Canoeing tips

Edmonton does things big: it’s home to Canada’s largest sports and entertainment district, the largest stretch of urban parkland in North America, the oldest and largest fringe theater festival in North America and one of the largest shopping malls on the planet. But underneath that big, bold surface is a vibrant capital city with an unpretentious population and a rich and diverse culture.

As a child, I dreamed of visiting the Amazon rainforest, but I always envisioned it being wildly inaccessible.

Jun 19, 2024 • 8 min read

A piece of Canadian history, Banff National Park is the world’s third-oldest national park and, over the course of its 140-year existence, has managed to walk a fine line between easy access and careful environmental protection.

It was a morning of brooding green banks and dark skies on the River Tweed. Heavy rains had hit southern Scotland and the waterway had turned into a fast flood, with the deluge sweeping our two-seater canoe downstream through farmland and fishing beats as fast as a salmon escaping a rod and reel.

Across more than 1.5 million acres across South Florida sprawls Everglades National Park, a wonderland of marshland, sawgrass and mangroves.

Most people come to Swakopmund, a Bavarian-style town surreally out of place on the edge of the Namib Desert, to explore the vast dunes. Few who visit know that the sandy Atlantic shallows of nearby Walvis Bay are also home to 2500 cape fur seals – one of the country’s last remaining colonies – as well as a resident population of diminutive benguela dolphins.

Have you ever fancied paddling in speckled sunlight past ancient châteaux and honey-hued villages, stopping off for a spot of gentle sightseeing and ending the day with a well-earned foodie feast? If so, then canoeing the Dordogne river in southwest France is just the ticket.