Day 13 Wednesday June - Whitesail Beach Camp to Little Andrews Bay

May 25, 2016

• Wake Up Time: 3:00 am


• Departure Time: 4:41 am


• Distance Paddled: 27 kms (Total: 325 )


• Total Paddling Time: 4 hrs 24 mins


• Weather Conditions: Calm at first but storm chased us into Little Andrews Bay

The final day started off fairly calm but the sky was almost completely overcast. It was a grey morning. A bit of a switch from the day before. Nonetheless, it was still calm. There was nothing unusual about our morning routine and we got onto the water at 4:41. We only had 27 kms left to go. This seemed like a small paddle considering everything that we had been through over the past twelve days. So away we went back out onto Ootsa Lake where we started twelve days ago.

I believe we did about 12 kms and then we found an island that had a good landing spot for a break. We had a quick drink, took a few photos and, before we knew it, we were back on the water to finish the rest of the journey. This was our very last paddling break. It didn't seem real at this point. Hard to believe that we were almost done. Note: When we hit the 2 km mark (of this first 12 km), we also reached the 300 km mark of our journey. Maria yelled out that we had hit this major kilometerstone (sorry not milestone in Canada for my U.S. friends).

This picture was taken to show us celebrating that we had passed the 300 km mark of our journey!

Once we started to paddle away from this island we were making our way across Ootsa Lake which is quite wide. At one point I started to notice how far we were from either side of this lake. It can get a little intimidating when you're out this far away from shore in a little paddle boat. As we were making our way across I also noticed that a wind was starting to pick up behind us. So I turned around and saw a massive, dark weather system coming from the west moving towards us. Every time I looked back, this system was getting closer, the wind was getting stronger, and the rain was starting to fall.

By the time we got closer to north side of Ootsa, the wind and waves really started to pick up. It wasn't quite as bad as the very first day we were on Ootsa (twelve days ago) but it was getting there. I remember thinking to myself that the wilderness just wanted to let us know who was really in control here. Strange things come to mind when you're out in the middle of lake on a paddle boat. It was just a little reminder.

As we got closer to the point where Little Andrews Bay was and closer to shore we also started paddling through more dead trees in the water. Between the wind, waves and trees I was being thrashed around a bit. For a while it seemed like I would never reach the point at Little Andrews Bay. But I just kept paddling and eventually I got around that point. Arnie and Maria had already gotten around that point before I got there.

All of sudden, when I entered the bay, the water was nice and calm again and that was it. The bay was somewhat sheltered from the storm. It was still raining but at least the water was calm. It took another twenty minutes to get to the actual boat launch at the end of Little Andrews Bay where we began the journey. We were finally at the end. We didn't take any photos of the storm behind us because we were trying to out paddle it before it got too bad.

Finally, we packed up all our gear back into the truck, got cleaned up and put on a fresh, clean pair of clothes to start our drive back home. That's it, and there you have it. Our journey in a nutshell.

And we're back at the boat launch where it all started. Little Andrews Bay.

We cleaned up real good, didn't we? No worse for wear!