We ended the day in Mattawa Ontario along the Ottawa River. As I had learned from my Barbara Huck book, French explorers Champlain, Brulé and Radisson all passed through this area on the way further west. I guess they also returned on the way east.   It was a regular stop on the fur trade route.

When we arrived in Mattawa , we selected a motel fairly quickly. Too quickly it turned out. Unless we had reserved ahead of time we usually found a motel or B&B on line.  Often that worked fine. Often not so fine. This was one of the ‘not so fine’ days. Quite often, particularly in Northern Ontario, just when Christiane thought she was securing a great place to stay  she discovered her phone was “out of bars,” which meant I gathered, she lost the technological connection and was thrown off course. No towers were in range.  That is what happened so we had to find a motel the old-fashioned way. Scoping it out where there were slim pickings.  That’s what ’s we did. The motel looked acceptable and had a real nice dining room overlooking the Ottawa River.

Mattawa is found at the confluence of the Mattawa and Ottawa Rivers in Nipissing District Ontario. I had never realized it before but Huck drew to my attention that “Today’s Ottawa River—with dozens of dams and reservoirs—is a docile, domesticated descendant of the wild waterway the fur traders knew.” Just like the Winnipeg River. And just like so much of Canada. So much of our country has been domesticated in the name of progress. Today, as we sat in the restaurant of our motel the river was a like placid lake. There was a lone boat anchored in the middle of it with a diligent fisherman enjoying the wonderful day. I guess domestication is not tall bad. Domestication has its place. My wife told me that so I am convinced.

Huck described it this way,

“Then [during the fur trade] particularly between Mattawa and Montreal, the river was a punishing, and often deadly, series of cataracts. But for fur traders enroute to the Great Lakes, it was nearly 500 kilometres shorter than the alternative route down the St. Lawrence and through Lakes Ontario and Erie.”

And of course, to the instruments of capitalism in the big cities distance and time were all important. The safety of the men not so much. Of course, who knows perhaps the voyageurs might have chosen the shorter and more dangerous route on their own. To them as well, time was money.  It was not just the greedy capitalists who appreciated money.

Our motel referred to itself as “your outdoor adventure’s dream.”  Nightmare would have been a better description. It looked really good. Right on the shores of the Ottawa River.  When we tried to secure a room, we were told we would have to go to the restaurant first.  We did not mind; there was no other restaurant around and we had noticed that the food looked good. We selected a seat by the window overlooking the river and drank in the view. It was outstanding. The river was like glass. There was one boat anchored in the middle of the river with a lone fisherman. It looked idyllic. It was a tranquil day with a fisherman or woman basking in the sun. The temperatures this day were very warm for autumn. In fact, I think it was record heat that day.

We started with drinks. Christiane had a Jameson and I had a Captain Morgan dark rum in honour of my trip to Wawa in 1967 with my buddies. That was my drink of choice that summer. We toasted the Cap’n. We were under age and just learning to drink. We were very stupid in other words. Today, we were smart. So at least I thought. Of course, now that I think of it, we thought we were smart in 1967 too.

I am sorry but the photograph I had of this site has disappeared into the digital ether never to be seen again. You will have to visualize it. My bad. Again.

After we settled in to our room, we thought we would open the screen window rather than air-conditioning as we thought (wrongly) that the AC was not working. Then we noticed an unwelcome sight. The window sill was covered—literally covered—in a pile of dead black flies about an inch or two thick, it seemed. It was rather disconcerting.  Actually, it was downright creepy. We wondered what caused the flies to come here to die? Was it the record heat wave? How long had they been lying there? Speculating did not help us to accept the scene. It was black fly Armageddon.

But it was late at night and we did not want to try to find a better room. This town had very few. We tried our best to clean up the corpses and put them out of our memories. Sometimes travel is not for the faint of heart. When you travel, you have to be prepared for everything.

This might not be the worst motel experience  we ever had, but it was definitely a contender for that crown.