Tuesday, July 27, 2021 - The next morning my girl was tired and not sure she was ready for another long day. She commented on how slow the day went on Monday. I gave her as many tasks as I could during setup to keep her busy but it was quite the change from 'normal' life at home. The good news?... I had a perfect solution... Adventure Day!

We planned a day trip over to Burnt Lake for some campsite exploration, fishing, and a lunch. We packed a day bag with our cook kit, stove, water purifier, snacks, and lunch. The portage to Burnt was legit. I'm not as spry as I once was so I needed a halfway break :)

Burnt lake was beautiful! Lots of islands and bays to explore and plenty of 'fishy' spots to work on our casting. We explored 3 sites and ended up stopping for lunch on the third. I know that this isn't a good practice because someone could be looking for a place to stay and think it was occupied. However, I knew my girl would need a latrine and we only saw 1 other canoe on the lake and they were without packs and definitely on a fishing expedition. We made it a shortstop and continued our tour of the lake.

We didn't have much luck fishing but we didn't work very hard. It was hard to keep her interested long enough. I managed to bring in a hammer-handle northern and a bass that was too small to eat. After that, it was back over the portage to Kelly and back to camp.

It was HOT that day so we were both motivated on our paddle and portage by the thought of swimming at camp followed by a nap! The water was perfect and the nap was replaced with some reading from the final Harry Potter book. For dinner we had hot dogs and beans and set out for some more fishing around camp. No luck again, but it was great to see her gain confidence in her casting and reeling artificial lures instead of waiting for a bobber.

We finished the evening with a game of cribbage in the tent while listening to the mosquitoes swarm outside. It brought joy to my heart to hear my daughter confess that she had so much fun that day and that the BWCA was much better than she thought it would be :)