Camping and Canoeing in Sweden (2)

Day 2 of the camping-canoe tour started off fine enough. After a good breakfast with some strong coffee we packed up the tent and got off on the water. The day was sunny but with quite a breeze. As such the water was a bit rougher than the day before. That meant more work, but all was fine - until the wind picked up a bit more and the sky started to turn darker and darker.

I was in the front of the boat where I could get a very good feel for the size of the waves, and the difference from the day before. As much of the shoreline of the lake was composed of 3 meter high rocky cliffs just pulling off the lake anywhere was not an option. I started to get nervous that I would run out of energy in paddling in the rough water and we would crash or something... not logical at all I realize. Morten did a good job though keeping me focused on the task. After 20 min or so (the longest of the WHOLE trip) we found a place to pull in. We no sooner got out of the canoe, got our rain coats on, and put everything under the tipped over canoe, and it started to rain.

The weather forecast was for a mostly sunny day (according to the newspaper we saw at the canoe rental place) so we decided just to wait out the shower by looking around the area we pulled into, and picking some wild strawberries. After about 45 minutes, and Morten's rain jacket starting to weaken in effect, we decided to put up a shelter using the outer layer of the tent. We put it in a place where we could sit and eat some lunch not too far from the canoe so we could be on our way when the weather cleared.

But every time it looked like it might clear, and we dared to say such an idea aloud, the rain got heavier. I don't think I've seen such heavy rain since the last time I was in Japan during typhoon season! Mostly sunny! I began to think that maybe EVERY DAY in that paper says mostly sunny to keep the dumb tourists coming in!

The rain was getting heavier, the wind stronger, and the dry-ish area of the shelter, smaller and smaller. We decided that we would stay there the rest of the day and put up the tent. The challenge was, the shelter was not in a good place for the tent, but we needed the shelter so we could make sure the tent did not get wet inside - that would defeat the whole point of putting it up! Sooo we put the tent together under the shelter, which was not very high, then when we finished we took the shelter down fast and laid it over the tent, and carried the whole thing over a bunch of rocks to a flat-ish spot. Then quickly got all the gear that was under the shelter and under the canoe to put it some place in the tent or in the shelter of the tent!

Sheesh! The good news is, it was a reasonably flat spot and the tent didn't get wet inside. We took a nap and when we woke up the sun was out! This was lucky and gave us the chance to dry everything out that afternoon....















Even though we were wet and tired and hungry, it worked out ok. Ironically that was on July 15th, Morten's birthday. I think he must have done something pretty bad to deserve that! :-).... Fortunately, even though it was stressful we managed it ok. The magnitude of the rain was just too absurd not to laugh at, mostly sunny...yeah right!















Another nice part of the spot we were in was that a bunch of birch had been cut down recently so there was lots of wood to have a fire and some stones that someone else had set up near before us. Although the wood was wet, we got a nice fire going at dinner time which made the evening cozy. We had a Spanish omelette for Morten's birthday dinner, it was delicious!













Despite the bad weather (and the scary waves, for me) the days end was pretty impressive...