Experiencing The Great Canadian Outdoors Part 2

Tent Set Up

Once our tent was up we got many compliments about how secured it looked, but that was only because of the kindness of Chris helping us to sort things out, and then securing the pegs safely in the ground.

The other tents you can see in this photo is the green one which belonged to Nichelle. The tent that looks as though its almost directly behind us belongs to Peter and the tent to the right of us belongs to Chris. We didn’t realize it when we were putting it up, but our tent is somewhat in the middle of all the other tents. 

The tent below belongs to Paul.

While our leader Richard knows everyone in the group, some of us were meeting for the first time. I was meeting Paul, Nichele, Peter and Patrice for the first time, and I hope there will be many more opportunities to connect with them in the future.

Below Paul’s tent you can get a better look at Nichele’s tent, and the tent belonging to Peter.

And of course here we take another look at Richard’s hammock.

The two tents on the other side of the fire belonged to Karen and Patrice. Patrice is a brave lady, as you can see her sporting her shorts. So there were nine of us in all, with eight tents erected. Tina and I were the only ones sharing a tent.

Meal Time

As soon as we got the tents up it was time to start the fire and look for something to eat.

Some of us had meat burgers while others including myself had the veggie burgers. Below you can see our kitchen area and the yellow bag for our garbage. On one of the trees close by was where the key for the bathroom could be found.

Washroom Key

When Richard mentioned there was a key for the bathroom I immediately perked up a little. I thought how bad could this be if we actually had a key for the bathroom. Remind me not to trust every word that Richard speaks. 🤣

The “key” to the bathroom turned out to be a long piece of stick with caution tape around it. It was to be left hanging on the tree. If we saw the “key” it meant the toilet was available and if we didn’t see the “key,” the toilet was occupied. That actually worked out pretty well except for one time I had to take a trip to the toilet but did not see the “key.” I waited and waited, but still no “key.” Ok, so now I really have to go, so I started counting heads and realized everyone in the group was there and the “key” was left behind on someone’s last trip to the toilet.

Socializing

After our meal was finished we had some time to relax and socialize.

And perhaps this is where the idea was formulated, for Richard to take Tina out in the canoe. As I said, I’m a novice at camping and canoeing and so is Tina. She is my tent mate and we are here with these establish campers and hikers—just for the experience.

Perhaps Richard and Tina might also be looking at the clouds that are beginning to darken, but in spite of that Richard decides to give Tina some instructions in canoeing. They put on their life jackets and decide to go out on the water in the canoe. I’m quite happy to stay on land and take some photos, but right at the last moment before they set out Richard talked me into going, and throwing caution to the wind I got in to the middle of the canoe, but would immediately wished I had stayed on land.

Peril 

As I look back at the situation I can now laugh about it, but at the time I was very afraid. We were just barely out from the shore. Richard was instructing Tina to go in one direction but the canoe seemed to be going in the opposite direction. I only came with them because he had promised to keep the canoe close to the shoreline, but we seemed to be drifting. I wanted out—I wanted to go back as things didn’t seem to be going right with this canoe trip. I could only see a bad outcome.

Storm clouds seemed to be forming quickly and Richard decided he would get the canoe turned around and we would go back. Well I was happy to hear this.

It took a bit of maneuvering on his part and then Chris would give us a helping hand. To stop the canoe from drifting out, he ran into the water and pulled us to shore. Thank God, we were safely back on shore and a canoe crisis averted.

After Peril

Well while I could breathe again, it was only for a moment. As we looked out at the lake we could see the rain moving in. A strong wind had picked up and Richard yelled, “Head for your tent,” or something of the sort. Tina and I ran and got into our tents, and once again, this is where minutes seemed like hours.

I have no pictures for this part of the story. This was a time for grave concern. A time for prayer and to ask God for His protection.

The rain had moved across the lake and now along with the wind it was ferociously slamming into the tents. It felt like the tent might blow away. We could see debris lashing up against the tent as the wind and the rain smacked into it. Tina sitting on her mattress clasp her hands and said lets pray. I could see she was terrified, so even though I also was terrified I didn’t want it to show. So I told her we would be fine. God had just save us from that perilous canoe trip, so I’m sure this will also blow over.

In my mind however I was talking to God and it went something like this; “Dear God, are you kidding me! These trees seem like they can come crashing down on us. Did you save us from disaster on the water to take us out this way? HELP PLEASE”

Water was dripping around the insides of the tent and I was thinking as to how I could protect myself in case a tree came crashing down. I considered putting my camera case over my head to break the impact of any falling trees.

So Tina and I had survived our first storm in the wild. I thought we were the only ones that were scared, but Karen admitted she was sitting in her tent shaking. I asked Richard our outdoors man, if he had ever experienced anything like that before and his answer was—no—never. So this tells me it was a pretty bad storm.

Praise God for sparing our lives to see another day.

Be exalted, O Lord, in Your own strength! We will sing and praise Your power.  Psalm 21:13 NKJV

 

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