My name is Phillip Nelson, the scoutmaster of Troop 8 in Macon Georgia. This past summer, we were
fortunate to obtain a slot from Northern Tier, the Boy Scouts High Adventure Base located in Ely Minn.
We elected to do our canoe trip into Canada. We left the scout camp on June 17th. The boys had
elected to attempt a 100 mile trip in our next 7 days. We entered Quetico Provincial Park of Ontario,
Canada after checking in with the Ranger and obtaining our permits and instructions. They had
received a large amount of rain and the ice had only been gone from the waters for less than a month,
so the water was high and moving fast from lake outlets to another lake. Our time was spent fishing
and paddling. During the next 5 days we covered around 80 miles, and had traversed some of the most
beautiful lakes I have ever been on, Carp Lake, Saganagons, Kawnipi, Agnes, and the Man Chain(This
Man, That Man, No Man). We had also seen waterfalls that were flowing with so much water that you
could not hear, Louisa Falls, Little, Koko, Canyon and Kennebas Falls.
On Friday, June 21 we camped on a beautiful overlook on Sunday Lake. We now had only two more
days and around 30 more miles left to go before heading home. Knowing that our trip was fast coming
to a close, we stayed up to almost midnight just looking at the night sky and sharing our stories of what
we thought about the trip.
Saturday morning, I was the first one up. I packed up all of my items in the tent and placed them
outside like I always do. Our tent site that we had chosen was on a huge piece of granite that was fairly
flat on top, but sloped down on either side. After I had placed things outside, I attempted to go and get
our food pack to start breakfast. I slipped on the granite and before I thought about it, I braced myself
with my right hand. Not a wise choice. I should have just walked away with a bruised behind and dirty
pants. I knew that I had hurt it but was not sure how much. I tried to do some things for a short while
but the pain was too much. I got my son, Chris, who is an assistant Scoutmaster, to get the Sam Splint.
He folded the splint in half with it going from just short of my elbow to the middle of my fingers. He
held it in place with and ace bandage.
The great weather we had been having was now changing with a lot of wind blowing our way. We had
almost 30 miles to go and I attempted to let Chris and Michael paddle out with me sitting in the middle.
We had the heaviest canoe, and it was hard for both of them to paddle with the amount of wind, so I
began to paddle. The way that Chris had placed the splint all the way out to the fingers, allowed me to
grip the paddle with my left hand and use my right fingers to pull back. I was able to paddle like this for
the next two days until we arrived back in camp. I was also able to portage with one of the packs which
weighed over 50 lbs.
I had someone from the camp to carry me to the Emergency room in Ely, Minn, to see the Doctor and
have x-rays completed to see what I had done. I had broken my right Radius just below the joint. The
doctor was so impressed with the Sam Splint that he refused to put me in a cast. He used the splint and
gave me two new Ace bandages. I wore the splint for four days, until my doctor in Macon could see me
and cast it. He had the same comments that the other doctor made. I am sure that having the splint
along with us allowed me to paddle and carry my share of the gear for the next two days.