Triplogs / Triplog#7 / Day 2
Day 2 - Keeping warm
Between not having a warm enough sleeping bag and my fear of things that go 'ker splash' in the night and such, I barely got an hour or two of sleep the whole night. After finally convincing myself to crawl out of the frosty tent and that moving around would make me feel a whole lot warmer, I made breakfast. A simple one; Coffee and oatmeal. While sitting on the rocks by the water's edge, eating my oatmeal, a loon appeared, drifting by. This loon was unusual in the fact that he or she was a very big one. I've been close to loons before, and was surprised at the size of this one. I continued to wolf down my rapidly cooling oatmeal. "Ker-Splash". ahhhh...mystery solved. It had been the loon the whole time. He was diving, and he had such a big fat beak/head, that it made the 'ker-splash' sound. I've seen alot of loons silently dip into the depths of lakes, however this guy was a noisy diver, and was responsible for sending my pulse racing the night before.
Saturday was very cold and gloomy
Breakfast finished, dish & cup cleaned, I got ready to disembark onto the lake. I was looking forward to a morning paddle..my first. I was just about to put my foot in the water, preparing to depart when a BIG FAT leech swam right by where my foot almost landed! YIKES! As I decided about how to get into the canoe without getting my feet wet or turning them into feeders for leeches, the wind woke up. The waves didn't seem so much of a problem, it was the wind. No way I was going out, unless if I had to, and I didn't "Have to". It was cold and overcast, and the wind wasn't helping either. So I lit a fire and stood around it. After about 90 min. of this I couldn't stand it anymore..either my back froze, then my front would as I kept turning my body to face the fire, to warm myself...it didn't seem to be working.
Still early in the year, the only thing growing seemed to be my beard
Hardcore fishermen: not even the chilly temperatures kept these folks away
I decided to go for a hike, to exercise and warm my blood. I hiked both east of my site and west. I spent quite a few hours doing this and was able to shake off the chill that had overcome me, just standing around my campsite. Hiking west was tricky, as the land near the shoreline became vertical. Eventually I had to hike quite aways far from shore to try and reach the end of the lake that turns into a creek as it heads into Jean Lake. I never did make it that far. Travel in the bush was difficult, there were many slippery sections, along some elevated rock-faces, not much in the way of growing vegetation though, it was too early in the season. Eventually I headed back and just hung around my site the rest of the day. I also noticed some of the campers on their island hanging around on their north shore, watching me, watching them. After a time the folks on the island went out fishing again, but not me. I didn't take to my canoe for the rest of the trip, till I had to leave. It was just too cold for me and the wind had me spooked. I tried fishing from shore, but caught lots of snags, and advise to only fish farther out in the water. Environment Canada Really messed up that weekend. It was supposed to be 12°C on Sat. felt more like -5°C. On Sat. Nite I failed yet again to get any solid sleep, constantly waking up, imagining I had heard things coming to gobble me up.
Lacking a digital camera of my own, I borrowed a friend's camera.
This image shows some of the terrain and bushwhacking I endured, to keep myself warm