This article covers the water based Canadian canoe routes used by early explorers of Canada with special emphasis on the fur trade.
Introduction European exploration of the Canadian interior was principally by river. The land has many navigable rivers with short portages between them. There are no serious barriers to water-borne travel east of the Rockies. The fur trade, principally in beaver, drove and financed exploration and initial settlement. Traders obtained furs from the natives and exported them to Europe.
Canada and Siberia Both Canada and Siberia are largely covered by boreal forest. Both were opened up by water-borne fur traders. In both countries the problem was to find streams that flowed in approximately the right direction and to find short portages to move from one river basin to the next. Both regions are flat. One can move from the Saint Lawrence to the Rockies or from the Urals almost to the Pacific with only a few short portages. In both countries furs were obtained by natives and exported by Europeans. In Siberia a band of armed Cossacks would enter a native village and demand yasak or tribute. In Canada furs were exchanged for European merchandise.
Russian expansion into Siberia began with the conquest of the Khanate of Sibir in 1582. Fifty seven years later they reached the Pacific. European settlement of Canada began in 1583 (St. John's), 1605 (Port Royal, Nova Scotia), and 1608 (Quebec City). Canada-based Europeans reached the Arctic Ocean in 1789 and the Pacific in 1793, both expeditions led by Alexander Mackenzie. For Siberian exploration see Siberian River Routes and its linked articles.
Gateways to the continent
An explorer naturally wishes to travel as far as possible by water. Hudson Bay gets one more than a third of the way across the continent, but it leads to unproductive country and is blocked by ice for most of the year. The Mississippi River is a natural entry point, but it only began to be used in 1718 with the foundation of New Orleans. Early sea ships could follow the Hudson River as far as Albany, but this leads north to the Saint Lawrence and westward travel was blocked by the Iroquois league. The Chesapeake and Delaware Bays lead a short way inland and the other east coast rivers are too short or shallow to be of much use. This leaves the St. Lawrence River.
Two ages of trade and exploration French Era: In the 16th century, cod fishermen began trading for furs, especially at Tadoussac on the St. Lawrence River. With the foundation of Quebec in 1608, Coureurs des bois spread out through the many rivers and lakes to trade with the Indians, while Indians would carry canoe-loads of fur down to Montreal. Nearby tribes became middlemen, drawing furs from further inland. Montreal was the main base where furs were stored before transshipment to Europe. By the end of the period, trade and exploration had spread to all the Great Lakes and was extending down the Mississippi. Meanwhile, the British maintained posts on Hudson Bay, ignored the interior and waited for Indians to bring furs to them.
British Era: The second era began when trade reached the pays d'en haut west of Lake Superior. In these cold lands beaver had longer and thicker fur. After the British conquered Canada in 1759, management of the Montreal trade was taken over by English-speakers while the real work continued to be done by French-Canadians. The Montreal-based North West Company was formed in 1779 largely because distances had become so great as to require a highly organized transport system (The Athabasca country was 3000 miles from Montreal and a canoe might go 1000 miles in a month). The independent coureur des bois was replaced by hired voyageurs. Since the west country was too far for a round trip in one season, each spring, when the ice broke up, boats would set out from Montreal while winterers would start east. They exchanged their goods at Grand Portage on Lake Superior and returned before the rivers froze five months later. To save the cost of hauling food from Montreal, Metis around Winnipeg began the large-scale production of pemmican. The Hudson Bay trade was diverted southwest to the edge of the prairie where pemmican was picked up to feed the voyageurs on their journey northwest to the Athabasca country. Competition from the Nor'Westers forced the Hudson's Bay Company to build posts in the interior. The two companies competed for a while and, in 1821, merged. Management was taken over by the capital-rich HBC, but trading methods were those of the Montreal-based Nor'Westers. Much trade shifted to York Factory and later some went south to Minnesota. After 1810 the western posts were linked to the British bases on the Oregon coast. By mid-century the HBC ruled an inland empire that stretched from Hudson Bay to the Pacific. The Carlton Trail became a land route across the prairies. HBC land claims were transferred to Canada by the Rupert's Land Act 1868. From 1874 the North-West Mounted Police began to extend formal government into the area. The fur trade routes grew obsolete from the 1880s with the coming of railways and steamships.
St. Lawrence River basin
Seagoing ships can reach Quebec City and smaller ones can reach Montreal. One might think that the route would continue up the St. Lawrence, but this was not the case. Possible reasons are the Lachine Rapids and other rapids above Montreal, Niagara Falls, Iroquois hostility, the poorer quality of southern furs and the lack of large birch trees to make canoes. The route west from Montreal has been called the 'first Trans-Canada Highway'. It ran from near Montreal, up the Ottawa River, west up the Mattawa River to Trout Lake and over the 7 mile La Vase portage at what is now North Bay on Lake Nipissing and down the French River to Georgian Bay of Lake Huron. This route was first used by Étienne Brûlé in 1610 and later by Champlain.Butterfield (1898). When the Iroquois made the Ottawa dangerous it was possible for small canoes to continue up the Ottawa above the Mattawa and from its sources across to the Saint-Maurice River and down to the St. Lawrence at Trois-Rivières.
Routes ran from the French River south to the Jesuit Huron missions at the southern end of Georgian Bay (1626–1640), west through the Strait of Mackinac to Lake Michigan, or west north of Manitoulin Island and up the St Marys River (26 feet difference in elevation) to Lake Superior. On Lake Superior voyageurs would normally hug the northern shore because of the danger of frequent squalls that could overturn their boats.
The route up the St. Lawrence to Lake Ontario, Niagara Falls, Lake Erie, Detroit River, Lake St. Clair, St. Clair River and lower Lake Huron developed later (Adrien Jolliet in 1669 was probably the first) and was never the main westward route. North of the St. Lawrence were many complex lakes and rivers that were sometimes used to go as far as James Bay. The Toronto Carrying-Place Trail was a major portage route in the St. Lawrence basin, linking Lake Ontario with Lake Simcoe and the northern Great Lakes.
Nelson River basin
The Canada–United States border meets Lake Superior near Grand Portage, Minnesota. From here to Lake of the Woods the voyageurs' route went northwest across the 9 mile (14 km) long Grand Portage to avoid the falls and canyon of the Pigeon River, thence along the present international border west up the long Pigeon River and Arrow River to South Lake, and then across the Height of Land Portage to North Lake whose waters drain into Hudson Bay. From North Lake the route goes through Gunflint Lake, thence down the Pine and Granite Rivers to Saganaga lake and through a chain of lakes, including Knife and Basswood Lakes, to Lac La Croix, where the route from Fort William comes in. It continues down the Loon River to Lake Namakan and north over either of two portages to Rainy Lake (a depot was established here to shorten the voyage of the Athabasca brigade) and down the Rainy River to Lake of the Woods west-northwest of Grand Portage. Leaving the US border, northwest down the Winnipeg River with 26 portages to Lake Winnipeg, a poor lake for small craft. This area was opened up by La Vérendrye in 1731–1737. Following the current downstream leads to the Nelson River and Hudson Bay, which is not very useful. (The Nelson River is difficult and the parallel Hayes River was preferred. The Hayes route became more important after 1821 when much trade shifted from Montreal to York Factory)
In 1803 it was found that Grand Portage was on the US side of the border and the Lake Superior base was moved northeast to Fort William, Ontario, from which an old trail led inland to the north and west to Lac La Croix in the watershed of the Rainy River.Lass (1980), pp. 37–39, 44. For the two routes from Lake Superior see Grand Portage National Monument and Kaministiquia River.
A minor route ran from Duluth, Minnesota, west and north up the St. Louis River and Embarrass River over another Height of Land Portage and north down the Pike River (Minnesota) and Vermilion River (Minnesota) to Rainy Lake on the Grand Portage route. During the negotiations for the Webster-Ashburton Treaty Britain tried to make this as the Canada–US border.Lass (1980), pp. 37–39, 49Vogel et al. (1992), pp. E-12, E-13.
The Saskatchewan River enters Lake Winnipeg at Grand Rapids, Manitoba. Around these rapids to Cedar Lake. (Cedar Lake is one of the chain of lakes that look like a single lake west of Lake Winnipeg.) Although it was not much used, a route ran from Cedar Lake south over the Mossy portage to Lake Winnipegosis and then the mile-and-a-half Meadow Portage to Lake Manitoba and then at least of Portage la Prairie to the Assiniboine River. Another route reached Lake Manitoba from Lake Winnipeg via the Dauphin River. Up the Saskatchewan, past Cumberland House and up the North Saskatchewan River almost to the Rocky Mountains at Fort Edmonton and Rocky Mountain House, Alberta. The North Saskatchewan is approximately the southern limit of forested beaver country. There are no portages between Cumberland and Edmonton, but there are sand bars and stretch of strong current east of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan where canoes were dragged upstream on ropes. Above Prince Albert is the La Montée prairie country where voyageurs were fed by buffalo hunters. Both York boats and north canoes were used. Trade was helped by the fact that the Cree Language was spoken along the whole route. South of the river there was enough grass for horses and one could travel from Edmonton to Red River on horseback. Horses were used for speed and canoes for freight. There are, of course, no canoe routes over the Rockies.
The Assiniboine River which meets the Red River just south of Lake Winnipeg provided another route west. The Red River of the North, which flows north into the southern tip of Lake Winnipeg gained some importance after 1812 with the establishment of the Red River Colony and when the Metis began supplying buffalo Pemmican to feed the voyageurs. These are prairie rivers and not good beaver country. Much transport was by horse and Red River cart, and American traders were able to subvert the British monopoly over the fur trade by siphoning off much of the trade to entrepôts on the Mississippi River to the south by way of the Red River Trails.Gilman (1979), pp. 7-8, 14
Mackenzie River basin