Wednesday, June 08, 2011 Morning brought cool, cloudy skies and some wind. We paddled to the portage into Ge-Be creek and hiked past the waterfall. After the corkscrew passage on Oyster the straight shot on Ge-Be-On-e-Quet was great. We came quite close to an eagle sitting on a fallen tree root. When we were too close he flew to a snag a short way off. When we moved on he was back on his root. He may have been guarding something. By the time I put down my paddle, got my camera out of the pocket of my PFD and it's zip lock bag I was only able to get a quick shot. I've only been that close to a wild eagle one other time. As we continued down Ge-Be creek Jay pushed off what looked like a large rock submerged in the water. His paddle sank into it and a noxious stench bubbled up. It must have been a large, dead animal decomposing in the water. I told Jay to stick his head beneath the surface to determine what kind of animal it was, but he declined. It was big. Too big to be a deer.

We arrived at Pocket Creek in a short time, made the right turn and arrived at Lac La Croix a few minutes later. Once on the big lake the wind increased dramatically. We pulled into campsite 150, which I had marked on the map as a 5 star rated site. By now the wind was blowing a moderate gale, according to the Beaufort Scale. We set up camp and rigged the big blue tarp as a wind break. The camp was a bit of a disappointment. The south beach was overrun with poison ivy and the area around the fire grate was brushy. I rated it a 3 star, but we were glad to get out of the waves.

  It was chilly and we soon put on our long underwear, fleeces and wool shirts. Then we had a rather pleasant day lounging around camp, gathering firewood and trying to avoid the poison ivy.