Having travelled across the Atlantic from Australian Eucalypt forests to the boreal, Minnesotan north, I (vainly and foolishly) fancied myself something of a Marlow in Heart of Darkness or a Fowler in The Quiet American; the stoic, intrepid flaneur upon foreign shores.
Little did I know that she had other ideas.
The “she” of whom I refer is, of course, Pagami Creek. Maybe you haven’t been acquainted. Nestled with innocent treachery between Clearwater and Lake One, the Pagami Creek shortcut holds a dual mystique of nigh-unnavigability, as well as being the bearer of a lightning-struck burn scar, decimating 90,000 acres of forest in 2011.
All of this characterised the pre-trip anticipation with a distinctly beguiling charisma. It was to be my first time, and as our seasoned veteran Smitty winked to me, there exists a certain backwater glamour to having Pagami as your first adventure.
Setting off with my fellow rookie fraternity of Adrian and Wes, our dauntless counselors of experience in Jackson, Smitty, and Nolan charged off the trailer onto the first 205-rod portage. I shouldered the bulging food pack (too afraid yet of the Grumman, I got there eventually, I swear) and trudged with as much grace as I could handle. I doubt strongly that my initial performance was anything more than pathetic; “Learn fast,” the trail seemed to smirk, “Learn fast or Pagami will chew you up and spit you out.” (probably quite literally)
Being completely unacquainted with the delicately sodden practice of wet-foot portaging and canoeing, I found the most successful principle as we traversed Bald Eagle Lake was to shush up and copy what I saw. Bit by agonising bit, I improved. In some cosmic twist of irony, the lighter and more optimistic I grew in the stern, the darker and more brooding the horizon became. Go figure, right?
The squall hit us full force as we bunted across Clearwater; Pagami was playing hard to get, you had to brave the tempest to gain admission!
Day 3. Showtime. After all the repartee, (none of which I care to repeat) I felt rather like I was stealing down a festive high-street in New Orleans as we turned from respectable Pagami Lake into the clutches of the creek. The rangers’ warning against attempting this voyage, given the morning before, hung heavy and unspoken in the air as the timid sun summoned a battalion of bugs from the marsh.
Winding through the twisting, alien waterway streets like Louis in Interview with the Vampire, we were simultaneously enthralled and repugnated by Pagami’s unique features. The snake-like canal kept our pace slow; the stern’s constant correction against the opaque water being the only sound punctuating Pagami’s oppressive stillness. She demanded near-silence as you ventured deeper. Instead of temperate pines standing straight-backed and orderly which distinguished most of the North Woods, we made our way through fenland– tall grasses, thickets and mud. No, mud sounds too polite, too terrestrial. It wasn’t mud. It was bog. Evil, sadistic, ominous-smelling bog.
Then there were the dams. Blockage after blockage of beaver-built bastions. Hand-crafted, I have to assume, by Pagami and her furry constituents for our humiliation. On most, an inelegant and noxious clamber allowed us to heave our canoes into the next section of creek. However one particularly cruel, if memorable, instance saw us crashing through trail-less quagmire and over moss-covered boulders in a desperate bid after encountering an 8-foot impregnable dam. There is no beating Pagami, one must instead wage one valiant battle after another to survive her.
I’m proud to say we did survive her. Like emerging into the natal daylight after revelling deep within that New Orleans’ clamour, we floated muddy-kneed and grinning into Lake One. Ego seems to be a prevailing factor in the seemingly machismo world of outdoor recreation, but the opportunity to be taught skills of the Boundary Waters by both the apt hands of my fellow counsellors and by the wiles of the creek promotes the opposite of ego; gratitude, and a hunger for that which you have no knowledge.
I should think that one leaves a piece of their heart behind in every monumental first; for though I have illustrated this trip of ours with a certain cynical humour, I do not think I can express quite fully the gratification and importance of taking on a challenge such as this.
So though my shoes will likely always smell questionable, and never again be fully dry, the trip, and Pagami herself, have thoroughly earned that piece of my heart.
By: Stan Wills, Australia
