i came upon this forum earlier today. i too am a camp kapitachouan alum. my first time there was as a camper in august of 1965. i was 13 and went out for 25 days with the youngest group. it was not a very good route (kekek river to macho river and eventually back to ck on lake choiseul), and we had lots of rain during the month. i'm surprised i ever went back, but am happy i did. i returned for three more trips as a camper (1966-68) and then worked as a councellor and then trip leader there through 1975. the camp was located 350 miles north of montreal. the road to camp was quite an ordeal over a very rough dirt road. i usually took an overnight train from montreal which dropped us off at the kapitachouane club stop on the cnr tracks. the camp on lake choiseul was 5 miles south of the train tracks. rod beebe sr. and carl williams founded the camp in the late 1940's (i believe rod may have canoed at keewaydin camp on lake tamagami in ontario as a teeneager). in addition to the base camp on lake choiseul (9 buildings including the beebe cabin, the williams cabin, the dining hall, a guest cabin, an office, a workshop, a boathouse, and two dorm cabins), there was also a smaller camp on lake capitachouan, 12 miles south via crooked creek. when the camp was full (usually in early july, when all the campers were in camp for training prior to embarking on the month-long trips), at least one group would be sent to the south camp as there wasn't enough room to accomodate everyone on lake choiseul. my second year there, in july of 1966, i went on the eagle river trip. i remember well the barry lake miler gerald referenced. it was a very difficult portage, as it was easy to lose your way and the entire mile led through bogs of muskeg. as gerald said, the eagle is a wonderful canoeing river. we were on it for 3 days, and we had perfect weather. the best rapid comes on the 2nd day, as i recall. there is a portage on the right that by-passes the entire rapid (if the water is to low), and there is a portage on the left that gets you around the falls on the top and puts you into the bottom half of the rapid. happily, we took the shorter portage and ran the lower rapid. the river flows south to north and empties into lake doda, from which it is a tough slog back up through the hebert lakes. there is a final 1 3/4 mile portage that brings you back to the saint cyr river. from there it was another week back to base camp we had a terrific group of campers (my sternman was carl williams's son peter, and rod beebe sr's son rod jr. was also on the trip. in '67 we paddled the wetetnagami and penache rivers (down the former and up the latter, which is the opposite of how one should make the trip). in '68, my last year as a camper, i finally made it to the "a" trip. led by rod sr., we paddled all the way up to chibougamau and then canoed down the chibougamau river to the waswanapi river and eventually to the town of miquelon from which we took a bus to senneterre and the train back to ck. i returned to the camp sporadically thereafter in '69, '70, '72, and '75 as a councelor and then a trip leader. because i was one of the younger staffmen, i generally took trips of younger boys (12-14). i led a few trips down the capitachouane river (the only trip the camp took that went south) and back up the camachigamau river. like the eagle river, the cap river is an excellent paddle with many challenging little rapids. my last trip to ck was in august of '75. a camp from maine (camp kieve) used to send a group of their oldest boys up to lake choiseul, and ck would provide them with canoes, food, and staff. i took them on the eagle river trip, and it was just as good as i remembered it from 1966. the only difference was that it hadn't been run in a few years, so the portage trails required a lot of bushwacking. rod beebe sr. took the same trip that month (he was a few days behind me). i'm surprised i didn't run into you then, gerald! sadly, that was the last time i travelled to ck, although i've kept in close contact with rod beebe sr. until his death in the late '90s. i still see carl williams and his wife ibby (she and rod sr. were brother and sister). they live in lakeville, ct, near the salisbury school where carl taught for 40+ years. as josh pointed out, the camp closed its door sometime in the late '80s or early '90s. when i canoed there, their entire fleet of canoes were wood and canvas, 17-foot chestnuts. sometime in the late 1970's they began to introduce the abs (royalex) canoes into their fleet. by the time the camp closed up, i think they had completely phased out the wood and canvas fleet. of the two directors, carl was the more ambitious with regard to the trips he took. by the early 1970's he was regularly taking trips (via mistassini post on the lake of the same name) to james bay, including the broadback, rupert, and eastmain. unfortunately, i missed out on these trips, as, by then, i was leading the younger boys on trips that started and ended at lake choiseul. as of this year, both the rupert and the eastmain have been dammed and diverted to the huge resevoir that is part of hydro quebec. for many years after i stopped canoeing with ck, my younger brother, chris hinckley, continued to lead trips for the camp, and he paddled the panache, eagle, magasagi, chibougamau, capitachouane, wetetnagami, opawica, and waswanapi rivers during his many years there. i don't remember the year of his last trip, but he may well have overlapped with you, josh. i still cherish the memories i have of canoeing the rivers of west central quebec. i sent my son to camp keewaydin in northern vermont, and he was fortunate to take a couple of their james bay trips, including one on the rupert. hearing his stories of those trips took me back to my days at ck 40 years ago, and it remains a shared connection for us.
|