Massasauga Provincial Park - Day 3

Jess, Eric, Lily; Me, Peter, Cynara and Jonathan and Chris.

Peter awoke early on the third morning. He went out to take sunrise shots with the mist on the water. Cynara suggested going out the night before, but slept in. Oh well.

Today we planned on hiking the nearby Moon Island Trail. It's right across the strait from our campsite (though the trailhead is on the opposite side of the island). A 20 minute paddle perhaps. We had to wait for Eric's group to arrive though because we thought they wanted to do the hike too.

After breakfast Peter and I went out for a short paddle. I don't remember exactly where we went. Maybe up and down Captain Allan Strait in front of our campsite. After awhile we came back and relaxed.

Jonathan decided to take a canoe out on his own to go fishing. Eric had left his rod there and Jonathan thought he might try it. A short time later he came back completely soaked. The canoe had flipped and he had lost Eric's rod and reel.

It wasn't far from where our campsite was, so Peter and I donned our PFDs and swam over. Cynara and Jonathan paddled there. Jonathan and I searched the riverbed while Peter and Cynara observed.

Jonathan hadn't flipped too far from shore, so we thought we were in the right area. He carried heavy rocks (which weighed him down) and searched the bottom with his feet, while I dove down headfirst and searched with my hands.

The bottom was murkier the deeper you got. In some parts there was seaweed growing from the bottom too. So the view was obscured. We searched a fairly large area for quite a long time but never found it. Too bad.

It was around the end of our search when we saw Eric's canoe coming in. There were four of them in it - Eric, Chris, Jess and Lily. As well we saw what we thought was a dog swimming in the water around them. We thought it might have belonged to them (who we didn't recognize at first) or to a motorized boat nearby. It was only when the "dog" got out of the water and scrambled up the rocks by our campsite that we realized it was a bear cub. No one got any photos unfortunately.

After Eric's group got resettled (and we broke the bad news to him), we split up to do different activities. Jonathan and Jess took a canoe to paddle to the LCBO at Moon River Marine to get some beverages while Eric, Lily, Cynara, Peter and I took the other two to Moon Island to do the 4 kilometre hike there. Chris stayed at the campsite to rest up.

Eric, Chris and Jess had actually gone over to Moon Island to hike when they were here earlier. But somehow they got lost and ended up wandering around off trail. They never actually completed it. So it would be mostly new for him too.

After hiking we made dinner. Eric's group brought some new food like wild salmon and cheap steak. They tried cooking it over the campfire first, but it didn't turn out so well. So Peter re-cooked everything in the skillet which turned out well. No one wanted to eat the salmon still, so I finished it off.

More star shots after eating. No more Northern Lights. With the extra bodies, there wasn't enough space in the tents. So Chris and Jess slept on the rocks under the stars.