Black Feather - Nahanni River Adventures Preparation

Getting Ready for a Nahanni Trip
Getting ready for a Nahanni trip may be as easy for you as packing your gear and heading to the airport while others may spend several years preparing themselves. Your present skill and experience level will determine how much pre-trip preparation is required. Getting ready may involve a number of aspects:

1) What Skills and Experience Are Required for a Nahanni Trip?
2) Skills Clinics - Whitewater Canoeing, Canoe Tripping
3) Experience - Starter Trips
4) Education - Learning About the Nahanni
5) Personal Equipment
6) Physical Fitness

1) What Skills and Experience Do I Need?
There is a trip information package for each trip that has a detailed description of the skills and experience required for that specific trip. We offer clinics and shorter starter trips to help you acquire these skills.

• Skill Levels: Black Feather trips are assigned a skill Level from 1 to 3 to assist you in identifying those trips suited to your ability. Briefly they are:
Level 1 - No experience required;
Level 2 - Some experience and basic skills are expected;
Level 3 - Some more advanced skills and abilities required - not for novices.

For more information about Skill Levels click here or contact the Black Feather office to discuss your suitability for a specific trip. Nahanni Trips range from Skill Level 2 to Skill Level 3.

• Skill Level 2 Trips:
Nahanni Classic, Classic for Women, Classic for Families, Getaway and Nahanni Hiking. You should be comfortable in a canoe, with a knowledge of basic whitewater strokes, manoeuvres and rescues. You should have been on a overnight river canoe trip. Ideally you will participate in a warm up session in easy whitewater such as Black Feather’s Whitewater Canoe Clinic or short river canoe trip prior to your Nahanni trip, or have canoeing skills equivalent to ORCKA Moving Water 1A.

Nahanni Canoeing and Hiking - In addition to the above canoeing skills and experience we strongly advise some pre-trip conditioning for the multi-night back packing trip. You should take 3-5 (or more if you can) pre-trip hikes with a loaded pack and your hiking boots on hilly, uneven terrain in late June and July. You can start with a shorter, flatter route but try to challenge yourself on later outings.

• Skill Level 3 Trips:
Nahanni Whitewater Trip - You should be confident in Class 2-3 whitewater and have an intermediate knowledge of whitewater skills, safety and rescues. You should have paddled other whitewater rivers and been on a multi-night wilderness trip(s). Expert skills are not required but this trip is no place for a novice. You should participate in a warm up session in intermediate whitewater such as Black Feather’s Whitewater Canoe Clinic or short river canoe trip prior to your Nahanni trip, or have canoeing skills equivalent to ORCKA Moving Water 2A.

2) Skill Clinics
Black Feather offers 3 clinics in the spring to help you get ready for a northern river trip:

• Whitewater Canoe Clinic - A 2 day clinic at Palmer Rapids concentrating on paddling skills and whitewater safety. Instruction is given at various levels. More info...

• Canoe Tripping Clinic - A 2 day intermediate clinic to prepare you for a challenging northern river expedition. More info...

• Dumoine Warm Up - A 3 day trip on Quebec's Dumoine River designed to hone your paddling, safety and camping skills for an upcoming expedition. Some previous experience expected. More info ...

For those living in other regions there may be equivalent training available near by. If a Google search doesn’t turn up anything contact us to see if we know of anything in your area.

3) Starter Trips
One way to quickly gain experience and skills is to take a shorter guided Black Feather whitewater canoe trip. Some of our trips have a little more emphasis on skill development:

• Upper French River: 3 days - Skill Level 1- an easy intro to whitewater canoe tripping for complete beginners.
• Petawawa River: 4 days - Skill Level 2. Summer river trip in Algonquin Park. A good trip to gain experience.
• Dumoine River: 5, 6 or 7 days - Skill Level 1+to 2. Longer trips with more significant rapids. A special Family trip available.
• Upper Magnetawan River: 3 days - Skill Level 2. For those with previous experience - an early spring warm up trip with coaching in technical rapids. Excellent preparation for more challenging northern trips.
• Lower Magnetawan River: 5 days - Skill Level 2. For those with previous experience - an early spring warm up trip with coaching in technical rapids. Excellent preparation for more challenging northern trips.

The two Magnetawan River trips can be combined for a longer trip.

4) Pre-trip Reading
Many people enjoy reading up on the Nahanni or pouring over the maps before they head north. The trip information package will contain an extensive reading list covering topics on the history, geography and wildlife of the Nahanni. There are also suggestions for reading about canoe tripping and paddling.

Maps: You can order the Government of Canada topographical maps for the trip online from World of Maps in Ottawa:

• For Nahanni Classic and Getaway trips - 95 E, 95F and 95G
• For Nahanni Hiking trip - 95 E, 95F, 95G and 95L
• For Nahanni Whitewater trip - 95 E, 95F, 95G, 95I and 95L

5) Personal Equipment
Black Feather provides all group gear - including canoes, paddles, lifejackets, kitchen equipment, tents, tarp, rescue and safety gear, satellite phone etc. Participants must supply their own personal clothing and gear. Most people already have much of what they will need. Some of the more specialised items include a fairly warm sleeping bag and pad, a good rain suit, a waterproof pack for your personal stuff and some sort of thermal protection like a wet suit.

A limited number of wet suits and waterproof ‘barrel packs’ can be rented from Black Feather for pick up in Ft. Simpson. Please contact us in advance to reserve a rental item. To see what you would need to get ready for your trip, you can download a clothing list for your trip by clicking on the appropriate link below:

1) All Nahanni trips except Nahanni Hiking trip (Download PDF - C&E Nahanni)
2) Nahanni Hiking trip (Download PDF C&E Nahanni Hike)

6) Physical Fitness
A good level of physical fitness is recommended and will make your trip more fun. It is a good idea to exercise regularly prior to your trip. At a minimum you want to prepare for day hiking in the mountains and for paddling 4 to 6 hours a day.

We have developed a 3 month conditioning program that should have you in good shape for your trip. Click here to download a PDF of the conditioning program.