Overnight storms developed, and I woke up to wind, rain and thunder somewhere around 4 AM. Then lightning started with flashes and ground strikes not too far off. Most of the tall trees and tall ground was a little ways behind my campsite, but as a precaution I invited Regent to crawl up onto my sleeping pad to help insulate him as much as possible from the ground. He was happy to oblige.

By morning the worst of the storm had passed but the strong winds and some rain remained. Worse, they were now blowing straight off the lake into my campsite, and there were decent sized white caps on the lake. At times I could not see the opposite shore. The more trips I take, or maybe the older I get, the less interested I am in forcing myself to paddle in bad weather. It takes about two cups of coffee to decide I’m going to wait for better weather. After breakfast I go back to my tent to read and write for a while and then take a nap.

I woke up to the sound of something outside flapping in the wind. I stepped out and found one of the corner guy lines for my tarp, which had been tied to a tree in front of my tent, and untied from the tree and through relentless whipping about tied itself into a complex knot. It looked like a wind knot at the end of my fly fishing leader, and took about 5 full minutes to untangle.

I spent the afternoon wandering the woods behind camp and reading, then fired up my MSR stove for another boil in bag dinner inside my bug shelter. I had planned food for a 10-12 day trip, but had gone a little light on my fuel and was already starting to wonder if I would have enough for the whole trip. I had looked at the Solo twig stoves before my trip but passed, and now wished I’d picked one up as this would be a perfect situation to use one, and right inside my bug shelter too. Spoiler alert - I got one before my next trip and love it.

Went to bed early, hoping for better weather tomorrow.