Wednesday, September 21, 2011 Lay-over day on East Pike Lake (low=52 high=52)

Woke up about 6:00. It was still overcast but there was no wind and no rain. It was 52 degrees when we went to bed last night and 52 when we woke up this morning. The cloud cover maintained a very steady temp all night.

With the warm morning and calm water, John went for an early paddle. It’s a very peaceful time to be out on the lake.

We had breakfast and cleaned up, no rush since we had no set plans for today. The weather was supposed to gradually improve as the day went on but the opposite turned out to be true. By mid morning we could see several breaks in the clouds. John & Dennis decided to take a trip over and find the portage that goes directly to McFarland Lake. This portage intersects the Border Route Trail and they wanted to hike a short section of the trail to check it out. Chris & I were just going to hangout around camp to relax and read while there was no rain.

By late morning the clouds had thickened up again and was starting to look like rain. About 12:30 Chris & I decided to have lunch just in case it rained. About 12:50 it started to rain and about 1:00 John & Dennis returned from their trip. They joined us for lunch and filled us in on their trip. They did find the portage and the Border Route Trail. They followed the trail for a distance in each direction. They didn’t find any real nice vistas of the lake but were glad they had gone and checked it out.

As had been the pattern, the rain continued for the rest of the day. We had an early supper under the tarp and cleaned up. We stayed under the tarp to have our brandy and discuss all the important issues of the day. Each of the 3 days we’ve sat under the tarp we always said, at least the rain is helping the fire crews. The forecast hadn’t called for this much rain but spending the second half of 3 days under the tarp would be a small price to pay to help get that fire under control. We turned in real early tonight, shortly after 7:00, and listened to the rain hitting the rain-fly as we fell asleep. I got up once just before midnight and the rain had stopped for the night.