A Summer Alight
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Lake Superior Journal LOIS NUTTALL Porphyry Island presents a remote but ruggedly beautiful outcrop off the eastern edge of Sibley Peninsula in Ontario. A Summer Alight Father & Son (& Pup) Meet Island Life with Zest by Adam de Pencier on Porphyry Island, just east off the given her love of swimming, we expect tip of the Sleeping Giant. she’ll enjoy this adventure as much as Before you reach the lighthouse you This journey has a purpose. I’m we will. have to cross the Lake, and before you one of the artists-in-residence for the Most visitors from the lower reach the Lake you have to drive the month of August with Canadian Great Lakes fly to Thunder Bay, but road – a long road to be sure, but for Lighthouses of Lake Superior, an we’ve almost always driven, partly for my youngest son, Hannibal, who at organization heading the movement practical reasons, but there’s also 16 just got his driver’s license, the to preserve, protect and promote these something about logging those road 921-kilometre (572-mile) trek to Lake lighthouses. My mandate is to file kilometres. (Driving from Toronto the Superior from Toronto lets him ply his stories for Thunder Bay’s Chronicle other direction to Chattanooga, new skills along the expansive Trans- Journal and write blog posts; it is, for Tennessee, is about the same distance Canada Highway. me, a labour of love. as to Thunder Bay.) My family has visited Lake Besides Hannibal and me, the From our home near the Superior for several years. Hannibal third member of our traveling party is comparatively calm shore of Lake and his older brother, Fin, both Puff, our King Shepherd (a German Ontario, farmland eventually gives practically learned to swim in and Shepherd-Newfoundland mix). Puff is way to pink granite in the Canadian around Rossport, Ontario. (Neither as hale and hardy as she is sociable, and Shield. Striking west along Lake got hypothermia in the Huron’s North process, all you Big Lake ONTARIO Channel, you begin to swimming naysayers.) get a real big lake feel. MINNESOTA On this mid-August Battle Island Still, Lake trip north, we plan to Huron/Georgian Bay MICHIGAN journey even farther, out WISCONSIN are lyric, while Lake to two of the more Superior is epic, and remote Ontario soon enough you begin lighthouses – on Battle Thunder Bay the marvellous – for Island off Rossport and Sibley there is no other word Peninsula Porphyry Island JUNE / JULY 2017 Lake Superior Magazine 13 LOIS NUTTALL Top left: Lissi Ranta, Stephanie Cressman, the author and his son Hannibal pose atop the lighthouse. Right: Puff accompanies author Adam de Pencier in a nightly bagpipe serenade. Bottom left: The crew and guests, including host Paul Morralee (standing in gray T-shirt). to describe it – passage along Lake a black sand beach blending into the Thunder Bay filmmaker spending Superior’s northern shore. boreal forest. the summer on the island. Ropes, We arrive at Rossport, where We make our way up the gentle fuel, ice and other supplies are we climb aboard a skiff to visit the incline to the once inhabited part of meticulously loaded prior to the 1 Battle Island Lighthouse, famous for the island and pitch our tent in a 1 ⁄2-hour trip out to the light. a 1977 storm that blew out the great camping site beside the roped- Skippering a 1952-style wooden windows, almost 150 feet above the off cliff. The light itself is accessible 26-footer crafted by Jon Olson in Lake. The name has a connection to via a precipitous set of stairs. After 1995, Paul tells us some of his own the 1885 rebellion led by Louis Riel, the climb, you are rewarded with a story. He grew up in the rarefied a Métis leader from Saskatchewan. panoramic view to the west across precincts of the world’s oldest English Before setting out, I hoist our gas the Simpson Channel, one of the university town, Oxford, before can, and in the process disturb a nest main channels into Nipigon Bay. moving as a boy to Deep River, of wasps on the pier and am rewarded During our three-day stay, the Ontario, where his dad worked at the for my clumsiness by several sharp island becomes a crossroads with Chalk River nuclear plant. After stings. Happily, Hannibal, with his visitors from Minnesota, Michigan, some stints in Ottawa, Toronto and bee-sting allergy, and Puff are spared. Quebec and Germany. Two of the Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, Paul By the time we head out, it’s three groups arrive by kayak, a settled at Thunder Bay in 1991. late afternoon with a freshening popular way to reach Battle, with From this home base, he has travelled breeze. We are careful in crossing, the third arriving by powerboat. the world making award-winning but mistakenly hop across one or Our next lighthouse stop proves documentary films. two islands before alighting at busier still. The light at Porphyry Finally, we land on a brand new Battle. The skiff, we discover, is Island guides commercial traffic to spruce dock and begin the 15-minute probably two to three feet short of and from Thunder Bay and is even walk along the path to the base of the appropriate for these waters, yet we farther from the mainland than lighthouse and the surrounding avoid being swamped by waves. Battle. Porphyry is named for a buildings. The path is a botanical Battle offers a splendid vantage purple-tinged rock with feldspar treasure-trove, bordered by trees from both land and water. A crystals found in the area. dripping with bearded moss that look sheltered anchorage includes a dock We are greeted at the wharf in prehistoric. Even though the Lake is on the south side of the island, with Silver Islet by Paul Morralee, a no more than a hundred metres away, 14 Lake Superior Magazine JUNE / JULY 2017 Lake Superior Journal the forest floor remains absolutely Puff’s job reflects her talent – bringing home amazing memories of silent, so much so that it jars me into fetching sticks thrown into the surf by special places. realizing how much ambient or “white anyone. She quickly earns status as the And at the end of the day, these noise” there is back in Toronto. “Lady of the Lake,” spending much of lighthouses still have a vital function – The lighthouse is a hefty climb, her day in the waves (a true fisherman’s their historical resonance complements but the payoff is an unmatched view of Newfie). Her only complaint comes their practical purpose. Like the canoe the entrance to Black Bay, the Sleeping late in the week when she is confined and the railroad, lighthouses have been Giant and surrounding islands. The to quarters after a bear sighting. essential in building thriving vista stretches to an unimpeded look at Strictly speaking, she registers a few communities on the American and the entire length of Isle Royale, the other complaints each evening when I, Canadian shores of Lake Superior. closest piece of American shoreline. a lifelong bagpiper, play highland airs. Long may they stand overlooking (On our map it looks, to this Puff regales us with her howling – the sweetwater sea. Canadian at least, like Isle Royale either as accompaniment or protest. should be flying the Maple Leaf Our five days on Porphyry pass all instead of the Stars and Stripes!) too quickly. It seems we no sooner This issue’s Journal writer: Porphyry has a few summer arrive than we are packing to return to Toronto writer Adam de residents this year. We spot artist-in- Silver Islet. Hannibal says that the Pencier has travelled residence Lois Nuttall, a gifted island is “a place that grounds you: you extensively around Lake Thunder Bay photographer, perching have to slow down, relax and having Superior and has written here and there, day and night. Paul can done so, you notice everything.” about it for the National take credit for this artistic initiative, Journeying to these lighthouses Post. A school principal at Blyth along with everything else that goes on takes you off the beaten tourist paths Academy in Toronto, he looks forward to here at the light. The hope is that by and, like anything worth achieving, returning to Porphyry Island this June inviting talented artists, it will inspire they’re not easy to reach. Anyone who with several students. Find Canadian their work, which in turn will profile makes the effort will have no regrets, Lighthouses of Lake Superior at clls.ca. both the light and the Lake. Also spending the summer with Paul are student lighthouse keepers Lissi Ranta and Stephanie Cressman, who study at the universities of Manitoba in Winnipeg and Lakehead in Thunder Bay, respectively. Hannibal, Puff and I have tasks, too. Hannibal helps Lissi and Stephanie paint, clear brush, give tours to visitors, even do curatorial work at Porphyry’s new art gallery. Paul orchestrates all this while Lois takes photos and I write. We gather late each afternoon to swim (yes, you heard that right) and this year’s Lake temperature seems to be at an all-time high, topping 70° F. Swimming in Lake Superior on a sunny, windy afternoon feels like the Hawaiian or Greek islands; the waves are enormous and the Lake’s unmatched clarity envelopes you like an azure tropical sea. We’re careful, though. The Lake can and does throw up nasty rip currents known to carry off the unprepared. (The trick is to swim perpendicular to the flow, even if that means parallel to – and not toward – the shore.) JUNE / JULY 2017 Lake Superior Magazine 15.