Oh Canada!

So, I'm going to be fired from my lame ass health insurance job paying claims or not paying claims, as the case may be, but I'm pretty fed up with the United States Of America and am starting to make plans on leaving it permamnently and heading to Canada, buying a sled dog team and mushing way out into the deep woods with important supplies to start a new life away from civilization.

I want to build a solid log cabin from the ground up, fortify it against the elements and start learning the area I'm in, as far as hunting, fishing and supply gathering goes.

Does anyone have any good spots to hit the woods where the shadow of man has never been seen before?

*edit*
I also need information about what I can and cannot bring across the border legally, like seeds for growing different stuff and whatnot. I suppose Canada's Customs department/website would have that info, eh?

 

A former insurance salesman living off the land and being a hermit in Canada is a little difficult to take seriously. However, where you live just crossing the border you'd essentially be in the middle of nowhere to some degree especially the further north you go. The biggest Canadian city nearby, Thunder Bay is a little bigger then Duluth unless you want to head towards Winnepeg. Seeing as you want to go away from people I'd say that buying crown land would be possible with some searching.. I think. If you go up to Lake Nipigon I've heard it is beautiful and you'd run into caribou!

 

I hope you are thinking about doing this when winter has passed?

I've lived in the type of area you are thinking of, in the US though, and winter is no time to put those type of plans in action. Thinking about them, yes...and getting prepared, yes. I was a city-type with no experience and moved to a mining claim in the fall. Which already had
a house of sorts there. That winter was the worst in a 100 years, I was
told, and I don't think it would compare to Canadian winters. Unless you
have done it, living without electricity for an extended period is quite an
experience. So is living without piped in water (because the pipes running from the springbox weren't buried deep enough not to freeze).

It was worth it, though.

 

The beginning of living life up in the deep woods would be difficult because I'm not used to doing it everyday, but that can be overcome. I grew up a regular jackpine savage. I'm comfortable in the woods and have hunted and fished regularly in my younger days. I'd like to study up on the natural flora/fauna of the area I will want to settle down in.

I don't believe I will end up as grizzly man. The goal is to end up as Jeremiah Johnson or perhaps grizzly adams. I could dig living with an 1,800 pound kodiak buddy, and perhaps a couple of wolverines, if they can control themselves and behave. Maybe befriend some eagles, hawks and falcons and make peace with the primitive indian tribes.

I might consider making a hunt for the wendigo, an old indian nature spirit.

All of this is just dreaming right now, because I have certain things to think about, like me having a 16 year old partially blind son that I'm solely responsible for who has never really had to rough-it and isn't familiar with the woods. Woodcraft can be learned though.

I'd also have to make a stop in Toronto and gather some good pot seeds. Maybe go to Halifax and get some from the trailer park boys. Hell, Ricky, Julian and Bubbles might want to come with.

If I am able to pull it off successfully, maybe I can become a folk legend and get Rush to write a song about me.

"Take off, to the Great White North. Take off, it's a beauty way to go!"

 

I suggest BC. Easier winters and you maybe able to locate a few hippy communes which are pot based cash only socities. As for living off the land, hunting is restricted to set times of the year for most big game, and water fowl. Fishing is different for each species. But I believe you can trap all year round so living of the land may require you to eat a lot of beaver.

 

Hugh is right, good pot seeds would come from BC anyway. As well as having alot milder weather it's a beautiful area of the country. However, you'd have to deal with a potential for alot of rain. I'd love to to move in the Okanagan Valley, myself.

I lived north of Edmonton for a year. Being that far north the growing season (vegetables for my garden mind you) was shorter, but the sun was in the sky alot longer. So I was amazed by how much produce could be made.

 

Oh yeah, automatic weapons and handguns are pretty much banned in Canada.

 

This is all awesome information, keep it up.

I'm not too worried about guns because I don't own any bazookas or tripod mounted chain guns or automatic .50 caliber machine guns. I would though, if they were available to me. Would make hunting significantly easier though. Not to mention the amount of supplies you would have to gather to have enough gun powder to use the freaking things. I'm perhaps looking at an old muzzle loader .50 for hunting, the ones that use the balls.

I want to confirm the existence of the canadian bigfoots and the kodiak marmosets.

 

Maybe you should stock up on Les Stroud's Survivorman episodes and get some pointers

http://lesstroud.ca/survivorman/home.php

 

I'm all over it like hair on a gorilla. I've watched and own all the Rambo movies.

 

Yeah, especially Rambo is the best when it comes to survival. Like fishing with grenades.

Well, I imagine you'll be just like Natty Bumppo or Daniel Boon.

I know I'd never survive in the wilds. Especially where it's cold. Yesterday I nearly froze my knee caps off in a bus with no heating (seriously, when I got out of the bus and went inside the Warsaw Metro I couldn't stretch them out fully). It took the bus about 4 hours to get to Warsaw (roughly 40 km from where I live).

It's not that I live in the frontier or something... it was the snowfall which sort of 'surprised' the local authorities and no snowploughs were present to make the roads drivable. Heh.

So, my point is, that I really admire your will to deprive yourself of the wonders of technology and civilisation.

EDIT: Well, actually it's a good way to sort of 'go green'. Grow/get your own food, don't rely on the stuff full of preservatives they have in the supermarkets, etc. Not using cars so much. I can see a lot of good things you can do for the environment. Unless you eat to much beaver.

 

I can definitely eat a huge amount of beaver. Hell, I already have. *zing*

Seriously though, I've never done any trapping but I'm more than willing to learn. I'll eat whatever gets caught, don't have to be just beaver. I'd eat a woodchuck, a muskrat, a raccoon, a wolverine, a wolf, a squirrel, and anything else that stumbles into the trap. I heard that a wolverine will chew their leg off in order to get out of a trap. Now that's balls.

*edit*
I just got home from work and was going through my routine of websites and this is a new video up today. Coincidentally, it's all about Canada in the summertime. I could definitely see myself fishing this way for the first video but not the second one.

http://www.clipjunkie.com/Crazy-Canadians-vid6376.html

http://www.bing.com/videos/watch/video/ice-fishing/1DCB8D69D3C603488D8D1DCB8D69D3C603488D8D

 

There were sightings, rumors and tall tales about bigfoot where I lived, too.

I have a suspicion that I am um buying into something here, but what, pray tell, is a kodiak marmoset?