We were on day 6 of a very long trip. It had been one of the coldest trips my partner and I have done. We broke camp late in the morning on Keats Lake. We portaged around Snake Falls and put in just above the falls. The current was fairly strong but we had been on faster water. As we headed up the channel towards Shelly Lake there was a small area of rapid water. We felt confident that we could paddle thru. When we got into it it was to late to turn back. The current sucked the front of the canoe under. Myself being the sterns man I went over the left side. My partner went the other side with the canoe. I made my way to shore with some difficulty do to my heavy boots. My partner headed for the falls. He had managed to grab onto a tree and hung on till I swam across the swift current to help.
After we got to shore we sorted thru our gear. We had lost all of our dried food and all of the maps. We were so pumped up that we wern't even cold as the temp. was around 40 degrees.
Lucky for us we had been on Kawnipi the year before. We just had to wing it, paddling out.
Since then we keep our life vest on when on any kind of rushing water. As we both knew that our life vest had saved our lives that day.

Posted by Greg on January 22, 2000 at 20:50