Friday, September 16, 2022 It continued to rain all night with damp patches showing up in the corners of my tent, but that could have been from my wet rain gear. It was a fitful nights sleep and I was woken up in the wee hours by a flash of lightning and rumble of thunder. The steady rain picked up force for a bit as the cells rolled through. I had to keep shimmying uphill since I pulled my tent off cantered yesterday. Finally, the gloomy morning light greeted me and I sluggishly tried to pull my wet rain gear on in my tiny tent vestibule without getting too many other things wet.

Ahh, nothing like a chilly damp evening to lift the spirits. I gloomily sipped my coffee and ate my oatmeal wondering briefly what the point was being out here in such miserable weather. I had been giving serious thought to packing up and leaving, but I really didn’t want to wimp out on my trip just because it was raining. I was warm, safe, and had plenty of food. I wanted to prove to myself that I could deal with some bad weather if need be. Luckily, during the time I was having gloomy and anxious thoughts, the rain actually stopped and I decided to go out for a paddle to see other sights and stretch the muscles.

Doing so did me a world of good. Moving around kept me warm and the lake was beautiful in the cloudy mist. The slight yellow tinge of the Royal ferns and birches really popped and I actually relished the feeling of being cozy and bundled up in layers. I did a slow tour of a few back bays and headed down to the far eastern finger where a remote campsite sat unoccupied. The loon chick popped up close to me and actually started approaching me like it thought I was its parent returning with food.

As I approached the campsite through the water lilies, it started raining again. But I wasn’t ready to be stuck back at camp and I pressed on and explored the site and the surrounding bay…no moose yet again darn! The wind was in my favor going back and I felt it pushing me onwards. I made it back just in time for the water to start collecting in my canoe-I was ready for some hot tea and some lunch. So back under the tarp I went.

Not much wildlife to watch, just a camp vole, warbler, and a nuthatch or two, and some croaking ravens. The puddles have reformed around camp and there’s a mini waterfall coming off of the face of my front porch rock going into the lake. I swear the lake level rose a few inches based off of my canoe landing “beach.” It keeps getting darker and lighter, and darker and lighter as each wave of rain passes through. A few drips of water are now coming through the surface of my tarp. Almost 30 hours straight of rain so far. Wow!

I’m looking forward to leaving early tomorrow morning, but I’ll survive the night with another hearty meal, chocolate, and scotch. I crawled into my tent at 6:30pm and bundled myself into my sleeping bag for some evening journaling and reading. Things are going to seem so quiet without the constant sound of rain on the tent!