Mille Lacs Night Navigation 2001
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The Lake Mille Lacs Night Navigation Weekend has become an ISK tradition. And there have been times when only a handful of people signed up for this trip. But this year, 16 of us went out to the lake for a weekend of camping and paddling.
The stifling hot weather seems to be persistent this summer, and this weekend was a continuation of extremely hot and humid air. But while it was in the nineties in the camp site, it was cooler and breezy on the water. The winds were light and the water warm. The bugs were a bit of a nuisance around camp -- there were deer flies and mosquitoes harassing us constantly. But more amazing was the army of daddy long leg spiders that seemed to creep into everything (even sleeping bags). We also had a visiting racoon one evening, who was frustrated by his ability to get to a bag of empty beer bottles.
Friday night at dusk, we hiked down to the beach for a cooling swim (with crayfish and mosquitoes). As the sun set, we floated and swam. It was a wonderful evening.
Saturday morning we ate breakfast and then met under the bright Cooke Custom Sewing "tundra tarp" which is screened in on all four sides. It got a little toasty in there, but the biting flies were hard to ignore if we left the tarp's protection. Dana gave a lesson on navigation, reading charts, using a compass and divider (aka pointy walking thing aka PWT), and how to plot a course. We all worked on a course for the evening's night paddle. We finished by lunch time. After eating, we went down to the lake to practice rescues and other skills and take a short paddle. It felt great to be on (and in) the water!
The evening meal was catered by Dana -- an old family chicken stew recipe, along with biscuits and salad. The dessert was provided by Jody in a chocolate fondue experiment -- the fruit was all dehydrated. It was a great meal!
At around 9:45 p.m., we went out for the night paddle. The sunset was welcoming, though the insects were not. They were swarming us as we got our lights on our PFDs and boats. But it was a successful navigation exercise. Lead paddlers were able to accurately follow the courses they had planned earlier in the day. Paddling in pairs, with left and right wings, sweep, and lead, we circumnavigated three small islands. We were even treated to a fireworks display over the mainland while we paddled. It was a gorgeous night and another good navigation weekend.
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