Ripples from La Prairie Voyageur Canoes: Genealogy Roadtrip to Voyageurs National Park

Day One

I rented a canoe from an International Falls canoe outfitter and planned on spending the early morning hours canoeing Rainy Lake’s Black Bay. My goal was to hopefully hear some Loons in the distance and paddle with the Voyageur Spirits of my ancestors.

Unfortunately everything went wrong…

DELTA AIRLINES lost my baggage containing my canoeing clothes, fishing tackle, lifejacket, and — most important — my water shoes.

On top of that the canoe outfitter failed to meet my expectations. During the planning stage I exchanged several emails and phone calls with him. I told him I planned to solo, and in an email I made my need and skill level abundantly clear when I wrote:

“I’m a 75 year-old guy with lots of canoeing experience, but my balance isn’t great these days. Once I’m in a canoe, and on the water, I’m pretty competent, but I like the odds in my favor, so I prefer a stable canoe.

My two personal canoes are an Old Town Pack (length 12’ width 32”) and an Old Town Hunter (length 14’ width 35”). I’ve also owned an Old Town Discovery 119 (length 12’ width 32.5”) and an Old Town Penobscot (length 16’4” width 37.5”). I’ve soloed all of them on lakes and rivers (class rapids 2 and less), and I’d be comfortable with something close to any one of these.

To make a long story short… the International Falls canoe outfitter completely screwed up the rental, and provided me with an Old Town Discovery 174. The 174 weighs in at 80+ pounds, and is too long to solo on a windy lake. To make things worse the outfitter blamed me for poor communications.

The canoe outfitter is one of very few canoe rental services on Rainy Lake, and they enjoy a pretty fair reputation, so I recommend you be very careful when communicating with any outfitters in the area.

After a few hours canoeing I planned to visit the Rainy Lake Visitor Center. That went pretty well, but the voyageur display was a little disappointing. Honestly, you’d think the United States government could find enough money to properly present the Voyageur and his accoutrements.

As it turned out — without a canoe — I was finished early, so I decided I’d spend the afternoon in nearby Fort Frances, Ontario, Canada. They have a history museum, and an archives of voyageur materials.

The folks at the Fort Frances museum were extremely pleasant, and spent lots of time answering my questions. They also suggested a visit to the town’s “La Verendrye Parkway,” a river walk along Rainy River.

Late in the afternoon I headed back to the good old USA, looking forward to a nice dinner and a good bed. When I crossed the border I encountered a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) checkpoint. What happened next was one of the worst experiences in my life…

I was asked what business I had in Canada, and when I tried to explain I was on a Genealogy Road Trip celebrating my French-Canadian heritage I was almost immediately directed to park and get out of my rental car. Next my wallet and backpack were searched, and the rental car was thoroughly probed. They detained me for maybe 45 minutes, and when they finished they simply said you can go now.

No apology from the CBP for harassing a 75 year-old man… I left feeling like a fugitive in my own country.

Later, when I spoke to business owners in International Falls, I learned the treatment was common, and the CBP is not highly regarded by local folks. One business owner told me this treatment from the CBP is a new thing, and may be a generational thing. I thought about the one young officer, who had a thick foreign accent, and I wonder if he even knew what a voyageur was.

Day Two

Voyageur statue at entrance Crane Lake

I woke up thinking things have got to get better today. At least Delta sent my baggage late last evening, so I now had my canoeing clothes.

I drove the 80 miles to Crane Lake where I expected to find a canoe I rented. My plan was to paddle to the Vermilion River inlet, and go upstream as far as I could paddle looking for the logical location of Rene Bourassa’s 1736 trading post (my 7th Grand-Uncle).

More bad luck. No canoe was waiting for me, so I was forced to rent a boat. It might have been a good thing as the wind was fairly stiff, and it would have been a hard paddle to the mouth of the river.

About a 150 yards below the first set of rapids the river widened revealing a beautiful cove with a fairly flat bench in the trees beyond. If I was a fur trader this would be the location I would select to erect a palisade and build a store house.

I’ll never know for sure, but I believe I located Uncle Rene Bourassa’s 1736 post site (above).

On the way back to International Falls I turned off the main highway and followed a beautiful narrow road that leads five miles back to Vermilion River Falls and Gorge.

It’s a lovely drive with several beaver ponds and lots of spectacular boreal forest views.

The falls and the portage trail around them offer some interesting side hikes with breath taking scenery.

Vermilion River Falls

The actual gorge is a roaring torrent that is reached after a quarter mile uphill stroll, and can be viewed from a series of stairs and bridges.

Driving back to my hotel I decided I had enough time to see Ash River and Kabetogama Lake, so I could do an unplanned trip to Lake of the Woods on Day Three.

On the way into the Ash River Visitor Center there is another short hiking opportunity that leads to a Beaver Pond Overlook. I highly recommend this shady forest trail.

The beaver pond itself appears to be vacated with little suggestion of current beaver activity, but I’m sure it is heavily populated during the nighttime hours by the parks forest dwellers.

The last week in September has always been my favorite time to travel in the North Country, however the National Park Service seems to lack a budget to properly staff visitor’s centers in the fall. It sorta like another park visitor quipped, “Your tax dollars on vacation.”