Chapter 2

Sue:

Dad and I were making good progress but it was very hard work. We were making our way down a large lake and we were getting no assistance from the current or the breeze, and we had discovered that inflatable boats are extremely hard to paddle, since they tend to stop moving at the end of each stroke of the paddle. After a couple of hours we had not travelled as far as we had hoped and both of us were more than ready for a break, with both of us needing to relieve ourselves and to stretch our cramped limbs. A small beach provided an ideal landing spot and we were soon behind bushes, peeing with some relief, and when we were back together we decided to brew some coffee and take a break for an hour or so. With lots of dry deadfall around there was no problem getting a fire going and after quickly boiling water, we were soon leaning back against convenient trees, sipping on our coffees and relaxing, and God, did I need it!

After a break of an hour and a half we climbed back into the boat and pushed off. At first my muscles complained loudly and hurt badly but when we had warmed up and my muscles had loosened up we soon got back into a rhythm and we made good progress down the lake. After we had been travelling for some time Dad turned towards me and made shushing gestures and indicated that we should both listen carefully with the boat still in the water. The sounds of ducks quacking and feeding drifted faintly over the water and we eventually identified their location. While I slowly and almost silently paddled towards where we thought the ducks were Dad untied the shotgun and loaded it with #5 shells. Eventually we were close enough for the sounds of the ducks to be quite loud and both of us were tensed up and ready for action, and when the flock of birds lifted off in an explosion of sound, the blast of Dad's two shots hardly startled me at all. To the surprise of both of us, three ducks dropped out of the sky and we soon retrieved them, and proceeded on our journey, content, anticipating the fine meal waiting for us.

Another couple of hours paddling convinced me that I had reached my limit for the first day and we decided to call it a day and set up camp for the night. While Dad pitched the two tents and got a fire going, I plucked and cleaned the three ducks, chopped them into pieces and dropped them in a pot with a packet of dried mushroom soup, a large portion of dried onions and a packet of dried mixed vegetables. Salt, pepper, mixed herbs and a covering of water completed the preparations and I set the pot on the fire to cook slowly.

I thought it would take about three hours for the ducks to cook properly and this gave us plenty of time to discuss our first day's travel and we both agreed that the best option seemed to be to split the day into three 2 1/2 hour shifts with spells of about an hour between them. After a while Dad got his rod out and pulled a couple of trout from the lake - breakfast, and, by now, the odours drifting from the simmering pot were mouth watering and acute pangs of hunger drove us to remove it from the flames and to share out the contents onto two plates before the three hours was fully up. The duck was cooked to perfection and whether it was all the unaccustomed exercise and fresh air, or the exquisite taste, it was possibly the best meal that either of us had ever had and when we had finished there were only bare bones left on the plates.

When the pot and the plates were cleaned I boiled some more water for coffee and settled down for a final drink before bed. When we were both finally tucked up in our sleeping bags in our own tents even the hard ground could not stop me from sleeping soundly but the distant, spooky sound of wolves howling did keep me awake for a short time.

Next morning Dad and I both awoke early and after separating for a spell to carry out our morning ablutions we decided to break camp and travel for a couple of hours before having breakfast. Two hours of paddling gave us an appetite and we were both more than ready for something to eat when we stopped, and coffee, grilled trout and toast really went down a treat. Another couple of spells of travel brought us within sight of the waterfall that was the start of the river that we hoped to be able to travel down to civilization. We decided to start that night's camp a bit early and make the potage down the cliff to the river first thing in the morning.

We set up our tents facing a large fallen tree trunk and circled some stones midway between the tents and the log for our fire. We had not hunted anything that day and decided to have a thick broth of vegetable soup and some cabin bread for that night's meal. I volunteered to make the soup while Dad went for a walk to see if he could hunt something for tomorrow. I gathered a stack of firewood and lit a fire and then mixed two packets of dried soup with only one and a half portions of water. The only thing left to do was sit it on the edge of our fire and let it slowly come to the boil and simmer quietly until we were ready. Dad had disappeared with the shotgun so I grabbed the rod and thrashed the water for a while. The fishing was great and I soon had a couple of nice trout cleaned and ready for the breakfast pan.