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Expeditions: Goin' Dune the MacFarlane
It is never easy to choose a river for a wilderness canoe trip.
After many nights of staring at maps and searching for elusive records, there were number of
considerations which were drawing us towards the MacFarlane River in the most northern area of Saskatchewan.
Story and photos
By DOUG McKOWN
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Keith, Heather and Donna walk along one of the many fascinating
- and constantly moving- sand dunes which are one of the unique features of the MacFarlane
River in northern Saskatchewan.
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The MacFarlane is a very remote river. That was the main attraction for us. It rises in the centre of northern Saskatchewan, about 30miles north of Cree Lake. From here, the river flows north through an immense, unpopulated area, for about 225 miles to the lonely shore of vast Lake Athabasca. There are no houses, fishing camps, or any permanent settlements in the entire drainage basin of the MacFarlane River. There is also a two mile portage around the lower canyon of the river which is enough to make most canoe outfitters think twice about bringing groups to the area.
However, one of the major drawing cards for us, are the unique, extensive sand dune formations found along the south side of Lake Athabasca. So unique are these areas that they have been protected with the formation of the Athabasca Sand Dunes Provincial Park. While a provincial park may not be everyone's idea of a remote wilderness destination, Athabasca Sand Dunes Park is a little different. Here, there are no campsites, no roads, no fences, no buildings, no park headquarters, no trails, no signs, and people. In fact, this 2000 square kilometres of wilderness park is just that, wilderness.
After a seemingly endless drive from Banff, Alberta, my wife Donna and I met our paddling partners, Keith and Heather, at the float plane dock in downtown Fort McMurray, Alberta. This is the end of the road for driving towards the MacFarlane River.
Heather and Keith have both been naturalists for Parks Canada for many years. Though quite experienced paddlers and outdoors people, Heather and Keith had never done a long wilderness canoe trip before. They were very excited about this chance to paddle the MacFarlane.
Our initial destination was the headwaters of the MacFarlane, at the west end of Lazenby Lake, 160 miles by air. After a long, but thankfully smooth flight over the green carpet of the boreal forest, my pilot circled in to land the little Cessna on the calm waters at the west end of the lake. As we unstrapped the canoe from the pontoons, I searched the sky, hoping that the second pilot would be able to find the same spot in this endless maze of lakes and streams.
Sure enough, a few minutes later the little blue and white Beaver splashed down and we set up camp for our first night on the MacFarlane. As we watched the planes disappear into the evening, the silence of our remote little lake settled gently around us. As twilight deepened, the tranquility of the calm lake was emphasized by the long, lonely cry of a loon echoing across the water-surely the most beautiful sound in the world.
One of the many black bears which kept the canoe group company down the river.
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We were up early on the first morning of our adventure, eager to find the river and see what we were faced with. As we finished off our breakfast, Heather glanced over my shoulder and saw a black bear ambling down a slope, out of the forest. The bear was hundred yards away, feasting on blueberries in a recently burned over area. We were quite excited about this sighting on the first morning of our trip and hoped that this was an indication of what we would see in the next couple of weeks. How true that turned out to be! After watching the bear's antics for a few minutes, we loaded up the canoes to embark, left the bruin to his breakfast and headed off down the river.
At the exit of Lazenby Lake, the MacFarlane River is a small shallow stream, flowing through the continuous boreal forrest. Its banks lined with willow bushes, the river flows through the alluvial sand and sandstone formations of northern Alberta and Saskatchewan. This sand is primarily the result of an immense glacial lake which existed in this area at the end of the last ice age. Lake Athabasca, itself 150 miles long, is but a remnant of this once vast body of water.
The river, while small at the exit of Lazenby Lake, flowed with a considerable current. Initially we were quite careful in out travel because we were somewhat skeptical about the dependability of the 1:50,000 scale topographical maps that we were using. When we were planning the trip we found it interesting to see that there is actually no exit shown on the map to connect Lazenby Lake to the rest of the MacFarlane River! While there are many rapids directly indicated on the topo maps of the MacFarlane, some rapids are not where they appear on the map, and we found many rapids which do not appear on the map at all. We soon came to realize that just about any narrow place shown on the map would have some sort of rapid.
The MacFarlane is a beautiful river. The appearance of the boreal forest is ever changing, with older growth, young forests, and recently burned areas. This is a continuous cycle of burning and regeneration which all the flora and fauna here depend on to maintain a healthy ecosystem.
Everywhere that the river had eroded through the sand to the underlying rock we would have a swiftly flowing rapid over smooth sandstone ledges, and exciting continuous rock gardens. Campsites were plentiful all along the river. Whether it was open jackpine forest with a soft carpet or crisp reindeer moss, or rocky ledges overlooking a rapid, we were never disappointed.
We chose to run the MacFarlane River in the later part of the summer. In low water years this could be a serious problem. While we took a chance on lower water levels, paddling in the later summer does have a couple of advantages. One is that the bugs are usually less ferocious. The other is the blueberries ripen this time of year. In this case we were blessed with a bountiful harvest. We had blueberry pancakes, blueberry scones, blueberry granola, blueberry muffins, and more. Every campsite provided an endless supply of this delicious fruit free for the picking. The excellent berry season had another, less foreseen bonus for us. It had to do with that black bear we saw the first morning of the trip. You see, he was not the last bear we saw on this river. In fact, bears began turning up with delightful regularity.
Consider yourself lucky, like author Doug McKown, if you are among the few
who have visited the MacFarlane own horseshoe falls - one of many scenic falls along the river
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The second bear we saw was walking away from us around a point at the base of a ridge. As we came around the point in our canoe, I spotted the bear again about 20 yards inshore among the jackpine. I shouted and pointed for Keith and Heather so they too could have a chance to see the bear before it ran away. Little did we know about MacFarlane bears! When the bear heard me shout, it stood up on its hind legs and looked right at us. Then it ran right down to the shore, stood up for another look, then came running right at us. It took a step or two into the water as if undecided whether to continue investigating. As we floated away, the bear eventually lost interest in us and went about his business. This behaviour quite surprised us. We are used to seeing bears around our homes in Banff National Park, and the bears usually run away at the first sight of people. It was very refreshing to see healthy, inquisitive black bears who had obviously never seen canoeists before.
It was also mildly disquieting. We continued to see this type of bear behaviour repeated numerous times during the trip. The next day, we had the canoes rafted together in a quiet, wide stretch of the river. We were all sprawled out having lunch as a light breeze pushed us gently along. Just as we were finishing lunch, I glanced over Heather's shoulder. There, about 3 yards off shore, about 20 yards from us, was a black bear, ears perked up, swimming towards us just as fast as his little paws could paddle. As I dove for my camera, and everyone else started thrashing about, the bear began to hesitate and then decided that maybe we were a little too noisy for comfort. He headed back to shore, took one last look at us, and ambled off into the woods.
After this episode we began to be a bit concerned about having one of these bears visiting us at our campsites. We became very careful about keeping a clean camp, and hanging all our food up a tree every night. We carried pepper spray and had several interesting contingency plans for possible night encounters. However, of the 13 bears we saw on this 16 day trip, never did we have one in camp. I think this is because the bears were more curious than hungry. Luckily for us, the endless supply of blueberries, bear berries, and bunch berries, ensured that the bears were not short of tasty food. Had we come earlier in the season, it might have been quite a different story about the MacFarlane River bears.
As we travelled down the river, bears were not the only wildlife that we saw. Waterfowl were always making noisy exits, splashing and flying in front of us. Canada geese, merganser, mallards, loons, terns, and sandhill cranes, are but some of the species we followed down the river.
One morning as we came around a bend towards a small rocky rapid, 26 snowy white pelicans were surprised to see us. They took off over our heads in a blur of white wings and large dark eyes. The quiet of the peaceful river was often disturbed as a family of otters would surround us. Lifting their sleek bodies out of the water for a closer look, they would snort and huff at as we floated down the river together. We also encountered muskrats, beavers, and mink making their homes along the river. The shallow river and burned over forest are excellent habitat for moose. There is little that can compare with these magnificent animals. We were privileged to see seven moose in one day along the river. They would lift their great heads at us, with a mouthful of dripping greens hanging from blubbery lips. At their leisure, they would slowly turn, and canter off in the awkward but rapid gate so characteristic of these huge animals.
Many of the rapids of the MacFarlane were Class I and II, and could be scouted from the canoe much of the time. All the major rapids occur at ledges where waterfalls roared down to the next level. The MacFarlane is one of those delightful rivers which has many rapids but few portages. The river drops about 290 yards over the approximately 180 miles that we paddled. In this distance there was only one lift over, and three portages. While there are a number of wide places in the river, the only lake of consequence is Davy Lake.
We paddled through the last turns of a broad estuary out into the wide expanse of Davy Lake on a beautiful, absolutely dead calm evening. Davy Lake is 12 miles long and almost four miles wide, and there was not a ripple in sight. We camped on an exquisite little island a half mile or so from shore. A beautiful beach, no bugs, and no bears made this an unforgettable campsite. That was just as well since in the middle of the night the wind began to blow. We woke up to a regular little gale which kept us windbound all day. The next morning we got up early and headed down the lake. The far end of Davy Lake brought us to the first of the three major canyons on the MacFarlane River.
The first canyon is 800 yards long, passing two dramatic ledges and a spectacular waterfall. The portage is quite pleasant, through open forest, followed by a less than delightful, very steep descent back down to the river. After another 12 miles we approached the dreaded middle canyon of the MacFarlane River. A few hundred yards of shallow rapids brought us to the beginning of the long carry. We camped at the top of the portage, making one carry that evening to get the canoes to the bottom of the canyon. Two trips the next morning saw all of the gear successfully carried for the two miles of bush.
After completing the portage, we went for a hike back up the canyon to see what we had missed on the river. The MacFarlane canyon is a wildly spectacular place. We could look up river for almost a mile to see huge ledges and steep rapids rushing between the towering canyon walls. The river drops about 250 feet in its descent of this canyon. Before us was a magnificent three ledge waterfall. Just downstream were three more fantastic, wild waterfalls crashing into the bottom of the immense canyon. We hiked downstream along canyon walls broken and cracked into weird and wonderful shapes.
The lower canyon on the MacFarlane River is less distinct. Actually, from the end of the Middle Canyon down to the final lake, is about three miles of continuous grade II and III rapids. Running these rapids was great fun but also a little distracting since this is the first time that you get a clear sight of the major sand deposits of the dunes area. As we paddled out into the little lake, we could see sand ridges interrupting the trees on three sides of the lake. This was the end point of our paddling trip. While Lake Athabasca is only 3 kilometres further downstream, it is a wide open and windy place. We had a much better chance of having our float plane land on this little sheltered lake.
We were able to spend a couple of days exploring a huge area of sand dunes on the west side of the river before the arrival of our floatplane. There is a great variety of vegetation to be found in the dunes. This ranges from dry desert grasses, to the carnivorous little sundew plants. This area is the most northerly formation of active sand dunes in the world. In our static, almost instantaneous observations, we could see where an enormous dune, 30 metres high, was in the process of engulfing a living forest.
On the other side of this dune, we walked among the very tops of long dead trees in an ancient forest being slowly exposed once again by the ever shifting sands. Along with the unique vegetation, there are many types of animals which frequent the dunes. We saw abundant tracks of wolves and heard their lonesome howls in the still of the night. On our approach to the dunes one morning we had a marvellous view of a wolf isolated in the middle of a vast sand plain. After a bold and curious look in our direction, he trotted off into the forest. There were also bear tracks, moose, and a multitude of smaller animal tracks to entice us. While wandering among the dunes, we also found some old, bleached caribou antlers being slowly uncovered by the blowing sand. The sand dunes are a fascinating area, a true desert landscape in the far north.
The dawn of our last morning broke windy and clear. As we waited for our plane to arrive, we watched impossibly long lines of Canada geese in their stately V formations, heading south on their annual journey to warmer climes. It made us realize that even on this pleasant warm day there were signs of the coming end of this brief summer, and soon the icy grip of winter would once again descend on this remote land. As we flew back up the course of the MacFarlane River we could look down on the endless expanse of untamed wilderness and be thankful at our chance to paddle this beautiful, wild, river.
IF YOU WANT TO GO TO THE MACFARLANE RIVER, choose the early summer, late June, early July. Water levels are just too unpredictable after that. Plan for 12-13 days on the river and at least one or two extra to explore the dunes.
Fort McMurray is a long drive, about 450 miles from Calgary and 275 miles from Edmonton. It is a good idea to plan to stay in Fort McMurray overnight before you leave. There are plenty of good hotels.
La Loche is an even longer drive on worse roads. It is about 300 miles from Prince Albert, and there are not many good hotels.
From Fort McMurray, the flight into the headwaters of the MacFarlane takes about one and half hours. For four people and canoes, our entire cost of flights both in and out was about $3000. From La Loche, the flight costs will be about the same. The following sources can provide you with more information about the MacFarlane River:
1. For information about canoeing, fishing, and Athabasca Sand Dunes Wilderness Park: Saskatchewan Travel, 3211 Albert St. Regina, Saskatchewan S4S 5W6 or call: 1-800-667-7191
2. Topographical Maps required: (1:50000)
Fond-Du-Lac 74-0/4; Tazin Lake 74-N/1; William River 74-K/16; 74-K/8 Livingston Lake 74-J/4; 74-J/5; 74-J/12.
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