December 2, 2014

Algonquin Provincial Park

Guestbook Centennial Sunset

This is a painting I made from a lookout on the Centennial Ridges hiking trail in Algonquin Park.
Algonquin has played a large role in shaping who I am. Growing up, I spent a lot of time in the park with my dad, who started a business guiding canoe trips there. I have spent many hours in a canoe on the lakes and rivers that cover the park, and many nights in a tent among the trees of its backcountry. I have howled to the wolves there and listened to them answer back. These experiences in this beautiful park made me into the explorer that I am today.
When I spent a summer working there, I realized that Algonquin Park is a special place for a lot of people in Ontario. It is our backyard wilderness, and a place full of childhood memories of adventure for so many of us. It is a place of early Canadian history, where we can feel connected to the Canadians who helped build our country from the harvests of Algonquin's forests.
One of my favourite moments in Algonquin Park occurred while I was starting out on a day hike by myself. The path I was following curved around a corner, so that very suddenly, to the shock of both parties, I was standing only about eight metres from an adolescent bull moose, who was also enjoying the hiking trail. We both jumped, then stood, regarding one another. He looked pretty awkward with his widely splayed knobby legs, and seemed unsure of what to do. I didn't want to be rude, so I simply said "Hello." When he finally recollected his composure, he turned and sauntered off into the bushes, where I realized his girlfriend was waiting. Not wanting to make their date feel uncomfortable, I casually averted my eyes as I passed and continued on my hike.
Algonquin, it turns out, has it all. Adventure, history, and even romance.

Robyn Perritt
age 25
Cobden, Ontario

November 27, 2014

Nahanni National Park Reserve

Guestbook Patiently Being

There is a place where you can paddle your canoe for days and never see a trace of the concrete that has smothered so much of our beautiful planet's surface. In this place, time is not broken down into the tiny segments that fly by, demanding to be filled productively, and threatening to make you late for work. Time here passes only because the river is flowing and the season is changing. Even the sun doesn’t care that it is very late and it should have set hours ago. Here, on the Nahanni River, in the Northwest Territories, I am thankful that Canada still harbours these places that remind us of our deeply-rooted connection to the Earth. Here, a person is able to remember their place in this living, breathing system of interconnected parts, all swapping water molecules and carbon atoms.
It was nine years ago now, and a great distance away, but this place has left a lasting impression on me. During the three weeks I spent in that beautiful wilderness, my dreams at night were so alive and vivid; nothing like I’ve experienced before or since. What does it mean about that place, I often wonder. What does it mean about the intangible connection between us humans and the Earth, and how we are hindering that connection with our lifestyles?
I remember laying on my back next to a small stream with my dad and younger brother, looking up at the conifers towering over us. My dad talked about how this little stream had been flowing hour after hour, day after day, for so many years, and how these trees have stood there, just watching the clouds go past and the snow fall and then melt. All the time that I had been growing up, this spot had been there, sitting relatively still. As our plane had flown us west from Ontario, these trees had just stood. And as we launched our canoes upriver and began to paddle, they had waited. Even as the Nahanni swelled with floodwaters and the canoes overturned, and we struggled in panic and desperation, the trees remained in their seemingly-meditative state. And then we were there. And my dad pointed out that when it was time to get up and paddle away and continue our lives, pay our bills, and drive our cars, that spot would just continue to be. It was operating at the natural pace of our world. There, in a simplistic state of existence, that little stream is still trickling today, shaded by those spruce boughs.

We have to remember that we are not separate from the processes of the Earth. We are part of them. We can take our cues from the tall, stationary organisms that have been here much longer than we have, and learn to live patiently instead of rushing forward. We can just be. And living in this country of beauty and wilderness gives us the opportunity to find little places that remind us of that when we need it.

by: Robyn Perritt of Cobden, Ontario
age 25