Day 12

Time: 6 hrs 55 min

Distance: 18.8 km (176.4)

Awake and moving slowly at 10:30, it's gotten hot in the hut as the sun beats down. There is some high haze and clouds visible to the Northwest. Although the water is not the mirror we had hoped for the wind is changing direction and will be offering some assistance. It's 1:40 before we set off; our plan is for a lunch break at Chip Point, which is about 13km away. Even though this is not the main lake there are long, wide stretches of open water with an array of islands to cause confusion. We turned slightly left, too soon as it turned out, going south of two smaller islands instead of between them and Phillips Island. After all the time on the river it was an adjustment to navigate on such a relatively massive scale. Our premature maneuver put us back into a headwind and the only "hard" paddling of the day. No harm however, a little route re-calculation and we are headed for Chip Point.

I suspect there is much more of a beach here; the high water has washed it out for the most part. We ate our lunch, collected a few pink stones and checked out the small tent sites just up the esker that rises here out of the water. It's 4 hours on the water now so we fill our water bottles and head across the bay to the point that leads out to the main lake. Taking a break we hear the approach of a motor, a couple in a zodiac (25 hp), pull up for a chat. They have also come from South Indian Lake, the woman is from Florida, and the man is from Tadoule Village. They had quite a time with the upstream sections, having to unload their considerable gear to get past the logjams and from the sound of it some real gruntwork on the portages and that short bit we had to drag and chop our way through. They head off to the village to refuel and would pass us out of site a couple of days later on Shethanei Lake.