It was windy during the night but warm. I woke to overcast skies. The sun never came out all day and it was very windy.

We got up about 7:00 am, ate breakfast, packed up, and left camp by 8:30. It was windy paddling though relatively uneventful until East Loon Bay. Once on East Loon Bay the water got very rough, the wind very strong, and waves quite high. Of course we were paddling directly into the wind (from the south).

That was tough going. I was never really scared, but I sure was getting worn out quickly. I kept great control of my boat and never felt that I was going to swamp, but neither was I making much headway. I just kept telling myself, "One stroke at a time … quarter the waves … don’t get broadside ... you are making SOME headway." I’m sure Steve and Jim were having similar mental conversations in their canoes. It seemed forever but I finally made it to calm water. WHEW! That was tough going!

We made it to the south shore and had lunch on a sand beach about 1:30. I think we were close to the seldom-used portage to Heritage Creek. We set up our chairs and took a long, well-deserved rest. It was hard to get ourselves back in gear and moving again.

Paddling was much easier now, finishing up the rest of Loon and up the LIS. Then we had Devil’s Cascade Portage again, this time going in the hard direction. We made it to Lower Pauness campsite (#43) at 5:30. 

This is the campsite on the point. It is a nice site but has a poor landing. I was paddling the north side of the campsite looking for a better landing spot when I hit a submerged rock hard … very HARD! It rattled my teeth and took a nice chip of gel coat out of my bow. I’m going to have to repair it. It has a duct tape repair now.

We were pretty beat after battling the wind all day and having finished the uphill Devil’s Cascade portage. It took us awhile to get camp set up and for us to get settled in. We were just dragging. We had supper about 8:15 pm. I don’t remember what.

It looked like the sky was trying to clear. There were a few stars trying to poke through. I went to bed at 10:00 pm.