The Athabasca Landing Trail was a long-distance

portage Portage or portaging ( CA: ; ) is the practice of carrying water craft or cargo over land, either around an obstacle in a river, or between two bodies of water. A path where items are regularly carried between bodies of water is also called a '' ...

route that linked

Fort Edmonton Fort Edmonton (also named Edmonton House) was the name of a series of Trading post, trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) from 1795 to 1914, all of which were located on the north banks of the North Saskatchewan River in what is now ce ...

(modern day

Edmonton Edmonton is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Alberta. It is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Central Alberta ...

, Alberta) on the

North Saskatchewan River The North Saskatchewan River is a glacier-fed river that flows from the Canadian Rockies continental divide east to central Saskatchewan, where it joins with the South Saskatchewan River to make up the Saskatchewan River. Its water flows event ...

with Athabasca Landing (modern day

Athabasca, Alberta Athabasca (2021 census (Canada), 2021 population 2,759), originally named Athabasca Landing, is a town in northern Alberta, Canada. It is located north of Edmonton at the intersection of Alberta Highway 2, Highway 2 and Alberta Highway 55, Hig ...

) on the

Athabasca River The Athabasca River (French: ''Rivière Athabasca'') in Alberta, Canada, originates at the Columbia Icefield in Jasper National Park and flows more than before emptying into Lake Athabasca. Much of the land along its banks is protected in nationa ...

. The distance of the trail between Fort Edmonton and Athabasca Landing was , giving the trail the nickname "The 100 Mile Portage." The Saskatchewan flows east and joins the

Nelson River The Nelson River is a river of north-central North America, in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Manitoba. The river drains Lake Winnipeg and runs before it ends in Hudson Bay near Port Nelson, Manitoba, Port Nels ...

which then drains into

Hudson Bay Hudson Bay, sometimes called Hudson's Bay (usually historically), is a large body of Saline water, saltwater in northeastern Canada with a surface area of . It is located north of Ontario, west of Quebec, northeast of Manitoba, and southeast o ...

. The Athabasca flows north and joins the

Slave River The Slave River is a Canadian river that flows from the confluence of the and Peace River in northeastern Alberta and runs into Great Slave Lake in the Northwest Territories. The river's name is thought to derive from the name for the Slavey g ...

, which itself joins the

Mackenzie River The Mackenzie River (French: ; Slavey language, Slavey: ' èh tʃʰò literally ''big river''; Inuvialuktun: ' uːkpɑk literally ''great river'') is a river in the Canadian Canadian boreal forest, boreal forest and tundra. It forms, ...

which drains into the Arctic Ocean. The portage, therefore, had local economic significance but was also part of a wider

trade network Trade involves the transfer of goods and services from one person or entity to another, often in exchange for money. Economists refer to a system or network that allows trade as a market. Traders generally negotiate through a medium of credi ...

that linked the

Arctic The Arctic (; . ) is the polar regions of Earth, polar region of Earth that surrounds the North Pole, lying within the Arctic Circle. The Arctic region, from the IERS Reference Meridian travelling east, consists of parts of northern Norway ( ...

and

sub-arctic The subarctic zone is a region in the Northern Hemisphere immediately south of the true Arctic, north of hemiboreal regions and covering much of Alaska, Canada, Iceland, the north of Fennoscandia, Northwestern Russia, Siberia, and the Cair ...

to the rest of North America. Various portage routes between the two rivers had been used by the Indigenous peoples of the region for centuries before the arrival of British and Canadian

fur trade The fur trade is a worldwide industry dealing in the acquisition and sale of animal fur. Since the establishment of a world fur market in the early modern period, furs of boreal ecosystem, boreal, polar and cold temperate mammalian animals h ...

rs in region in the late eighteenth century. Once fur trading posts were established in the region, the same simple trails were also used to move freight between the posts. They linked Edmonton House (in all of its various incarnations over the years), the centre of the Saskatchewan District, to posts in the Athabasca District (including the

Peace River Country The Peace River Country (or Peace Country; ) is an aspen parkland region centring on the Peace River in Canada. It extends from northwestern Alberta to the Rocky Mountains in northeastern British Columbia, where a certain portion of the region i ...

) such as

Dunvegan Dunvegan () is a village on the Isle of Skye in Scotland. It is famous for Dunvegan Castle, seat of the chiefs of Clan MacLeod. Dunvegan is within the parish of Duirinish, Skye, Duirinish. In 2011, it had a population of 386. Name In ''The Nors ...

, Fort St. Mary's,

Fort Chipewyan Fort Chipewyan , commonly referred to as Fort Chip, is an unincorporated hamlet in northern Alberta, Canada, within the Regional Municipality (RM) of Wood Buffalo. History Fort Chipewyan is one of the oldest European settlements in the Provi ...

, and

Fort Vermilion Fort Vermilion is a hamlet on the Peace River in northern Alberta, Canada, within Mackenzie County. Established in 1788, Fort Vermilion shares the title of oldest European settlement in Alberta with Fort Chipewyan. Fort Vermilion contains many ...

. The main

pack Pack or packs may refer to: Music * Packs (band), a Canadian indie rock band * ''Packs'' (album), by Your Old Droog * ''Packs'', a Berner album Places * Pack, Styria, defunct Austrian municipality * Pack, Missouri, United States (US) * ...

route northwards from Edmonton from 1824 to 1876 was that to

Fort Assiniboine Fort Assiniboine is a hamlet in northwest Alberta, Canada, within Woodlands County. It is located along the north shore of the Athabasca River at the junction of Highway 33 and Highway 661. It is approximately northwest of Barrhead, sou ...

, well to the west of the later Athabasca Landing Trail. It was due to

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the ...

scouts seeking an alternative to the Fort Assiniboine route that Athabasca Landing was founded in 1876. The

North-West Mounted Police The North-West Mounted Police (NWMP) was a Canadian paramilitary police force, established in 1873, to maintain order in the new Canadian North-West Territories (NWT) following the 1870 transfer of Rupert's Land and North-Western Territory to ...

stationed nine officers at Athabasca Landing in 1893. In 2010, a conceptual master plan for the modern version of the Athabasca Landing Trail was completed. The plan is to build a non-motorized recreational trail, which runs between

Fort Saskatchewan Fort Saskatchewan is a city along the North Saskatchewan River in Alberta, Canada. It is northeast of Edmonton, the provincial capital. It is part of the Edmonton Capital Region#Edmonton CMA, Edmonton census metropolitan area and one of 24 muni ...

and Athabasca, and highlights the region's historic and natural features. The route is also designated as part of the

Trans Canada Trail The Trans Canada Trail is a cross-Canada system of greenways, waterways, and roadways that stretches from the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, Pacific to the Arctic Ocean, Arctic oceans. The trail extends over ; it is now the longe ...

; it links to the River Valley Alliance Trail in the south and to both the land and water routes north to the Arctic Ocean.

References

{{Reflist, refs= {{cite news , url = https://era.library.ualberta.ca/items/ec73fd59-773e-4044-8215-c63ac33aeb65/download/414e5ca0-860b-46d9-bf44-2d0e42917ee2 , title = History of the Athabasca Oil Sands Region, 1890 to 1960's , author1 = J .M. Parker , author2 = K.W. Tingley , publisher = Boreal Institute for Northern Studies , accessdate = 2020-08-23 , quote = In 1892 the first summer detachment of the NWMP began operating at Athabasca Landing, and in 1893, Inspector D.M. Howard, with eight constables, established a permanent outpost at Athabasca Landing to regulate the rapidly increasing northward traffic. Portages in Canada Athabasca, Alberta Events of National Historic Significance (Canada) Historic trails and roads in Alberta Hudson's Bay Company Rupert's Land North-Western Territory

See also

References