Comments on: The Lake Superior Coastal Trail

By: Brittany Slugoski

Brittany Slugoski — Mon, 22 Mar 2004 10:12:30 +0000

Hi there,

My boyfriend Erik and I had the opportunity to experience this beautiful trial in June of 2003. It is comforting to be secluded from society, and to see the views along Superior’s coastline. It was definitely a challenging hike, and was my first camping experience ever. We went for five days, and started at Guargantua. I was definitely a little apprehensive when approaching those pit-privies, but thankfully not many people have used the trial yet that season, so there weren’t any unpleasant surprises. The old shorelines are so beautiful, and the Canadian Shield was amazing. Once in a while we would get lost, but thanks to the rock carns we stayed on tract. This piece rekindled my fond memories of our trip, and I really enjoyed reading it. I remember the old chimney that was left by it�s lonesome! It was really awesome , and made me marvel about its history.

By: Chris

Chris — Fri, 29 Aug 2003 07:19:57 +0000

My family are actually from Cape Croker, down in the southern end of Georgian Bay, but I’ve been to Agawa. Ojibway Ceremonies and its companion, Ojibway Heritage are on the shelf next to me right now, leaning against and Ojibway-English dictionary published in 1903 for Methodist missionaries going into the bush.

My mom’s family are Johnsons, way back, and I’m certain we are related to Basil. I think my great grandmother went to residential school in Midland with his mom.

If you enjoyed those pictographs at Agawa, sometime when you pry yourself from the north and get near Peterborough, Ontario, you’ll have to go see the Peterborough Petroglyphs. These are figues carved in rock a few hundred years ago. They cover maybe 600 square feet, and the hundreds of little doodles and figures tell many stories about cosmology, spirituality and history.

Anyway, I’ll look up the other books you mentioned. Thanks for seeing us in the land up there.

By: Dervala

Dervala — Tue, 26 Aug 2003 10:22:44 +0000

You’d mentioned your Ojibway blood before and I wondered whether you were from these parts (and thought of you as I looked at the pictographs at Agawa Point). I’m reading up on the Ojibway heritage around Superior. There are some great books in the park library that you might like if you haven’t read them already:

Superior: The Haunted Shore, Littlejohn and Drew, 1974. A coffee table book in the wrong format—the prose is luminous.
Ojibway Ceremonies, Johnston
Four Way Lodge, Reed, 1924. This one’s a thinly-fictionalised novel about Agawa Lodge.

The place is extraordinary. I can’t imagine what the 18th/19th century Ojibway felt when they realised they were losing it. And I perfectly understand how the idea of ‘owning’ such a landscape had never occurred to them.

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 25 Aug 2003 21:23:44 +0000

I am on the verge of tears reading this. As an Irish/Ojibway mix, you cannot imagine the stirrings in my blood that this post brings. A beautiful evocative picture of my ancestor’s traditional territory, one which I dearly miss despite being happily ensconced on the west coast.

And then the Irish accents and the Guinness (one of which I partook of last night after I played a set of jigs and reels Lunasa-style on my flute with five of my band mates at our local community fair here on Bowen Island).

Martin Hayes the Clare fiddler writes about the essence of Irish music hanging in the “lonesome note.” There is such a complex of harmonies resonating in this post for me, that I’m humming at a full on minor seventh chord.

Thanks for coming to Canada, Dervala.