The Ramparts are rapids in a canyon that forms a navigational impediment on Canada's Mackenzie River, in the

Northwest Territories The Northwest Territories (abbreviated ''NT'' or ''NWT''; french: Territoires du Nord-Ouest, formerly ''North-Western Territory'' and ''North-West Territories'' and namely shortened as ''Northwest Territory'') is a federal territory of Canada. ...

. The river narrows from almost wide to barely more than . The river's only other rapids, the Sans Sault Rapids, are found upstream. According to the 1968 ''Great Slave Lake and Mackenzie River Pilot'', the rapids lie between mile 672 and 682. Early explorers for the

North West Company The North West Company was a fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in what is present-day Western Canada and Northwestern Ontario. With great weal ...

reported that

Stone Age The Stone Age was a broad prehistoric period during which stone was widely used to make tools with an edge, a point, or a percussion surface. The period lasted for roughly 3.4 million years, and ended between 4,000 BC and 2,000 BC, with t ...

eskimo Eskimo () is an exonym used to refer to two closely related Indigenous peoples: the Inuit (including the Alaska Native Iñupiat, the Greenlandic Inuit, and the Canadian Inuit) and the Yupik peoples, Yupik (or Siberian Yupik, Yuit) of eastern Si ...

" were known to have ascended the river as far as The Ramparts, in search of flint, to make stone tools. A scholarly study on climate change discussed how it had led to reduced water levels, which were, in turn affecting navigation. Water levels in the shipping channel in The Ramparts sometimes falls below —too shallow for the tugboats used for water transport on the river.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ramparts, The Rapids of Canada Mackenzie River