We woke up in a heavy fog all over the sea; a rather late wake-up call given the hour we went to bed after our looooooong voyage. In reality we had to imagine that we were facing the Gulf of the St. Lawrence River somewhere behind that heavy fog curtain. You can hear the surf, you can smell the kelp, but there is nothing to see.
David, Francis, and Ali are the first to emerge from their tents. Émile and Charles-Henri soon join them. The girls sleep in in their tent as Sean and Jeffrey try to recuperate from their night shortened by the snores of their tent-mate, Jacob.
A table fit for the best restaurants was set up for breakfast. With colourful tablecloth and fruit bowls, it is generously supplied with French toast and maple syrup. Madison, Layla and David then get busy with the dishes; in fact, each day a different team of three people takes care of this chore.
They we board the bus for the 5 km ride to the shores of Lake Paterson, a (hot) water lake in the suburbs (!) of the Longue-Pointe-de-Mingan village. We unload our crafts and attend a kayak paddling technique session and recuperation in case of capsizing. There are very few chances of capsizing in our large double kayaks, but one is never too careful…We spend a few hours perfecting our technique before coming back to the beach to dry out and wolfing down bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon.
We then return to our campsite on the shore of the Gulf. Two surprises were there for us. First, the weather is 10 to 15 degrees colder then on the shores of Lake Paterson, a mere 5 km away! The water temperature is around 4 C and this affects the ambient air. And… second surprise, the fog has lifted and we can now see the outline of the Mingan Islands, the archipelago we will explore during the coming week!
The rest of the afternoon is spent leaning to pack our bags and leaning about the equipment supplied by the Foundation to our adventurers. Transferring personal belongings in waterproof bags takes some time and soon it is suppertime. Tonight, we’re treated to Indian cooking: Indian butter chicken, “with no” Naan bread as we forgot to take it out…
During the evening, we ask our young friends on the one hand to verbalize their fears, if any, and on the other, to describe their idea of adventure. Very few apprehensions were identified, but our young friends were quite voluble about their definition of adventure: unplanned, new, unique, pushing back one’s limitations… I for one am very impressed by depth of their thinking.
But this evening will be short, as we have to catch up on our sleep… Early to bed to be in good shape for tomorrow we launch our boats and start on our adventure for real!