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While I was camping Kathryn and Eric went overnight at our friend Linda’s camp near Lake Brantingham.  Eric had a good time playing at the beach.

We planned on a three day / two night trip canoeing Cranberry Lake from Wanakena into Dead Creek Flow and camping somewhere near Janack’s Landing on Saturday. Sunday we were to hike to the top of Cat Mtn, have lunch and spend the day basking in the sun and enjoying the view with a return trip out early Monday morning.

We were on the water before noon and with Skip setting a racing pace we were at campsite 35 in just a little over an hour. It started to splat rain as we came across the lake. Once at the campsite we quickly set up tents and a large rainfly. With the impending rain and dire forecast we pitched tarps over our tents for insurance.

As the rain picked up in the afternoon we sat under our rain fly, told stories and were amused by Len.

In the evening we watched a loon family - Mom, Dad and Loon Jr fish in the nearby bay.

Len & I tried fishing with a found lure and dental floss, but with no luck.

It rained all night and we were thankful for the extra precautions we took with the tarps. The next morning we were shrouded in fog. With wet surroundings and more rain in the forecast we bailed on hiking to the top of Cat Mtn and prepared to depart. Len and Matt’s untethered canoe decided to depart before them and had to be rescued and returned.

The wayward canoe being towed back to camp.

Mom always said not to pick up hitchhikers…..

We are 95% done with the bedroom. Kathryn wallpapered on three sides and painted the other side a deep blue. It looks nice. We still have two snippets of wallpaper to put up and we need to paint the moulding around the hardwood floor.

This has been an interesting week. I made travel plans to fly out of Albany airport to Melbourne FL on Wed-Thurs only to have them cancelled the last minute and cancelling my overnight in Schoharie.

Kathryn’s volleyball teams are in the final week of playoffs. Her Tuesday night team bowed out early in the process but it is all in good sport.  Tonight are the Sand Fleas playoffs and the league banquet is next Thursday.
Eric excitedly went to day care on Tuesday morning because there was a new child that was 3 years old . Expecting a sympathetic playmate he came home disappointed as the new boy was too shy to play much.

We have been wallpapering the bedroom. Kathryn bought a steamer which greatly helped the process of removing the old paper. Monday the room was spackled and sized and Tuesday she got about 1/3 of the new wallpaper up. At least now we don’t have to move the two dressers very morning to make room for working on that portion of the wall.
This past weekend I managed to cut a little wood across the road and cleared a couple of Kathryn’s trails for use.

Monday I had shale dropped off in the wet spot in the lane leading to the back hayfield across the road. There is a culvert for the small stream. One the edges had eroded and the area over the culvert was prone to being a deep mud puddle. So I spread shale across the crossing and laid up stonework to hold in the dirt I plan to dump to stem the erosion.
Last night I started packing for a canoe camping trip to Cranberry Lake. Other than our trip down the Chenango in June I haven’t done any canoe camping this summer and I look forward it.

Saturday moring was cool - we had overnight temperatures in the low 40s. So as the sun came up Eric and I moved our race car game out onto the deck and into the sun.

Of course, sunglasses were required and the scene just begged a couple of pictures.