Champlain Day

Had a great time at Bell park on the weekend, i set up my first artists vendor booth for the French Champlain Festival. DIdn't make much money, but got a few comissions for house illustrations and christmas cards. Kind of cool to put art out there and get positive responses. All of us were annd are way more talented than we gave ourselves credit for.

Also in the Sudbury Star I have had a series about Champlain over the last three saturdays. The fourth part comes out this saturday. The other three are up on their website now.

Champlain will always be synonymous with canoes and I love canoes and canoeing. I have paddled the historic Mattawa river thay Champlain woukd have paddled. It is a beautiful paddle but has some rapids that were above my skill level. The portages were not excessively grueling but I imagine back then, before the trails were opened up and the gear they would have carried made ever portage a gruelling one. I think I have paddled a few historic routes during the time I paddled that area. Such beauty and history. I really enjoyed paddling to peteoglyhs and seeing them. A lot of them were at river junctions and all were of animals and I believe had a lot to do with trade.

And congratulations on getting some art and writing out there for other people to enjoy.

What approach did you take to Champlain? Did you manage to re-insert the Gougou back into the narrative? I picked up a copy of his journals at Allison's last month due to the talks we've had.