I'm not sure what direction yer taking with "best"
as in the most accomidating and friendly?
I've paddled in the SE, the NE (I'm bad with my cboat geography, now does Vermont and NY count as NE or is that some other term ) , Quebec and Ontario
pretty much everybody is helpful and willing to let you "pouch a shuttle" I think sums up what's amasing about boating in general
can't argue with the "ice" arguement and the SE sure has some of the most friendly and layed back talented boaters out there....
but if we are talking support by sheer numbers?
show me a festival outside of Quebec that has open boaters showing up in the hundreds?
Running into one of the portageur trips from montreal on the river feels like a festival there's so many of them whooping it up.....
those folks love water
You'll find too that Canadians (in general) usually split their time between river tripping and creeking .... then again, what do I know, I got me one of them orange whistles....
You're right Gail, the Gatineau fest hosts so many people each year it's amazing.
But the funniest I've heard of is the d'Israeli river day. In collaboration with hydro-quebec (yes they do sometimes help us a bit) the river downstream of the dam has people running it on low water on saturday in canoes and kayaks and on sunday the water level goes exponential and you get a whole bunch of people running it in big inflatable truck tire tubes or such crazy stuff. A total blast.
Since it is quite hard to find a parking spot out there one of the river guy is letting people park on its land for the weekend for a 6-pack of canned beer per vehicule, then he spends its whole sunday sitting on a riverside rock besides its mountain of cans, throwing them at anybody passing by the river.
As far as splitting creek vs tripping it is a question of not having enough water around summer time but also there's just too much good fishing to do around as well can't let that go either!
) , Quebec and Ontario
