March 2026 · Preparation
Why a canoe trip, and why La Vérendrye?
How this trip started. A beat-up topo map, a borrowed canoe in 2024, and a promise we'd come back with our own gear and a real week.
Short pieces from before, during, and after the trip. The posts below are placeholders. Each one will get real text and photos as we publish them.
How this trip started. A beat-up topo map, a borrowed canoe in 2024, and a promise we'd come back with our own gear and a real week.
Australian Shepherd, born November 27, 2025. Seven months old at put-in, on his first multi-day trip. How we trained him for the canoe and what we'll do differently if we bring him on a longer route next year.
How we got the gear list under 48 kg without giving up the cast-iron skillet, the whisky, or the wetsuits June water demands.
The four things we always check before launching: wind, weather, weight, exit. None of them require Wi-Fi.
The first paddle stroke, the shake-down camp, and the 480 m portage we did on day one because shoulders are never fresher than at the start.
The 575 m portage on Rivière Denain. R3 rapids on either end. Two carries for the gear, one for the canoe. What we'd change about our packing.
Take-out on the longest day of the year. The small things that worked, the things we'd leave behind, and the route we'd paddle next.
This page won't update during the trip. We're fully off-grid from Jun 17 to Jun 21. Real-time signals come from the Garmin Enrich tracking map instead. We'll publish the full journal with photos in late June once we're back.