Late on a July afternoon, we began poling up Wisconsin's Brule River. Four canoes, eight of us in all. We would move upstream a couple of miles, find an appropriate spot and grill brats and chicken over a fire.
For weary paddlers making their way downstream toward the Winneboujou Landing, we must have seemed unorthodox, at the least. Poling a canoe upstream is something of a lost art.
It takes just the right kind of river to make poling practical. The stream must be shallow, with just enough current to make efficient upstream paddling a little too hard.
The Brule is just right. Fishing guides and trout anglers have been poling the river for decades.
In poling, the poler stands in the stern and uses a slender pole about 10 feet long, fitted with a metal cover on its lower tip. The bow paddler sits back and relaxes.
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The poler, holding a few feet down from the top of the pole, plants its base on the stream bottom, Then, walking his or her hands up the pole, the poler pushes the base of the pole toward the rear of the canoe. The canoe slides forward a few feet with every push.
It isn't fast, but it's steady.
Poling up a set of rapids can be tricky. If the bow gets a little bit to one side, the current will catch it and try to swing it downstream. In that case, there's nothing to do but let it go and start over at the bottom of the rapids. Worst-case scenario, the occupants make an unscheduled swim.
On that recent evening, we met several canoes headed downstream.
"Defying physics, huh?" one paddler said.
"Is that easier than paddling?" a woman asked.
I guess the answer to both is "yes."
On a warm summer afternoon, standing barefoot on the floor of the canoe, poling puts you in touch with your inner Tom Sawyer. You felt intimately connected to the river, reading every nuance of the current. With every subtle nudge of the Brule, you react from feet to legs to torso to arms to hands -- to pole.
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We felt immersed in the river world, as much a part of it as the old cedars leaning out from shore, the strands of grass waving in the current and the kingfishers swooping for a minnowy morsel. The pale blue of forget-me-nots adorned moss-covered logs at the river's edge. Upriver, a whitetail in its summer red paused midstream to check out our flotilla.
As the shadows lengthened, the day's heat began to dissipate. The Brule took on its evening personality. Somewhere down beneath the tangled roots and overhanging banks, resident brown trout began to think about sipping insects.
We had a fine dinner upstream and sat on the cedar needles afterward, watching the river slide silently past.
It must not have been too late when we paddled back down. The whippoorwills weren't calling yet.
SAM COOK is a Duluth News Tribune columnist and outdoors writer. Reach him at (218) 723-5332 or scook@duluthnews.com . Follow him on Twitter at "twitter.com/ samcookoutdoors."
