Going with the flow in Ontario

As Canada celebrates its 150th anniversary, Abi Jackson delves even deeper into its history, exploring the area via canoe

Greg Elmhirst, general manager of the Elmhirst Resort, has a theory why paddle sports are growing in popularity. “People are turning more towards ‘silent sports’,” he observes. “When I was a kid, people were more into motors. We’re craving something more calm and relaxing.”

It certainly fits my bill – except, it wouldn’t be entirely accurate to call my first paddle around Lake Rice, the dazzling 32km (20 mile)-long watery stretch on whose shores Elmhirst Resort nests, in a traditional-style, big, eight-seater Canadian canoe, completely silent. Not if you count the gentle flip-flap of water against wood, as we bob along.

It’s a leisurely introduction to this unassuming watercraft, which I soon discover has played a starring role in Canada’s history.

The country celebrates its 150th anniversary this year – though of course, this gigantic nation of 10 provinces (most of which dwarf the whole of the UK), home to more than half the world’s polar bears (not to mention most of the world’s maple syrup), has been around a heck of a lot longer than one-and-a-half centuries.

The anniversary actually marks 150 years since the British North America Act was passed by British Parliament, marking the start of Canada’s new era as a self-governing federation.

And there’s a lot to celebrate; from the late 19th Century onwards, on the whole, Canada’s population and economy flourished, helped in no small part by the development of the railways.

But long before any of this was on track, Canada’s indigenous people were blazing trails of their own – hunting, trading, transporting goods and simply getting from A to B with the help of their canoes.

The oldest ones were “dugouts”, huge carved-out tree trunks. North American Aboriginals are credited with pioneering the most widely-recognised version of the canoe – wide wooden frames covered with lightweight strips of bark – which date back thousands of years.

If you’re after serious adventure, you could retrace some of their routes across multiple provinces, forgoing mod cons for camping kit carried on board, as many of the nomadic Algonquin communities, or fur trade voyageurs in the 17th Century, would have done.

I’m only here for a week so am sticking to Ontario but home to more than 250,000 of the country’s 31,800 lakes (more than 50% of the world’s lakes are in Canada), it’s a good place to start.

Greg’s in full agreement. “This area’s the centre of the canoe universe, false modesty aside,” he states, noting there are three canoe factories within a few miles of family-run Elmhirst, which in the heart of the Kawarthas region, is a two-hour drive from Toronto.

And there’s much more besides canoeing here; there’s skating in winter, fishing, hiking trails, wine tasting and float plane rides, so you can take in the views from the sky.

There’s a spa too, for a spot of pampering after all that outdoorsy fun but if blissful calm is what you’re after, you need only venture a few feet from your bedroom.

The morning after my arrival, following the best nights’ sleep of my life (I knew lakeside living would agree with me), I plod into the kitchen, brew some coffee, then carry my mug a few grassy steps from my white-painted clad cottage to the lake and sit on a little wooden jetty, sipping as the sun rises.

Less than an hour’s drive away in Peterborough is the Canadian Canoe Museum, proud home to the world’s largest collection of the craft (one of the oldest was found in a shed in Cornwall a few years ago; it’s believed a British lieutenant who fought in Canada during the American War of Independence in the late 1700s took it over to the UK) and a great place to get a better understanding of how symbolic this banana-shaped vessel really is.

“A lot of what makes each canoe