Two weeks and counting. We had a wonderful event last night on Long Pond where we introduced the joys of canoeing to some New Canadians and their conversation partners. It was a great partnership between School of Human Kinetics, Student Services, and the Association for New Canadians. I annotated the photo above with some common parts you might hear us use during audio updates.

Mark has been busy watching the news for relevant items as we get closer to our trip. One recent pst he sent mentioned swarming black flies: https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/hundreds-of-black-flies-attack-labrador-woman We are packing fly dope as well as our head nets and bug jackets-which say be know henceforth as our “happy places.” We will also be travelling south at the end of our trip on the next Labrador coastal boat: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/kamutik-w-maiden-voyage-1.5225946 Hopefully sea conditions allow us to get all the way to Hopedale and ride the new ferry.

We are also watching the weather: https://weather.gc.ca/city/pages/nl-38_metric_e.html It looks like Hopedale is having a cool and wet summer thus far. Today in St. John’s it’s hot and sunny and the squashes in our garden are loving it. We’ll make sure to pack our woolies because 8 degrees and rain can be quite chilly. As we ended neared the end of our big trip, Paddling North, last year-it got much cooler and wetter as we approached the Arctic Circle. Here’s a fun post from last year as we were looking back as well as forward to the last kilometres of our trip: https://taloeffler.com/2018/08/02/paddling-north-2739-kilometres-of-memories/

I’ve mentioned the legendary salmon fishing on the Adlatok River. Here is a newspaper clipping from September 1963 reporting that a 27.5 pound salmon had been caught on the river.

OK-off to do more prep. Stay tuned.