Hiring a canoe in Yellowknife.

When I heard Nicole saying that the Canoe hire place hadn’t returned her call from yesterday, and were not answering their phone, I told her about the offer I had from a mate at work who’d said we could use his canoe whenever we wanted. Unfortunately, I don’t have the guys number and don’t know exactly where he lives. Nicole reckons she’d told me that we needed to get a canoe to go with her work mate Yose, and the Yellowknife Somba K’e Kayak Club.

I’ve had a busy week, so maybe I missed the part of Nicole’s conversation – about us needing to get a canoe to go canoeing?

With two nights of a boat safety training course (yes Nicole, I know we don’t have a boat……yet) and my debut ball game, I was looking forward to our debut canoe trip. With my backpack loaded up with warm clothes (just in case) and supplies for a picnic lunch, we wandered over to Yose’s place.

While loading the car, Nicole mentioned our lack of a canoe, so we then drove over to the canoe hire place. No wonder they hadn’t answered the phone or returned Nicole’s calls – there was no one home. But this is Yellowknife. The house was unlocked, so after no answer from the door bell, Yose told me to go in. I yelled out to no avail, but Yose assured me he knew them, so we loaded up a canoe (from the row of about 20 sitting by the drive way), helped our selves to a life jacket each from the shed, while Yose selected us a selection of paddles.

Pre departure

Hone Heke aka Whare

A bach aka cabin

Lunch

Skipper keeping us on track

Team Kilwere

With the canoe off Yose’s car, I put my jandles on and strolled into the lake with my end of the canoe – cold. Yose said there was a better way ie. a way without having to get your feet wet. The memories from my dragon boating days in Wellington came flooding back and we were off.

My J-stoke was soon mastered. That’s the one used to correct some crooked paddling. Whare paddled like she was on Hone Heke’s waka – with fire in her eyes.

We had a fantastic day. The sun was shining, we parked up across the other side of the lake where quite a few people had assembled. While a few of them were gearing up to take on the white water section of the river, we were content to have a few beers, cook sausages over the fire, and watch the world go by.

We made it back to the canoe hire place (someone’s house), and I knocked on the door…. I explained that I’d left a voice message (saying that I was friends with Yose and Maria, and that Yose said it would be fine to borrow a canoe and sort it out later), but they hadn’t heard it, and had been away for a few days. The lady said she could now call the police and tell them to call off the search. I laughed and paid her for the canoe hire. Only in Yellowknife.

Tags: Canoe, J-stoke, Yellowknife