Dan’s annual family backcountry trip is becoming one of my favourite events of the summer. I haven’t been away from the house since the Beaverbrook camping trip earlier this summer and despite the rain in the forecast I was not willing to miss it. We had said that we would not go if there was a lot of rain, but how do you determine what “a lot of rain” means? My final deciding point was “If Dan is going, we are going”. We’ve had a drought all summer in Ottawa and I was looking forward to rain.

I got soaked through on my way back from work so the little evening drizzle we encountered once we reached the lake was pleasant. How I missed the grays and the dark greens of an overcast evening!

We booked off a cluster of sites on Lac La Peche. The remaining camp clusters were so far away it felt like we were alone on the lake.

Saturday had huge rainfalls in the morning and in the late afternoon. Our tarps held up quite nicely and as the weather was warm and the fire sustained through the downpour, the time passed pleasantly.

The older kids pretty much entertained themselves, but the families with younger kids ended up calling it quits half way through Saturday.

They could not leave before playing The Most Extreme Elimination Challenge

Sitting in the middle of canoe and not paddling is called “princessing”.

It was time for me to improve my steering skills. That is me doing a tack in the background.

The kids were fishing like crazy.

A really cool thing about tarps in rain is that they are a constant source of water. Markus went a bit too far…

Sunday morning was absolutely gorgeous!

We were sad to pack up, but it was time to get back to civilization.

Getting ready to show off the paddling skills…

There was a bit of a worry that the rain would make us miserable. I found that it was not so much the rain itself that was the problem as it was warm and hence not actually unpleasant. The worst, for me, was worrying if it would get colder, or if the kids would get sick or if our clothes or equipment would start leaking. None of this happened and the worry was moot. The lovely company more than made up for any worries, but the best part was how happy and engaged the kids were.