Saturday, July 06, 2013 I had set the alarm on my watch to go off at 5:30 so I could get an early start ahead of any wind or heat. Some crazy “alarm clock bird”, however, pre-empted my watch alarm going off. The bird kept repeating three times “cheep, cheep, cheep” which sounded an awful lot like my watch. This went on for what seemed like an eternity. Every once in a while the bird would randomly toss in a 2 count or 4 count just to throw things off and drive me even crazier! Can anyone reading this please identify what this Satan’s Spawn bird might be?

It was partly cloudy, but calm this morning. Looked like a great day for paddling. Not so blasted hot out! I ran into the same female Forest Ranger again on my pass through Trapline Lake where she had spent the night. On my way out of Trapline, my canoe was able to nicely slide down the “V” created in the middle of the beaver dam. Again, it saved me from having to do the 60 rod portage. Sweet!

It felt remote in this part of the loop. I didn’t run into any other canoeists until I set up camp on the north east end of Malberg Lake. I decided to stop and camp on site #1057. I set up my hammock, and put the tarp in lock down storm mode (looks cool that way with closed “doors” and all!), ..ate lunch, ..took a quick dip in the lake to cool off, ..and around 1:30p.m. a light rain began to fall, ..followed by louder and louder, and closer and closer lightening strikes, ..followed by a true downpour with intense gusts of wind. A real gully-washer as they say. As much rain fell in a short period as I had ever seen in my 39 years of coming to the B’dub. It felt good to see how my new tarp set up and groundhog stakes stood solid and strong against the onslaught of the storm. And contrary to what all Noobies fear, -- absolutely NO water dripped down the suspension system and into my hammock. Stayed dry as a duck’s back.

One thing I REALLY appreciated and grew to like was being able to use the hammock as a comfortable camp chair to sit in under the tarp to read and wait out the rain. Very comfy, dry, and relaxing! Great support for my back! Also, I had pitched the leeward side of the tarp in “porch mode” using my hiking poles so I was still able to catch some breeze and didn’t feel so claustrophobic.

I was disappointed to discover that two heavy sprayings of Permethrin on the outside of my hammock did NOT keep the mosquitoes from drilling my back through the single layer 1.7 nylon fabric. Has anyone else had a similar experience with using Permethrin on the outside of their hammock? Perhaps I just missed a spot, …but I kind of doubt it.