To celebrate the 150th anniversary of the founding of Canada, a long-distance paddler is making the epic 4750-mile (7644 km) journey cross-country by canoe. Navigating remote rivers and lakes, while portaging around obstacles, over roads, and between bodies of water, Mike Ranta is now seven months into the journey, which is has undertaken for the third time.
According to Men’s Journal, his particular journey began back on April 1 at Bella Coola, British Columbia. Ranta, along with a photographer by the name of David Jackson, set out together by first hauling their boats 625 miles (1005 km) by cart into the Rocky Mountains, where they then made their first put-in at Bow River in Calgary. Since that time, they’ve spent 130 days on the water, stopping in towns to replenish their supplies along the way.
Currently, Ranta and Jackson are making their way across Ontario, but the goal is to reach Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia by November 1. Looking at their tracking page, it seems like they have an awfully long way to go before the get to that point however, and October is already slipping away.
As mentioned, this is Ranta’s third paddling expedition across his home country. In the past, he’s gone solo on those expeditions, but this time out Jackson wanted to tag along in order to document the journey using his cameras. The first crossing occurred back in 2014, but Ranta wasn’t content to stay at home for very long, and repeated the journey in 2016, completing the trans-Canadian paddle in 200 days. His dog Spitzii accompanies him on these trips.
So why does he keep crossing Canada in a canoe? Ranta tells Men’s Journal “I just love to paddle,” which is a good enough reason for me.
You can read more about Mike and his expeditions on his official website, where you’ll also be able to follow along with his progress on this particular trip. He’s also posting updates to Facebook at Twitter too.
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