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What shall we say about ourselves? Never been ones to toot our own horn much (aside from the business need for this website) so here's something that appeared in a Spring 2001 edition of Bushwhacker Magazine, a popular publication focused on Ontario's wilderness recreation scene. You can also learn a little more on our Q&A page. Putting Canada's Wilderness Areas on the Map by Boris Swidersky Just about every trip into the wilderness starts with a group of friends sitting around the kitchen table poring over maps of the area trying to decide which route to take, where to camp, and what to see along the way. Yet most people have little idea about just how the maps they're looking at were made, and how accurate, reliable and up-to-date they might be. When Mark Smith and Christine Kennedy found the recreation maps they were using on their hiking, biking and paddling holidays to be of poor quality, out of date and usually little more than copies of generalized, outdated government topos they wanted to do something about it. "Canada has the world's finest wilderness recreation areas, and often not very good maps to describe them. We found ourselves in a position to change that". web.jpg) Mark and Christine have been mapmakers since 1983 when they started their business, Chrismar Mapping Services Inc. For many years they created custom designed, original maps for outdoor centres, summer camps, parks, conservation areas, resorts, mountain bike events and other outdoor-related clients. They also developed quite a large service to businesses and corporations needing custom-designed maps for reports, books, outdoor display signs, magazines, and web sites. "We've made several thousand maps of one sort or another, for clients across Canada, in the United States, and even overseas", says Christine. "We still enjoy that work, but wanted to create something that was all our own, and also the ultimate mapmakers challenge. I think we found it". In 1995 they started The Adventure Map™, which is a series of original topographic recreation maps featuring National Parks, Provincial Parks and other popular wilderness recreation destinations. These waterproof maps are specifically designed for outdoor adventurers such as hikers, backpackers, and canoeists who need accurate, up-to-date, rugged maps to enable them to more safely travel Canada's backcountry. There are now 20 maps in the series.  Mark and Christine use an involved, multi-stage process that usually starts with overlapping aerial photos, obtained either from flying the area or from a source of existing photos. "The Mississagi map we're working on now, for example, has four overlapping flight lines of 15 or so photos each," said Mark. They put pairs of overlapping Mississagi photos into their photogrammetric stereoplotter, a large Swiss-engineered machine that rotates, levels and adjusts the photos to create a properly scaled and calibrated 3-D image of a section of our earth. It's the overlap between photos that allows the ground to be seen in 3-D, so that the hills appear to rise towards the viewer and the valleys sink away from the viewer. The stereoplotter operator can see, interpret and capture roads, buildings, trails, vegetation boundaries, water and many other features, even different species of trees. Contour lines are also created by following the ground at pre-set elevations. The end result is a detailed topographic base map of the area seen in the aerial photos. "We generate everything from scratch," said Mark, "every contour line, marsh, clearing, lake and stream. It's a complex, labour-intensive process, but it's also the only way to make a really good map". The resulting photogrammetric basemap is the essence of The Adventure Map and other custom Chrismar maps, but that's just the beginning of their mapmaking process. "Real mapmakers, like early Canadian legends (and Chrismar heroes) David Thompson, Champlain, MacKenzie and others have made exceptionally good maps by surveying, in person, the ground and waterways," said Mark. "We've just taken the process a step further by starting with aerial photogrammetry. But as with those early explorers and mapmakers the only real way to be sure of what's out there is to actually go out there and record it. It also happens to be the most interesting part of the mapmaking process for us". Christine continues, "Aerial photos aren't always current. Areas change due to beavers and logging operations. Leaf cover or the small scale of the photos often hide important features like trails, campsites and portages". So Christine and Mark head into the wilderness, spending between 90 and 120 days a year hiking and paddling their way around places like Mississagi, checking and enhancing their base map. "It's a tough job but someone's got to do it", quips Mark, then continues, "That doesn't mean our maps are perfect. That's simply impossible, but we do try to make them as accurate and up-to-date as we can".  "We're also fortunate to be able to rely on a few friends for additional information", says Mark. "For example, Mike and Jim Stoneman of Go With The River, a canoe route and trail maintenance company that works closely with us, have been through most of the parts of Mississagi we haven't seen yet". The autumn is Chrismar's prime outdoors season so they're looking forward to spending the next three months in the outdoors at places like Mississagi, Algonquin, Halfway Lake, the Little Bonnechere River, Mattawa River, Awenda, Arrowhead and other areas they're working on. Once field survey is completed, it's back to the office and their computers for the preparation of the final map. Mark and Christine enhance their base map with field survey notes, add title, legend, labels, scale, grid system, and other non-geographical information that makes a map useful. For example, magnetic north lines are marked on their maps so the user does not need to worry about adjusting for declination. Sensitive information that appeared on the base map is also deleted at this time, such as park trails that are being allowed to grow in, campsites closed for regeneration or sensitive archeological sites. All the various types of information make for a very complex graphic image. "The Mississagi map requires about 180 layers of information, for example. It often takes a year or more from start to finish to make a map," said Christine. "And we're usually juggling twenty or thirty maps at a time". Chrismar isn't finished their mapmaking process yet. They also research and write about the area, including natural and human history, trail descriptions, safety concerns, contact information, etc. so the entire back side of the map is covered with essential, helpful, or simply interesting information. "It's a difficult job finding people and documents with the answers to our questions but also one of the most rewarding as we get to meet a wide variety of people, many of them real "characters", who have wonderful stories to tell about the area we're mapping", says Christine. "For example, the Mississagi map has the Gloster Meteor jet crash story (see last issue), and also a fascinating story about the development of the uranium mines and current reclamation work now that they are closed, which we'll be describing more on our Elliot Lake area map, which will overlap the Mississagi map. Unfortunately, we have so little room on the map that editing the information to fit can be a painful process".  Though Mark and Christine use stereoplotters and computers to help create their maps, they have very firm opinions about technology in the wilderness. For example, they don't use GPS at all. "Too complicated and, like most new technology, highly overrated", says Mark. "For mapping accuracy you need a base station and all sorts of computing time to figure the results. Then all you get is a line. We use a compass and pencil and record all sorts of information beyond the trail's line. Real low-tech, real simple, and plenty accurate enough in most situations. Unfortunately, we've also found that most recreational hikers and paddlers think a GPS will help them avoid having to learn how to navigate with map and compass. It's a dangerous premise. We've seen GPS's on trips we've taken with others, but only for the first day or two. After that they're left in their packs, novelty worn off, too complicated to use or batteries dead". "Besides, we personally feel it important to preserve the sanctity of the wilderness experience. That's why you'll probably never see us with a cell phone, GPS or emergency beacon on one of our trips", Christine added. Once the map is completely drawn, a set of colour-separated film is made for each side. Next, the map is printed, on waterproof plastic, on a large offset printing press. Once folded, the mapmaking process comes to an end. "Then we start planning for the next edition, which is only a year or two away. We like to update and reprint every 1-2 years so that our maps are always fairly up-to-date" said Mark.  Christine and Mark acknowledge that there are other, simpler, ways to make recreation maps. For example, they decided long ago not to use existing government topos as a base for The Adventure Map™. Government maps are copyrighted works and require licenses and payment of royalties before they can be used (even though they've been paid for with our tax dollars). More importantly, government maps are simplified and, because they're made for sovereignty, political or planning purposes, don't include information of importance to hikers and paddlers. They are also typically out of date by ten or fifteen years. Mark explains,"There are so many maps in government series (over 13,000 NTS 1:50,000 sheets, for example) and they cover such a large area that the government is hard-pressed to get around to updating even the most popular ones more quickly than every five years or so, especially with recent cutbacks".  "Most people simply copy government maps (often without permission); others enhance them by doing field surveys and studying aerial photos, but this still isn't ideal because the underlying information is so generalized," said Christine. "At Chrismar we decided to go for a higher standard and create our recreation maps from scratch. It's expensive, and we know of no other company in Canada or the USA going this route." "It's the ultimate challenge for a wilderness mapmaker," said Mark. "We expect to eventually have several hundred titles, some in every province and territory". Recent updates include Glacier National Park-Rogers Pass and Mt. Revelstoke National Park in British Columbia. New Ontario maps being worked on are several well-known destinations including more Algonquin maps, the first in their Temagami series, some popular kayaking areas along Georgian Bay and Lake Superior, as well as less well-known treasures like Arrowhead, Little Bonnechere and Awenda. "There is a wonderful array of wilderness recreation areas in this country, most of which are poorly mapped for outdoor pursuits,"said Mark. "We're also very concerned about the loss of these areas due to lack of use as a result of poor maps and guides," added Christine. "We hope to change that". Probably the biggest motivation for doing the series is that they love getting out into the wilderness. And what better reason can there be when your work and lifestyle contribute to the enjoyment and survival of our wild places. 
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