We had put the positive energy out there that would warrant this leg of the journey to flow smoother than the previous ten days to cover 122 miles. (Three or four of which were weather days). Until that point I had felt pretty good about our food selection, we planned, and prepared ourselves to eat boxed food- which in our neck of the woods came from a natural food section, meaning our boxed food, was not necessarily unhealthy. Buying ‘boxed food’ elsewhere enacted me to feel like Edward Abbey’s character Hayduke, enforcing me to mumble ‘chemicals, chemicals, chemicals….’ As we ate our meals over the following few weeks… Back at the boats, repacked and jonesing to go, a fellow Canadian, one whom knew these parts offered us some fish, unfortunately packed to the gills ourselves and not owning a fillet knife, (let alone possessing the knowledge of what to do with one) we gracefully declined. He told us of some camping places and informed us that the wind, “ALL OF IT ALL THE TIME, would now be from the South – good luck.” This of course would make perfect hypothetical sense as we were now on the north shore… Que Sera, Sera.We camped on some swank sand abode facing Detention island, (little foreshadowing there) hoping tomorrow would be a more prosperous day. Yielding no such return we fought 4-6 foot beam (from the side) swells and 15 knot winds during our just under five mile crossing. Slightly gripped from that experience we hung out on Detention isle until later in the afternoon and made a break for it, still swells, but no wind, warranted our arrival to Pic Island just after sunset, where we would literally almost camp on the water.
This would be a defining corner stone of the journey, gentle rolling swells up no wind until we reached the Pic-ster right as the sun was going down some blast of 10+ knot wind ripping over the isle into our faces giving that early evening chill. (We would later refer to late-day decisions with reference, ‘We don’t want o have another Pic Island experience do we? Thus recollecting a dark , wet, cold, windy creation of camp.) No worries though the next day would yield an early start. Banking on the pattern of the winds we should be able to at least make it to the provincial park before it kicked up. (Insert laughter here) How wishful we were in our thinking. By the time we rose, our reference buoys were registering some heavy wind from the southeast, no need for alarm though we were in the wind shadow from the island. We paddled out and positioned for the 1.5 mile crossing no big deal right? Except the wind was wrapping around the island causing the waves to crash over you one way while the wind pushed you another, exciting times. We fought through that only to never find the boat launch for the campground and got pressed deeper into this bay yielding no real safe ground to land. At one point we saw a small fishing boat, and I mean small, like the one Uncle Bob uses to catch bass on the weekend with his buddies, all of us thinking the same thing, “What the heck!?” Shortly after that a miraculous saving grace appeared in the form of a sail boat moored, unattended with a note that read ‘ If you’ve found this boat, it’s yours to keep for free… Really! There are instructions how to sail located in the cabin…’ ok so that didn’t happen, but we did stumble, upon a sandy beach with, bum bah daah baaaahhh…. A CAMPSITE!! A few of them actually. SWEET. Protected from the wind we watched the waves build and break all day and attempt to plot our route whilst staying warm in the sunshine. 
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