An entire week of learning and adventure

I just got back from winter camp today. We were privileged with accommodations at Christopher Lake for the last five days while we learned all about fish netting, water quality testing and wilderness survival.

Christopher is a gorgeous little lake about 40 minutes North of Prince Albert inside the Boreal forest. We were treated to three square meals a day and a cabin full of bunk beds. I was in a much more posh situation than normally. I had running water!

I never went to camp as a kid so this was a new experience and it truly ruled. I really did not want to leave. Good friends, guitars and lots of learning. It seemed like everyone at camp was a secretly a musician so we had five straight nights of campfire guitar playing and loud singing. There was one old toothless man who truly ruled the roost. His guitar playing was spot on and when he sung at your campfire, every camp for half a mile could hear his voice.

We learned how to net fish and classify the population. We learned how not to tie knots when using the jigger (used to run the net under the ice. I tied the one set of knots and our instructor tied the other. When it became apparent we lost the jigger I became awful nervous. But as we pulled the loose rope out of the ice the truth came out and my knot had stood the test of time. We also did a bunch of water quality testing on the surrounding lakes that we will take back to the classroom.

I also learned that I will never buy a power ice auger. A sharp hand held auger is just as fast and ten times as reliable. It is also lighter, gives you a workout and you don't have to waste money on the ever expensive gasoline.

Wilderness survival was once again a blast. Our instructor was far to easy on us and gave us tarps, extra blankets, poly and even an axe and saw. Our shelter had an awning! we set up the poly so we could roll it down when night came so we could keep in the heat and keep out the smoke. We hardly needed a fire it was so warm in there.
Give me a saw and a tarp any day and I'll build you the Vatican.