The Campsite

Our campsite was nestled in a grove of Eastern Hemlock. We were well protected from sun and rain by thick trunks rising up to crowns of lacy green foliage. We could stand by the fire in a drizzle and not get uncomfortably wet. When the sun turned the full force of its heat upon us, we stayed cool in the shade.

The ground was spongy close to the water and carpeted with needles all the way back up the slope to where the forest floor was choked with the enormous three-pointed leaves of striped maple trees. Scattered about the site there were rocks and rotten logs covered with emerald green moss.

Extending out over the water two white pines swooped up into the sky with feathery boughs growing back towards shore in frozen relief. The needles were bundles of brilliant green that hid our dome tents from anyone on the water until they were directly in front of our campsite. The giants with their delicate crowns grew out of the rocky lakeshore next to a smaller cedar which had adopted the same bow in it's trunk. These three sisters had escaped any competition for sunlight from the droopy summited hemlocks behind them by stretching over the water.

Ollie put a life jacket on and climbed the stringy bark cedar up to just below its summit. He could perch up there high above the lake and find a few moments of solitude. He came to see himself as a chipmunk and spent a lot of his time scampering around on all fours and climbing trees.Les mer