August 15, 6 am and 6:19 am, ruby red sun because of heavy forest fire smoke.
The mosquitoes are so bad that I get on the water without breakfast. I stop on this bare boulder at 6:44 am on the lower side of a small island in the middle of the channel between camp 32 lake and the next lake. The small pot is full of water boiled the night before which I usually heat for breakfast the next morning. Today I bring it, somehow without spilling, sitting on the bottom of the canoe in front of my canoe seat. I have escaped the mosquitoes, and a light breeze is refreshing, but my throat is a bit sore from the smoke.
White trumpeter or tundra swans in the channel where I stop at an old burn area to pick fireweed salad.
I continue on through two narrows to the next lake.
Approaching the outlet of the second lake into the same named river that I entered on August 13. I find and check the 650 metre portage on the left, clearing a few small down trees by hand. Then I cross the current above the rapids to set up camp on a patch of sparsely treed rock that extends into the bush about 50 metres. Camp 33 is 13 km from the previous site.
Moonset on August 16 at 5:22 am.
Cinnamon bannock breakfast at 6:45 am. The fireplace is about 10 metres from the shore.
The tent is inland as far as the open area extends.
The tarp shelter is midway between tent and fireplace. Very little clearing is required, a nice change.
This is the sixth time that I have done laundry this season. Yeah, a welcome change to clean clothes.
Sadly there is a lot of garbage strewn about the site, probably by locals. There are some unused plastic bags graciously left to aid in picking up the litter which I burn.
A 28" pike caught at the head of the rapids caught from shore at my campsite. The scale on the multitool is 9", my boot is 12". I hoped for walleye, but no such luck.
While sitting in my chair at camp, a lynx walked on the trail close to shore in the open bush in front of me. He was a big specimen with luxuriant brown summer pelage, the thick fur rippling with each step. If I had been a second faster, I would have captured a photo of him, instead of this one of where he was. An awesome sight, only the third that I have ever seen in the wild.