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Okanagan Lake

Okanagan Lake is located in the southern interior of British Columbia and is the largest lake in the Okanagan Valley. Approximately 6,188 km2 of land drain into the lake, which has a total surface area of 351 km2. The lake is long and thin, measuring 120 km in length and ranging between 3 and 5 km in width. The depth of the lake is highly variable, with a mean depth of 76 m and a maximum depth of 230 m. Okanagan Lake is heavily used for recreation and is believed by some to be the home of the mythical Ogopogo creature.

Article

Husky Lakes

Husky Lakes, 880 km2, lie along the southern edge of the Tuktoyaktuk Peninsula, NWT, and drain into Liverpool Bay on the Beaufort Sea. Though commonly known as Husky Lakes, the name “Eskimo Lakes” still appears in certain maps and literature. (See also Eskimo.)

Article

Physiographic Regions

Canada may be divided into seven physiographic regions. The Canadian Shield is the largest and oldest of these regions. The other six physiographic regions are younger and form two concentric rings around the Canadian Shield. The outer, older ring contains the Western Cordillera, Canadian Arctic and Appalachian Region. The second, younger ring contains the Interior Plains, Hudson Bay Lowlands and the St. Lawrence Lowlands. These regions may be further sub-divided based on their structure, relief and the presence or absence of permafrost and forest cover (see Natural Regions).

Areas quoted for these regions are the land areas and do not include adjacent continental shelves or bodies of ocean water within Canada's territorial limits. Readers should also note that the abbreviation “masl” stands for “metres above sea level.”

Article

Rupert's Land

Rupert’s Land was a vast territory of northern wilderness. It represented a third of what is now Canada. From 1670 to 1870, it was the exclusive commercial domain of the Hudson’s Bay Company(HBC) and the primary trapping grounds of the fur trade. The territory was named after Prince Rupert, the HBC’s first governor. Three years after Confederation, the Government of Canada acquired Rupert’s Land from the HBC for CAD$1.5-million (£300,000). It is the largest real estate transaction (by land area) in the country’s history. The purchase of Rupert’s Land transformed Canada geographically. It changed from a modest country in the northeast of the continent into an expansive one that reached across North America. Rupert’s Land was eventually divided among Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and the Northwest Territories.

Article

Rocky Mountain Trench

The Rocky Mountain Trench is a long and deep valley extending approximately 1,500 km from the Bitterroot Valley in northwest Montana through British Columbia to the Liard Plain just south of the Yukon Territory. Its predominantly flat floor is 3–20 km wide and ranges in elevation between 600 m and 1,000 m above sea level. With walls made of sedimentary, volcanic and igneous rock, the Trench is sometimes referred to as the “Valley of a Thousand Peaks” because of the towering mountain ranges on either side: the Rocky Mountains to the east and the Columbia, Omineca and Cassiar mountains to the west. Humans have relied on the rich resources provided by this distinctive landscape from pre-colonial times to the present.

Article

Yukon River

At 3,185 km (1,149 km of which lie in Canada), the Yukon River is the fifth-longest river in North America.

List

Ten Mountains in Canada Named After Women

While the majority of geographic features in Canada are named after men, there are examples from coast to coast of places named for women. These place names reflect the story of Canada and were chosen for a variety of reasons. Some celebrate trailblazers and their accomplishments. Others are named for locals, or the friends and family of the person naming them. They can honour individuals lost during wars and women who made their mark on history. Here are 10 mountains in Canada that bear the names of women.

Article

Clayoquot Sound

Clayoquot Sound is a dramatically varied inlet of the Pacific Ocean nearly 100 km wide on the west coast of Vancouver Island (estimated area, water 784.25 km2; land including freshwater 2715.75 km2 ). Clayoquot ("clah quat") Sound takes in the highly scenic islands and mainland drainages from Quisitis Point northwest to Escalante Point. Population is concentrated at Tofino, a fishing, tourism and wilderness recreation centre at the terminus of Highway 4. Most native communities are accessible only by air or water.

Article

Red Lake

Red Lake, Ontario, incorporated as a municipality in 1998, population 4,094 (2021 census), 4,107 (2016 census). The municipality of Red Lake is located in northwestern Ontario on the shore of Red Lake, 555 km northwest of Thunder Bay. The municipality is the result of the amalgamation of the former townships of Red Lake (incorporated in 1960) and Golden (established in 1985), and the unorganized territory governed by the Madsen local services board. Red Lake consists of six communities (Madsen, Red Lake, Balmertown, Cochenour, McKenzie Island and Starratt-Olsen) that sprang up around the area's gold mines.

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The St Lawrence Seaway

The following article is an editorial written by The Canadian Encyclopedia staff. Editorials are not usually updated.

When the first sod was turned near Cornwall, Ont., August 10, 1954, it was not so much the beginning of the great ​St Lawrence Seaway as a continuation of centuries of dreams.