The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
From time to time, we like to reprint classic articles from our sister magazine, Cottage North. Today we present 'The Return of the Marsh Monster,' written by Craig Harvie, which appeared in the May-June 2010 edition. **** This isn't a story about monsters, nor is it particularly about marshes. The 'Marsh Monster' is a canoe, but not an ordinary simple watercraft. The Marsh Monster has a storied history, and what follows here is a tale of growing up in northern Manitoba and Saskatchewan, canoeing our historic waterways and the forging of strong, lifelong friendships. Before the Marsh Monster entered our lives, I (Sam) and my buddies Doug Abrahamson (Abe) and Rod Nystrom (Leroy) began our paddling careers piloting Nystrom's 12-foot aluminum fishing boat on the small lakes and streams surrounding our hometown of Creighton. The three of us were no strangers to being on the water, although the mismatched battered paddles we used to propel our unwieldy craft were infinitely less efficient than the outboard motors our dads used when they took us fishing. Nonetheless, all of us were generously endowed with colourful and vivid imaginations, and once that old boat was launched and we had paddles in our hands, the old tub became a fur-laden Hudson's Bay Company Tripping canoe; our pitiful, spindly 12-year-old limbs became solidly encased in rock hard muscle, and the streams and small lakes just a few miles from town became isolated, treacherous wilderness... Sadly, once we got back home, sore, weary and blistered, reality would once again settle in. Many times as we struggled to maneuver that unwieldy tub using only what little muscle power we could muster, we longed for a real canoe. In early summer of 1967 or '68 an ad was placed in the classified section of the Flin Flon Daily Reminder offering a canoe for sale. Barely able to control my excitement, I immediately went to work on my dad, breathlessly explaining all of the benefits that canoe ownership would bring. Abe and Leroy were equally excited and in the end, Leroy's dad Roy was corralled into the deal. We all headed out to Channing, on Schist Lake, to inspect the canoe and strike a bargain with the owner. For the life of me I can't remember the name of the old gentleman in Channing who sold us that fabulous canoe, and that's a shame because that man had handcrafted it himself. What lay before us that evening was a bright green 17-foot canoe sturdily constructed of oak, cedar and canvas. She had solid oak ribs, tight fitting cedar planking, and a tight, formfitting outer shell of canoe canvas. She sported a solid oak keel and the gunwales and bow and deck plates were perfectly crafted. The builder was clearly influenced by the time proven features of the famous Peterborough and Chestnut canoes, and the lines of the Marsh Monster were a fair approximation of the 'prospector' models. Leroy and I experienced a major thrill when the old canoe became ours. Our dads agreed to split the purchase price of $75 and we became proud owners of a real canoe. Of course we had to name our noble craft and it was Leroy who came up with the name Marsh Monster. Using bright red paint, we proudly (and somewhat crookedly) inscribed both sides of the bow. Over the next few years, until the inevitable pressures of high school, impending adulthood, and the distraction of girls entered our lives, we explored hundreds of miles of the beautiful waterways and wilderness surrounding Creighton and Flin Flon. Once we mastered the basics of safe paddling, we set our sites on finding a spot we could call our own. One favourite trip was to launch at Sucker Creek on the Beaver Lake Road, or alternately at Bootleg Lake, and paddle and portage into Wekach and Mystik Lakes. On Wekach, we located an ideal cabin site. With complete disregard for the government rules and regulations concerning cabin building, leases, etc., we enthusiastically hacked down trees, cut cabin logs and haphazardly fitted them into a rough approximation of a log cabin. I can safely say that cabin was constructed at a total cost of $0 as the logs were cut on site and the corrugated steel sheets for the roof, as well as the fir planks we used to build the floor, were scrounged from wherever we could find something for free. The Marsh Monster served us well as we hauled in her most of our building materials as well as the cast off junk we furnished the cabin with. With a base camp established, we used the Marsh Monster as our vehicle to explore, to hunt and fish, and to travel in all directions from the cabin. Sometimes we travelled conventionally, with a bowman and sternman, and by trial and error we learned to be competent on the water and in the bush. It stands out in my mind though, those times when all three of us were paddling together, because on those days we moved fast with three pairs of arms sharing the work! Paddling with three paddlers required some different techniques on the part of the stern paddler (usually me), but we could cover a lot of territory quickly when we needed to. As the years went by, the three of us went our separate ways, although we generally managed to keep in touch. Leroy moved on to an incredibly successful career in broadcasting producing sports programming at major TV stations such as TSN. He lives in Toronto, is married to Gayle, and has three fine kids - two sons and a daughter. Abe, despite a promising start to his junior hockey career, decided playing hockey for a living was not for him. He became an electrician and recently retired from his job at the paper mill in Pine Falls, Manitoba. He is now with Manitoba Hydro. He and his wife Heather have two sons and a daughter and live on a lovely acreage at Lac du Bonnet, Manitoba. I spent 30 years as a civil servant with the Manitoba Department of Family Services as a counsellor, mostly in Flin Flon. I took an early retirement due to a hearing disability. My wife Mildred and I raised two sons in Flin Flon and still live here. After Abe, Leroy and I began to follow the various trails our lives would take us on, the Marsh Monster lived on, at least for a time. Roy Nystrom used her for fishing and hunting trips, and more than one moose made his final journey in that old canoe. After Roy passed away, Marsh Monster lay upside down in Nystrom's yard for many years until a few years after my return to the Flin Flon area. When I got her back, Roy had repaired a few cracked ribs and replaced her original canvas covering with a rough fibreglass skin, and I used her occasionally until I built my log cabin at Ledge Lake in 1993. From then until 2008, she saw only occasional use as she was in rough shape and I lacked the skills needed to perform a restoration job on her. See 'Spending' on pg. Continued from pg. In September 2008, Abe and Heather came north to spend a weekend at the cabin with Mildred and I. That's when the Marsh Monster was 'born again'. Marsh Monster was at rest, bottom side up when Abe began his inspection. Of the three of us, Abe was the one who carried on paddling into adulthood. Not only did he continue to paddle, but he introduced his wife and kids to the sport. Not only that, he took it one step further by learning to build beautiful functional cedar strip canoes and perform repairs to older craft as well. The Marsh Monster by now was only a decrepit shell of what she once was. Many of her ribs were worn and cracked, her cedar planking was badly worn in places, her gunwales in need of replacing and the bow and stern plates showed obvious signs of rot. All that, plus the peeling grey paint on her faded, lumpy fibreglass outer shell had pretty well convinced me that her life was basically over. Abe, however, didn't see it that way, and quickly rendered his verdict, 'I think we can do something with her.' My response was quick too, 'Abe, if you figure she's salvageable, then take her, she's yours. There's no point in me keeping her if I can't fix her up.' With that, we towed the old Marsh Monster to the landing at West Arm Mine, trucked her into Flin Flon, and loaded her into Abe's truck, where she began the next stage of her long and picturesque life. Let me here confess that I was in no way optimistic that Abe could pull off a repair job that would make Marsh Monster sea worthy again, despite the amazing examples of Abe's canoe building skills that I had seen. It was Abe that got me back into the paddling game, and for that I will always be grateful. Over the years Abe made almost annual trips to see his parents and when we got together he always tried to convince me to take a canoe trip with him. Finally, in 2005, I took the plunge and we made plans to paddle the Grass River from Iskwassum Lake to Paint Lake - 203 miles on the glorious Grass River system. We made that trip in early September and it was 13 days of total heaven for us both. I was hooked, or rather, hooked again on canoeing. Since then we have scheduled two week annual canoe trips and have paddled the Bloodvein River, the Reindeer, Churchill and Sturgeon Weir systems, and the Dease River in northern British Columbia. Following the Grass River trip, I purchased a 16'4' space age wonder - a Mad River Kevlar canoe and used it on solo trips as well as trips with my youngest son and both of my grandsons. Introducing Darryl, Alex and Jake to canoeing has been a special joy for me and as long as I'm able, we plan to take as many trips as we can, as do Abe and I. There is something special about travelling by canoe under your own power that can never be equaled by travel with motorized watercraft. My carefully preserved photos and journals are among my most treasured possessions. Back to the Marsh Monster... One year following her journey to Abe's shop in Lac du Bonnet he called to announce that he and Heather were coming up to visit us at the cabin again. I went to Ledge Lake a day early to prepare for company and when Mil, Abe and Heather arrived at West Arm, there was a beautiful dark green canoe tightly lashed to the rack on Abe's truck. I can with all honesty say that even as I approached to shake Abe's hand it hadn't occurred to me that it was Marsh Monster I was looking at. See 'Abe' on pg. Continued from pg. Abe just shook his head, reached into his truck and presented me with a paint can, saying, 'Here you go _ this is what you use to touch her up.' I was totally and completely dumfounded. In no way could I ever have contemplated a gift like this. There have been very few times when I've ever been at a loss for words, but this was one of those times. Marsh Monster was now far more than just seaworthy. To anyone who loves canoes like I do, or for anyone who simply appreciates fine craftsmanship, she was, in a word breathtaking. Her ribs were now solidly repaired and the shattered portions of cedar planking painstakingly replaced. New ash gunwales had been crafted and installed and her rotten bow and stern had been re-shaped and re-installed. Both bow and stern now sported protective brass strips fitted perfectly. The interior had been carefully sanded to bare wood and now boasted a coat of clear epoxy finish and several coats of varnish. The old plank seats had been discarded and replaced with seats crafted from ash, complete with perfectly woven artificial babiche. The crowning touch was the glossy dark green finish that had been applied over the epoxy outer shell of the canoe. Abe had used decades old craftsmanship to create a beautiful work of art. The epoxy coating is the only modern element to his masterpiece. That night at the cabin we launched Marsh Monster into Ledge Lake to go paddling. She was a joy, and I've always said that she's the first canoe I ever handled, and she's also the best handling canoe I've ever used. The next day we launched into Wekach Lake (the West Arm Road which wasn't there when we were boys makes Wekach easily accessible now). A brief one mile paddle brought us right to our old cabin site. There's nothing much there anymore of course, and you have to look close just to see where the little shack once stood. For me though, the memories of one of the best times of my life will never fade. Abe, Leroy, and Sam - the cabin _ the wilderness _ the strong and enduring friendship _ and always, the Marsh Monster.
