Woke up at 4:40am to watch the sunrise over the east end of Kek. Each sunrise is never the same so that is why I try to see as many as I can. This morning it was about 60 degrees. The view from this campsite really is something else as you can see some of the bluffs on the east end. You also have a panoramic view to the east and south. Nothing like enjoying a cup of coffee to this! Thankfully the rain stayed away from us and eventually cleared up to blue sky for the day with a SW breeze to help keep the skeeters at bay. I went back to bed after the show about 6:35 for a bit as the only paddling we would do today would be a daytrip to the Kekekabic Cabin on the east end. No portaging today! Relaxing, watching the loons, swimming, exploring a little and my favorite....Hammock Time.

After waking up again we made breakfast. Today we had biscuits and gravy, hashbrowns, bacon and oj. Why does the food always seem to taste better when you are in the backcountry? Great way to start the day. A canoe with 2 girls slowly paddled by looking for a campsite. They also were attractive, fit and knew what they were doing. We exchanged hellos and they took the next campsite to NE of us. I must say I have never seen so many good looking women in the boundary waters on one trip. What a nice surprise!

The day ended up being sunny and warm, in the 80's and low humidity. I spent lots of time in my hammock today. After all the portaging it took to get here, I felt this was well deserved. One of my favorite parts of being in the boundary waters is laying in a hammock overlooking a lake, listening to the loons and just taking it all in the best I can.

After getting plenty of rest we decided to go for a daytrip to the east end of the lake to see if we could find the ranger cabin. We had a nice breeze at our backs as we headed east. As we came to a bend that we could not see from our campsite the lake really opened up and wow, this is a very big lake. It really humbles you as you paddle such big waters in a canoe and see a lake that has changed very little over hundreds of years. I know this lake was hit hard over the big July 4th blowdown storm of 1999 and I did see some of that but I thought my trip to the south arm of knife lake 2 years ago was much worse in certain areas. Kekekabic was very impressive to me. We end up paddling 3.5 miles from our site to the cabin and had no problems finding it thanks to my gps. It was a short hike to the cabin and we could see that is was in really good shape. Somebody is taking the time to keep it in good condition. It is kinda weird to see this cabin in such a hard place to get to but realize this was built many years ago and there was a road very close which is now the Kekekabic Hiking Trail that which gave acess to a fire tower that was there for many years but has since been removed. We took a look around the area. The cabin was locked up and there was a sign that said "closed to public". After we were done looking around we paddled back to our campsite into a brisk wind. Our daytrip was a total of 7 miles paddled.

Dinner tonight was pizza! We brought some premade crusts and rehydrated some mushrooms, red, yellow and green peppers and added pepperoni. It was excellent and we were feeling good after that. We started a campfire and listened to the loons that were out in full force tonight as the sunset. It was calm and a perfect evening.......until the golden hour of 9:30 when a massive buzzing sound invades our site followed by fast and furious repetitive slapping of ourselves until we can't take it any longer. Yep, our "other" state bird, the mosquitoes were on a mission tonight. Time to get in the tent! 64 degrees out and we were in bed at 10:00 pm.