outfitters on the river.  It’s here that the Grand River earns its name. The Grand’s clear shallow waters burble 160 km. on a relentless journey from its headwaters in the Bruce Peninsula to disgorge in Lake Erie. It takes 40 hours at 4km/hr for the waters to meander from Dundalk to Port Maitland.  This is not a strenuous paddle. Kayaking from Glenn Morris to Paris takes two hours. If you don’t paddle, you arrived at the same destination in 3 hours. You exit the river at a campground above Paris, and shuttle back to the starting point in a company van recreating the feeling of being a kid on a day camp excursion.

 Photobombing the Family Portrait             

Determined to share my discovery, I gathered up the family for a weekend trip. Doing this on a summer Saturday turned out to be a mistake. A hoard of Ontario’s finest grabbed our rented kayaks off the trucks and bullied their way into the river, the twenty somethings dropping jubilant f-bombs as they pushed pass us at the launch. However, once on the river, a mile past the party rafts, our flotilla of kayaks, canoes and paddle boards left the yahoos behind for a memorable family experience.

Following this debacle, I took on lesser-known sections of the Grand above and below Paris and gradually solved the back transport problem. Ten km. east of Fergus, you launch on Lake Belwood Conservation area. Paddle 4 km with the prevailing wind at your back and pull out at the park at the east end of the lake.  Here you lock your kayak to a tree and summon, Fergus Taxi to bring you back to your truck at the launch. Now reunited with your kayak, relax with a take-out from Super Snax by the park at the foot of the lake.  The paddle from Fergus to Elora is equally charming. Be sure to exit the river above the falls at the Elora Mill. Enjoy a stroll and lunch at one of the quaint cafés in this historic mill town - much preferred to drowning in the gorge beneath the falls

The Historic Elora Mill and the Gorge Beneath

Launching into the River below Elora proved a bit more challenging. Relying on a portable set of light aluminum wheels, I trucked the kayak to the river’s edge through the field behind little known Gow Park, collapsing the wheels and strapping them to the back of the kayak at the river’s edge. This section of the river is quick and quiet and ends at a highway overpass at Wilson Flats in Inverhaugh. Rinse and repeat, leash your kayak to a post and cab back to Fergus to pick up the truck. By this time, your reputation has preceded. You are welcomed as a familiar though quirky traveller.

Another day, I took on the section between Inverhaugh and West Montrose. The launch at Inverhaugh features an impressive nest at the top of a cell tower, equally loved by the eagle family and the eagle photographers with their gigantic telescopic lenses

This section of the river is a bit of a nightmare, flocks of seagulls mocked me as I hauled myself out of the kayak in shallow waters 24 times in 10 kilometers. Absorbed in self-pity, I was cheered by the sight of a young Mennonite family hauling their two young children in the canoe, up to their knees in the shallow waters while fully dressed, he in fedora, long pants and a vest and she in a long calico dress Clambering out at my destination above the famous West Montrose covered bridge, I was almost run over by a handsome Mennonite beauty trotting a solo hack at speed along the riverside road and then cabbed back once more.

Covered Bridge - Montrose, Ontario

Many would be solo travellers are defeated by the back transport challenge, but the greater reward is getting to know the county cabbies. To a person they are happy forgiving souls who are delighted at the prospect of twenty-minute ride through the countryside for the equivalent of an airport fare and tip. They have diverse personalities but are universally wise and friendly eager to share origin stories, details of personal history and earned wisdom.

               In two years of daytrips, there was one calamity. I needed to be rescued by my daughter after losing my car keys somewhere near Kaufman’s Flats in Kitchener. Another time in mid-October, having driven with my wife to from Dunnville to York to scout the lower Grand River, we encountered an exhausted group who had battled an autumn wind off Lake Erie all the way from Cayuga. One look at the demoralized paddlers, convinced us. Wordlessly we agreed to “abandon boat”, drove back to Dunnville and lunched in roadside café.

On another occasion, recovering from cataract surgery, I found myself in Cayuga unable to read my cell phone well enough to find the number for Jay’s Taxi and was forced to flag down a passing senior to borrow their reading glasses. The beneficiary of a new hip, I have saved my grasper to help this plucky septuagenarian secure the kayak to the roof rack, ready to explore the Saugeen, the Beaver and the Nottawasaga. 

The Beaver Valley, Ontario