Saturday, July 12 – 2008
11:00 – 14:45
Start: 10:00
Roads: Dry / Clear
Visibility: 24km
Temp: +30C
Area: Charles Dailey Park
Vehicle: Blue Pontiac Grand Prix
Weather: Mostly Cloudy
Trail Conditions: Dry
Hikers: Wolf, Chris
Plan: Find an island in the 16 mile creek
GPS: 43 09.98N by 79 19.88W
08:00 Wake up early to get all packed and rady for the day. Packed a lunch and gear for our trip
10:00 Drop Tori off at her new job and head to Dereks mothers house to pick up our aluminium Sportsman canoe and head to Charles Dailey Park.
11:00 After unhitching the canoe, we set-sail southbound under the Queen Elizabeth Highway towards the Island I read about in Paddling Niagara, a book I bought at a local outdoors shop in St. Catharines. I checked out the area on google maps before the trip. The paddle went well except in the beginning we had a few hard rocks which were barely submurged in the murky, green waters of the massive creek. We had to paddle into the wind heading Southbound.
12:00 We arrived at the small island and beached the canoe on the windward side and hiked up the island to get set-up for lunch. I turned on the GPS unit to get a reading of 43 09.98N by 79 19.88W. After some fighting with the new portable coleman single-burner stove we had some freeze-dried Chicken Polyneisian and relaxed in the unusual quietness of this area, which is right in the middle of the Niagara Region. After lunch we took a few photos and headed out of the quiet solitude of the area. Sadly the stove needed some adjustment but for some reason I only had my Smith and Wesson S&R knife and not my swiss army knife. The single-burner stove did cook, but very slowly as we could not properly adjust the burner. Chris said we should have a flag made with our family crest on it and plant it on the highest point in the island and claim it as ours. I assured her that this is not the 1500’s and that would be frowned upon in the 21st centure.
13:00 We headed out towards the car this time with the wind at our backs. The island was very nice and desolate. Heading back under the Queen Elizabeth Highway was easier this time as we kept to the right to avoid the rocks we had hit badly on our way out earlier.
14:08 We arrived back ar shore at 14:08 and packed up. I wore my ESS v12 goggles, adventure hat, beige shirt and MEC green pants I got for my birthday.
14:45 We arrived home safely with the canoe on the roof of Chris’s car held down with three red tie-down ratchet straps.
6 thoughts on “Paddling in the 16 Mile Creek 200807-12”
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This looks like a great place to learn to canoe!
Neat little inner-city paddle!
Nice information, brilliant design. Great article!
I love canoing. This looks like a great place to visit if I’m ever in the area.
Thanks for taking the time to post this, I feel love Niagara-on-the-Lake. I did not even know this existed in the town and I’ve been here most of my life! Thank you for posting!
You might be happy to learn that 16 mile Island is available for the taking…for the right price. I attempted to acquire it several years ago. The Niagara Land Registry Office deems it riparian riverbed below the high-water mark and therefore identifies it as Crown Land. We know they are incorrect. The agency responsible for Crown Lands Distribution (Canada Lands Corporation) identifies it as an island, but does not consider it to exist within their land holdings. To claim the island, you would have to get the Land Registry Office to reclassify it as a land parcel separate from the riverbed, and to do so, they would need CLC to confirm non-ownership. I hired a top-notch land development lawyer to take on the case, and after presenting me with a large preliminary bill, I was informed it would cost $35,000 to $50,000 to proceed, which I did not. The island falls within the Niagara Escarpment Commission’s jurisdiction, which would prevent any owner from building a permanent structure. It is also in the municipality of Lincoln, although does not exist on their tax roles. Best case scenario: build a treehouse or some other non-permanent, non-destructive development. There is no land-owner to remove you, the Escarpment Commission can not prevent such a structure, and the municipality can not tax you. That would allow you to live on the island, but would provide you with no (legal) ability to keep others off. For exclusive ownership of the island…hire a good lawyer and get ready to pay.