After our introduction to Wallace Island on Monday with beautiful afternoon views, and a spectacular sunset, we were excited to see what Tuesday’s paddle would bring and it did not disappoint.  With the almost full moon, the low tides were very low so it was interesting looking down in the water at all the sea stars, crabs and other creatures. 

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We also enjoyed seeing so many exposed rocks and mud flats.  The visible rocks were full of bright green plants showing above the water, and navigating the inches of water around them brought back memories of Georgian Bay: lots of rocks and narrow, shallow passages.  It was a lot of fun. 

We arrived at Norway Island as the tide was starting to come in.  With the tide so low there were two ridges of rocks that are usually submerged that were calling to be explored.  So we pulled up the boats quite a ways (we thought) to allow for the time that we were going to look around. It was really fun rock hopping and looking at the moonscape of rocks that would otherwise be well under water. 

When we got back to the beach, our boats were floating and almost made a getaway. 

You’ve gotta watch that tide. 

We circumnavigated the island and decided to have lunch there so went back and this time pulled the boats up to the high tide line, and they were safe.  It was lovely sitting in the shade, looking out at the various rock formations, other islands and the blue sky and waters.  It was pretty perfect and we had to remind ourselves, this adventure was only 1/2 hour drive plus a ferry ride away.  We could, if we wanted, even paddle to this group of islands.  But we prefer interesting shoreline/island paddling to long crossings so we gladly paid the ferry ticket.

The trip back to camp was a lot more difficult.  The wind came up quite a bit during lunch and we had to go directly into it to get back to Wallace Island.  It was work, but I’ll say that the new paddles made it easier; not so much tugging on our shoulders!  There were patches of small haystack water in channels between islands where wind and currents mixed but nothing that was too difficult.  We earned our snacks and my glass of wine back at camp.

We expected another great sunset, so we decided to see it from the water, in our boats.  By then the wind had died right down so it was a very leisurely paddle.  We saw some colour and then incorrectly guessed that it would not intensify too much more so we went back in.

But from land we did continue to enjoy the deepening oranges and reds and once again had a delightful evening.  The moon was ALMOST full so as it rose, there were some wonderful reflections on the water as well.

Wallace Island has become a favourite spot for us.  We have to admit, we didn’t love the cackling/squabbling ravens that woke up all in camp early in the morning.  They seem to be mad at the world and each other and the 3 of them made quite the racket.  The low tides also made carries in and out of the water, including loading and unloading the boats on the island and at the put-in a little more work but it was worth it!

And that is just part of kayak camping. We had the best campsite, weather, sunsets and views we could wish for, so it made it pretty perfect.  We will try again in September, once the summer crowds have thinned out.