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Greetings True North Fleet,

I am assuming that you have all received your May/June 2009 issue of Wooden Boat by now. 

http://www.woodenboat.com/
http://www.woodenboat.com/wbmag/pdfs/WB208_TOC.pdf

Starting on page 44 is an interesting article titled “Exploring with Penelope”.  The setting is from your neck of the woods. It seams that Ken Weagle and his wife Clio, accompanied by their Siamese cat, Nuisance, put their $100 wooden canoe (Penelope) in on Great Slave Lake at the mouth of the MacKenzie River and proceeded northward and down river past Fort Simpson, Norman Wells, Fort Good Hope and on to Inuvik and the Beaufort sea – a distance of just over 1,000 miles.  For performing this stunt they managed to get six, count em, six, glossy pages of coverage in the Wooden Boat.   And they didn’t even build the thing.

I’m guessing that setting out from Yellow Knife on the Great Slave Lake, deepest in North America and Ninth largest lake in the world, braving the wild dangers of the Northwest Territories while sailing through the rocky archipelago of McLeod Bay with a small fleet of wooden boats actually built by their skippers should be worthy of at least a dozen pages.

Be sure to bring along a camera to take a lot of photos and a pen and notebook to take notes.  We especially need to know who gets eaten by the bear.

Cheers,
Tom

Thanks for the heads up Tom, haven't seen it yet but look forward to picking a copy up.  I'm sure there will be a camera or two on our Epic Voyage as I am a pro photographer

The MacKenzie in a canoe, that would be a feat. I've got to get a copy of that mag. I'm sure our Epic Voyage to Moose, and perhaps Drybones Bay will be well documented, and photographed.

Greg

We won't tell all....right Greg??  What happens in Mosse, stays in Moose...

Drybones Bay?  What’s that, 30 miles? That’s a scant one-day sail from Yellowknife at hull speed, maybe two days if the wind is slack.

(for those of you following along at home, Drybones is at …
http://www.google.com/maps?q=62.138,-113.806&t=k&z=12 )

One thousand miles down the MacKenzie in a canoe named Penelope; now that’s epic. The Argo under Jason sailing across the Agean, up the Bosporus, through the Symplegades, and across the Black Sea to Colchis; that’s epic. Odysseus’ long sail home after Troy, surviving sirens, whirlpools, and sea monsters; that’s epic.
 
Drybones Bay?

Well, at least it sounds as if there might have been a Kraken there, ... once, ... a long time ago.


Tom

Ah Tom, the Mackenzie is dead easy, all you need is time.  No rapids and downhill all the way!  Now our epic voyage might be against wind and wave, and at 3knts Drybones is an epic voyage.  Time is the real thing though, most of us only have a few days to do this in.  There are far worse things on/in this lake then the Kraken, far worse....muhahahahaha.

The East Arm can be done with a lot of time. YK to Etten island takes 5-6 hours one way in my power boat, at 30 knots. Either Christie or Macleod Bays would take a good month or more to truly explore in our fine wooden crafts. Just can't swing that much time in the summer. I rather like the comfort of employment, and the associated benefits. Maybe one day in retirement.

Last summer our friend Ken ventured to Drybones Bay and back with his Weekender in 7 days.

Greg

MAN

Where are you guys taken US  :o

No worries Denis, Moose Bay with it's abandoned barge and old cabin on the shore to explore will give us lots to do, and fit into our 3 day time plan. If sailing conditions are good, Drybones Bay might fit the plans, we'll see what the wind deals us on that weekend.

Greg

Denis, just bring lots of rum and food.....