Home For Two Nights Rest

As soon as the canoe was unloaded, we got to the important part of eating chocolate bars. While doing groceries I made a last-minute addition to the list and bought three chocolate bars, planning them as a surprise after our long portage. The portage was done so we shared two of the bars. We saved the third for a portage that was coming up in a few days. This idea worked out great, and we will definitely do that next time. It is a nice way to mark significant accomplishments. The only change we'll make is to have them available to eat right at the end of the portage.

Setting Up Camp, Settling In

Katherine was still homesick, so I kept her occupied to distract her from thinking of home. She said that doing things that she does at home reminded her of home. Deciding where to put the tent, the tarp, and the food hang are things that never happen at home. William was having a good time and was happy to explore camp on his own. His first goal at every campsite is finding climbing rocks near the water.

As on the previous day, Katherine was enthusiastic to learn any camp skills. We went hiking for marshmallow sticks which then gave a chance to learn whittling. She paid attention well and then worked on her stick. I noticed her finding reasons to pause, each time this was a process of closing the knife and setting it down in a safe place. Then she would do whatever was needed, chatting or something, and open the knife to work on her stick again.

William also got ready for marshmallows at this point. He has a good time with all camp things, but had already learned about whittling on our trip the previous fall. After getting his stick ready, he was content just to explore around the area and look at things in the water.

Katherine helped to prepare firewood by watching while I sawed a log that had been left by previous people. The log was originally used by the kids as a teeter totter, this was the end of that. The part of the log that had been on the ground was wet and difficult to cut. As we would soon learn, also difficult to burn. My hope was that the dry wood on the other half would burn well enough to dry out the wet side.

Dinner

Dinner was store-bought prepared rice; I forget what flavour. It was OK, but turned out to be a poor choice for camping, we'll choose something different next time. Uncooked rice makes sense, because water is added at the site, so the rice is relatively light. The pre-packaged version already has water, which means we carried that water in with us. Also, it was packaged in bulky plastic, which took a lot of space in our garbage for the rest of the trip. On the plus side, it was tasty and I was able to cook it even on our poor fire.

Marshmallows

We had some fire problems, either from poor wood or too much wind (more on that tomorrow). Whatever the problem, I wasn't confident that our fire would last through dinner. We missed marshmallows the previous night and I started to worry that the streak would be extended. I proposed that we roast and eat them as appetizers instead of waiting for dessert. No surprise, the motion quickly carried. It was a good thing too, because the fire petered out while we were eating dinner.

Dishes

After dinner I did dishes while the kids played at the shore. Katherine was doing much better by this point, and was not homesick for the rest of the trip. I think that she was done in by the combination of long portage, little water, and late lunch.

Since the kids were having a good time at the shore, I did dishes on my own. I used the same "low impact" method as the previous night. As an added challenge I tried to hide the hole by putting the pine needles back place. I thought I did a good job of this, but the kids found it right away ☹. I solved that problem at future meals by not asking them to look ☺.

We put the dishes away in the food barrel and then hung it in the woods. We had prepared the rope earlier in the day, so we just had to hoist it up.

Evening

With that job done, we all went back to the shore. The site faces mostly east, so no sunset view — we sat on the rocks just to watch the lake. We spotted a beaver swimming by, about twenty feet from shore. He came from around our point and headed to shore a little north of us. Surprisingly he wasn't spooked, even though we were engaged in noisy human chatting. We didn't have a camera, so no picture of that guy. It was the only time we saw him during our stay, so maybe he was more bothered than he let on.

After a while, the kids went to the tent while I puttered around the site. I saw the moon rise, and could even see it moving relative to the trees. I went to get the kids, but by the time they came out it was higher and the motion was no longer obvious. They said they enjoyed the view anyhow, then promptly went back to the tent. There wasn't enough light for a good picture — memories will have to do.

We all got into the tent and read for a while. I made notes from the day, but we didn't stay up very late. The kids decided to alternate doing the Spot OK message because they "wanted to know what it felt like to push the button at different times." This reasoning didn't make sense to me, but they both agreed so that was the process for the rest of the trip.