Personal Story No. 2 - Heckle Island

As I got older I must have told my father about my composition agony.  I don’t know what got into him but when we moved to Winnipeg one summer my dad actually decided he was going to take his sons on a vacation.  My sister and I were in our mid teens and of course the youngest was still a baby but the 3 boys were just the right age for going on a camping trip.  Never mind that my father had never camped in his life or that he did not have any camping gear.  As was usual with him he would improvise; he brought two huge Polish sausage along as supplies.

Where did he decided to go?  He knew a man who knew a man who had gone to this great island called Heckle Island and that is where they went.  Until I started writing this story I actually thought that was what the place was called but apparently its true name is Hecla Island which is part of Hecla Grindstone Provincial Park.  The first day they only managed to get to some little place called Riverton where they stayed in a cabin.  The next day they reached the island.  Back in the day I don’t think there was much there, at least not accordingly to the sagas of my three brothers.  They met a fisherman who, for the price of one of the Polish sausages, gave them a "ride" on his fishing boat (still cabled to the dock).

More exciting for the two younger boys, who would have been about 8 and 10 at the time, were the trees.  Dead trees.  As they walked in the woods Dad accidentally leaned against a tree and it keeled right over.  The boys got excited at how strong Dad was.  The next thing they knew they were all knocking down trees, boom, boom, boom.  They had got into a dead zone of some type.  Erik got over excited and rammed into a live tree, barely retaining consciousness.  I can just imagine them knocking everything down as we were all a very active bunch of kids.

Dad found a cabin for them to stay in which turned out to be a good thing because it turned very cold that night.  It was supplied with an outhouse but as there had not been anyone on the island for 3 or 4 years it was quite the experience to go to the toilet.  When "fresh fodder" whizzed down the pipe a million flies went "whoopee" and flew up the pipe right into their you know what's!  As John said it was the quickest in and out procedure of his life.

Aside from the sausages they hadn’t brought any food with them so the next morning they drove into the village, found a café and had breakfast.  And that was enough for Dad.  They decided to go home.

Their bonding vacation lasted a day and a half.