It seems our day off yesterday has seriously eroded our newly acquired expertise as canoeists. One could wonder as we rode down our first rapids of the day… It was a simple, anonymous Class 2, run-of-the-mill rapid, yet some members of the group nearly capsized. Overconfidence? Not really! Lack of attention? Probably. No matter, we all came out of it with dry hair, but, between you and me, this one will not make the highlight reel of canoeing…
Monet may have painted “Lunch on the Grass”, but we had ours on the water. With 25 kilometres to go today, we decided to link our canoes and slowly drift down the river as we ate. Just like that, we had put a full kilometre behind us without any effort.
Today’s itinerary included a Class 1 rapid at the halfway mark, which we shot easily (we think we even heard some Backstreet Boys’ tunes coming from some canoes over the rumble of the water…) as well as a second Class 1 rapid to end the day. The highlight of the day was a drastic change in the weather. When we launched this morning, there was a partly cloudy sky and the mercury was above 30 C. At the end of the day, there was a light rain, sustained winds, and the thermometer was below 20 C. On the up side, the mosquitoes are nearly gone! Let’s hope this situation will still prevail at 10:15 pm, when they usually mutate from tenacious pests to voracious ones…
For the time being, we’re comfortably under the tarp, eating a superb tofu and almonds curry, with hot chocolate and homemade s’mores, laughing heartily at Mario who fell asleep leaning on a tree, at Magalie and her contagious smile, or at Noémie who took an involuntary mud bath.
For sure, there is a friendly atmosphere at the camp. At times, we get the impression we’ve known each other forever, that we are not a group, not a team, but a real family, that our life on the river is like a metaphor for life, the metaphor of a struggle, sometimes against the elements, sometimes against illness, but with the ever-present feeling that the game will end in victory.