June 19, Moskey Basin to East Chickenbone

When we woke up this morning, Alisia realized that it was Father's Day so we sang happy Father's Day to Victor to celebrate. Unfortunately his gift was too large to bring along on the trip so he will have to wait until we are off the island.

We saw some baby loons swim by as we were eating our breakfast:

We started off on our journey much earlier today at around 12:30. We are such morning people!! We prepped ourselves for the rain that was forecast (check out Alisia's awesome getup!), but it held off until later that night.

A man at Moskey Basin had warned us of the mud in the direction we were heading, but we quickly realized that the mud was nothing compared to our hikes thus far! We made it to Lake Ritchie pretty quickly and took a nice long lunch break along with some fishing. (Check out the size of that HUGE fish!)

I finally found the food Gavin loves: plain chicken plus ketchup! I'm so glad I found ketchup packets at the hotel we stayed in before our trip!!

We packed up and continued on our hike to East Chickenbone. This was a mostly uphill journey that was extremely difficult! I think I was the one holding up the group today! Victor carried Gavin's pack again for some of the way. I offered Lillia but she is adamant that she wants to leave the island proud of the fact that she held her backpack for the entire trek! We are more than halfway so I think she will make it! Here are some hiking pictures:

Holland clogs flowers:

Upside down flowers:

Catching butterflies:

Break at West Chickenbone to fill up our water and play mancala:

When we arrived at East Chickenbone, I dug a hole for Lillia. She was very excited not to go in the latrine and had the best view around for doing her business! 

Gavin got the spa treatment while I tried to wash off his filthy legs:

Gavin loves to enjoy the scenery:

Filtering water for our dinner:

We started setting up the tent and making dinner until we realized it was about to storm! Victor and Jared worked hard to finish staking tents and the rest of us threw everything into the tents. It turns out that the storm held off until we were completely set up. Thank you, God!! 

I'm sitting here inside the tent cuddling with the boys while the girls and Victor are next door in the tent. The lightning is extremely bright and, Gavin would say, scary! Gavin keeps saying "I'm too young to die!" as he recites Hail Marys! Hopefully we will get some sleep tonight! 

This is definitely an adventure! I've never camped in the rain before!!

A little back scratching finally got Gavin to sleep:

Now for the rest of us...