Thunder Bay and Kakabeka Falls, Ontario

Before you visit Thunder Bay, Ontario, be sure to read chapter five, "Sleeping Giant", in Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw by Will Ferguson. Two cities have merged, Fort William and Port Arthur. Like many corporate mergers, the result is awkward. We enjoyed an architectural stroll around "church hill" - there's St. Paul's Anglican, St. Andrew's, Trinity United (the Methodists and Protestants), and Baptist church, and one funeral parlor - the funeral parlor is ecumenical, they don't care where you came from, they'll see you eventually. We wanted to have lunch "down town". The merged city has done a great job of preserving history in museums but they haven't quite figured out how to develop the downtown area into an inviting space. There were gulls screeching and circling overhead as we changed out of our riding gear and into normal street clothes. The streets were empty except for a few odd folks, including a twenty-something young man in ratty clothing with a consumptive cough leading black dog towards a dumpster. Had we stumbled in on a Hitchcock movie? No, we had arrived in Thunder Bay on a civic holiday - everything was closed.

The Kakabeka Falls are a short distance out of Thunder Bay - I recommend a side trip, or a planned stop.


The Legend of Princess Greenmantle

The text of this entry is taken from the sign on the viewing platform for the falls.

Ogama Eagle, the powerful Chief of the Ojibwa Indians in the Thunder Bay region, had one child - a daughter named Greenmantle. The princess was tall and graceful, with dark eyes and jet black hair. This child of the woodland was much loved by her people and renowned as a dancer.

When Greenmantle had passed her seventeenth summer, the traditional Ojibwa territory along the shore of Lake Superior was invaded by the neighboring Sioux. The enemy warriors captured Greenmantle and held her captive in their camp on Dog Mountain. After a time, the Sioux forced her to guide them down the Kaministiquia (river) so that they might launch a surprise attack on an unsuspecting Ojibwa camp.

Pretending to betray her people, Greenmantle led the war canoes down river, toward Kakabeka Falls. Skillfully, she paddled her lead canoe through the turbulent white-water, with the Sioux in breathless pursuit. She was determined to foil the enemy's plans, even at the cost of her own life. Just as Greenmantle was about to enter the swirling waters above the falls, she swerved toward the west bank, leaped from her canoe and swam to shore. This unexpected maneuver so caught the Sioux flotilla by surprise, they were quickly drawn into the rapids. Many were swept over the falls to jagged rocks below.

Greenmantle fled in triumph down the portage trail to alert her people and the Ojibwa were able to hold back the remain Sioux forces. A last battle was fought on Welcome Islands, near Thunder Bay, where the Sioux were decisively defeated.

Another version of the legend states that Greenmantle, too, perished over the falls when she tricked the Sioux. Her spirit, it is said, lingers in the mist as a rainbow, while the voices of the angry Sioux cry continuously from the roaring waters below.

When Europeans first arrived in the Lake Superior area, it was occupied by the Objibwa. The life and lore of these native peoples inspired Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem "the Song of Hiawatha". Similar romantic legends were woven around well-known landmarks by other travelers - the story more often told about the Kakabeka Falls is that of the Ojibwa Princess Greenmantle.