10/16/2026
At LiftWerx, just about everybody knows Daren Bernier. A respected member of our training team, he's a cheerful technical trainer and a highly-experienced GWO climbing instructor. At some point, most of our employees participate in his high-angle rescue courses, sessions which require its students to work up a sweat, care for others, learn valuable safety skills, and have fun along the way.
Daren is a paddling enthusiast, and he is especially fond of solo wilderness trips. In this photo, taken at sunrise with mist lifting off the water, Daren has raised the LiftWerx Flag of Adventure on the shores of Algonquin Provincial Park, located in Ontario, Canada.
We're proud to see the Flag travel into these types of wilderness areas, far from roads and cities, in places that are off-grid, and nested in nature.
Algonquin Park was established in 1893 and is Ontario's oldest provincial park. It covers more than 7,600 km² of forest, rock, and water on the southern edge of the Canadian Shield. The land is the traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe people, who efficiently travelled these waterways for thousands of years. With their survival skills and nimble canoes, they spread their culture and language over most of Canada's boreal forest, from the Northwest Territories to Nova Scotia, a distance spanning 6,000 kilometres (~3,750 miles).
In the 1880s, European loggers drove squared pine timber down its rivers to build a growing country and to provide wooden masts to a global shipbuilding industry.
In the early 1900s, the park's rugged shorelines and wind-bent pines inspired the famous impressionist artist Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven, whose paintings helped shape how Canada sees itself.
The park is also important beyond its beauty. It protects the headwaters of several major rivers and is home to moose, black bears, loons and one of the last strongholds of the eastern wolf. It's also a living outdoor classroom for conservation and research.
Today, Algonquin Park is a wilderness mecca for paddlers. More than 2,000 kilometres (1,250 miles) of canoe routes connect over 2,400 lakes, linked by portage trails that people from around the world come to travel. People typically pack light, carry their canoes from lake to lake, and earn every campsite. After one paddles away from the highway, there are no roads, no hotels, no cars, no bicycles, and very few people. People come to be one with nature, enjoy the flora and fauna, travel solely by muscle and paddle, and quietly stroke from one shoreline to the next.
At LiftWerx, we are proud to employ a high-performing team of people who have a zest for life and adventure. Thanks to Daren for raising the Flag!
