I’ve canoed in Pennsylvania (Allegheny River) and Canada (Kipiwa Game Preserve, Quebec, French River and Magnetawan River, Ontario) and held an ACA Moving Water instructor certification. But I sold my beautiful 17″ Kevlar canoe in 2004 and moved to the Las Vegas valley. I still have my 18″ Sea Star Kevlar sea kayak.
To me canoeing is great and portaging is a price to be paid for the ease and of paddling in the wilderness beauty of Canada and Minnesota.
Be sure to buy Bill Mason’s book “Path of the Paddle”. It is still, after decades, the very best book on how to paddle in various situations. Master it and you will be and expert canoeist. For example learning how to travel in a nearly straight line from one river bank to the opposite side is a skill that once learned is easy to do. Hint: point your bow upriver at a slight angle to the flow.
Mason’s companion book, ” Song of the Paddle” is about canoe camping but is outdated in terms of equipment. If you are a decent backpacker you can easily canoe camp so these days the book is more of a curiosity than instructive.
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