Kelby and I let our eager campers lead the way to the mine and we followed with the canoe. They all waited for us at the nearby cabin that was abandoned and missing most of its outside shell. Once we got the canoe into the mine Kelby led the front and we put three campers in the canoe with her. After we had filled the canoe with campers I went to push it off and send them into the mine; but it didn’t move.
There was a log blocking the entrance and we could not get the canoe around it. We tried angling the canoe a different direction, we tried pushing the log to the side, and we tried to lift the log out of the water. Nothing worked, and Kelby and I quickly gave up due to our feet going numb in the freezing water. I also tried walking around the mine, to the hole in the mine and further back to see if there was any other entrance point, and I concluded that there was not any safe way to enter the mine.
After the unfortunate event of not being able to truly explore inside the mine as I was able to last year, we took out the canoe and headed back to the rest of our canoes.
We confirmed with the campers one more time that they wanted to do the portage tonight and they did, so we headed back to our campsite, had a quick lunch and then made our way back to the portage.
This time to make the portage easier, we unloaded the canoes into the marsh one at a time and sent the campers with gear packs in groups of two and three. Once they got the gear pack to the other side of the portage we had them walk back to help with the canoes. Once all the gear was at the end of the portage we had three people carrying canoes over mud puddles, downed trees and any other obstacles until we came to the open clearing and were able to one-man the canoes. Even with having the campers shuttling gear and canoes back and forth, the portage took us almost half the time it did the first time through.
As promised we stayed the night at Deadman’s Campsite. After gear was unloaded, tents were up and firewood collected we let the campers go for a swim. As Kelby made us spaghetti for dinner I lifeguarded the campers. While they were swimming a painted turtle swam at the shoreline near me and later came up to a nearby rock and laid its eggs.
These are the moments I live for on trail. The moments campers are having fun and enjoying each other’s company. Nature unbothered by humans. And the feeling of accomplishment after doing something hard.
