Maps provided courtesy of Toporama which contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Canada. I have marked my route in blue and portages in red. 

On the third Friday of August, I rocked up to my father's door at 6:30 AM to pick him up for the trip. We loaded his gear into my vehicle and were off in the direction of the Ottawa Valley. We made good time and after a couple of stops for gas and coffee, we arrived at Esprit Whitewater outside of Fort Coulonge, Quebec just after 11 AM. There, we met the owner, Jim, and our driver, Dennis. We loaded their van with our canoe and gear and departed their location slightly before noon. 

The drive to our put-in location was on a series of gravel and logging roads. Dennis, our driver, was very nice and was incredibly knowledgeable about the area. He mentioned that he had been shuttling customers to the Three Sisters and other adventure locations in the region since the 1990s. It was a pleasant drive with a nice exchange of stories about canoe adventures. 

We arrived at our put-in location around 2 PM, slightly over two hours after leaving Esprit. A two-hour shuttle only? On the one hand, we were happy to arrive early at our put-in location. It meant we would have more time on the day to get further downriver. On the other hand, we were wondering about the 6-hour shuttle that we had paid for. The Esprit Whitewater website did say that the $950.00 + tax shuttle was a 6-hour shuttle, yet somehow we paid that amount for a two-hour shuttle. We were confused. Did the website mean it was a 6-hour return drive for our driver including loading and unloading time? If so, I grossly misinterpreted what the website meant as a 6-hour shuttle for customers. As far as I understood, the bridge that was our put-in location near Pilon Creek was fairly new. (I couldn't find any online data on the validity of that.) Did that mean the road was also new and there was now a more direct and faster route to the Meanders than when it was originally priced? We didn't really try to get those answers at the time from Dennis because we were just happy to be there and our thoughts were concentrated on getting unloaded and starting our trip, but we didn't understand how a 6-hour shuttle was actually only two hours?  We had been shuttled several times in recent years on various trips and paid far less for a shuttle of that duration and length.  To put it in perspective, the 2025 rate for Lakeland Airways to fly myself, my father, and our canoe into the interior of Temagami is $962.00 + tax. So, for a two-hour van shuttle, we essentially paid the same price as a fly-in trip deep into Temagami. 

After removing our canoe and gear from the van, we said our goodbyes to Dennis and carried our belongings down the steep slope from the road to the water. We loaded the boat, and Dad gave us the thumbs-up to start our adventure. 

We pushed off and entered the swifts of the Coulonge. Water levels appeared to be very high for the third week of August and we couldn't have been happier about that. 

We rounded a bend and immediately ran into a young family playing on a sandspit in the river. We waved to each other as we floated past. They must have accessed the river from the road just up from where we put in. With the many cabins, roads, and trails that meet the river, we knew we weren't going to be on a remote wilderness trip. The chances of seeing wildlife would be relatively lower than on other trips that we have made. We weren't too fussed about that, though. We were looking forward to running some fun rapids and enjoying the scenery. We were also looking forward to staying at some interesting campsites that the Coulonge purportedly had along its banks.  

There were a few swifts for the first five or ten minutes and then the river slowed down somewhat. Within 15 minutes, we were paddling under some impressively large sand cliffs lining the riverbank. 

Downriver from those banks, the Coulonge River twisted and turned quite a bit. One might say it 'meandered'. Hmmm, I wonder if that is why the section was called the 'Meanders'? The banks were sandy and bushy; there was very little rock if any at all. 

On the many turns, there were ample spots to pitch a tent on some of the small sandbars, however, in the high water, the space was somewhat limited. We guessed that at normal August water levels, there would be more room.  We weren't in the market for this kind of campsite, however. I brought a hammock on the trip, so we were looking for sites amongst the trees. On portages and next to rapids and falls would be the best locations for that. Besides, I'd take higher water levels over sand space on the river banks any day of the week. With our swift progress in the current, we decided to aim for the Hap Wilson-recommended site at the junction with the Corneille River to camp for the night. 

The only thing out of the ordinary that we noticed en route to the campsite was a tarped structure of some sort on river-right about an hour after we put in. 

In retrospect, it wasn't the most enthralling paddle along this section of the river, but it was pleasant. There was quite a bit of birdlife, and the steady current kept us moving at a good clip for the most part. We were averaging about 8 kilometres an hour when paddling at a normal pace. We weren't in a hurry though; we would just drift along, taking in the sights when we felt the current pick up at certain points.  

Not long after observing Bryson Creek flowing into the river on the right and exactly three hours after putting in, we noticed the river moving at more of a downhill trajectory. We could see some rapids up ahead at a bend.  

As we got closer, we saw that those rapids were caused by a tributary flowing into the Coulonge from the left.  We immediately realized it was the Corneille River and we had reached our destination for the day. We began drawing the canoe to river-left, where the campsite supposedly existed on the north side of the junction. 

Approaching the confluence, we spotted the sandy landing spot on the point between the rivers. It was tricky business getting there, however, because it was behind some exposed rocks in a fairly strong push of current. We had to do an eddy turn behind a rock to get to a spot where we could exit the boat safely without continuing our ride down the rapids and past the campsite. We pulled the canoe ashore, unloaded it, brought it up to a safe spot between the two rivers behind a bush, and flipped it for the night. The photo below is the view looking up the  Corneille over the last set of rapids before it joins the Coulonge.  

This next photo is a shot of the reverse direction from the same spot looking over the Coulonge. 

The campsite was up on the bank in a clearing between the two rivers. It was spacious with plenty of room for many tents. Dad set up his tent on a nice flat spot at the back of the site, and I found a couple of nicely-spaced trees for my hammock closer to the river. We gathered some wood, and made a nice fire for our first-night ritual of grilling steak over an open flame. 

Little did we know at the time, but this would only be one of two evenings on our trip down the Coulonge River without rain. The sun began to set and eventually, we watched the moon rise over the river in the south shortly after 8 PM.