We started our trip in the rain (foreshadowing, or what?), packing up on the wet beach in Longue Pointe while a pod of whales put on a show in front of us. There was a bit of surf, and after we parked our cars (at OPS) we had to deal with a surf launch. There is the proper way of launching in surf and the whiny, demanding way. I chose the latter: I put my boat at the surf's edge, got in, did up my spray skirt, and then, with a big wave coming toward shore, looked up at Lee and demanded "push me!". He did (a manoevre only possible on a sandy beach!) and whee! I was in. Lee tried another way: he got into his kayak to wait for the tide, but I suspect he had to resort to plan B: skill. I know Ron did the skilled wet launch, and I know he did it in sandals, and I know we could have used his feet as a beer cooling device for the rest of the day (no beer on this part of the adventure. We were too cold to even think about it!)

Our destination, Ile Nue de Mingan, was less than 5 km offshore. However, the fog was so thick that it might as well have been the other side of the Atlantic for all we could see. There was much discussion of bearings, and consulting of GPSes. Me, I have a GPS, but there were enough people operating them (Frank, Bill, Jim and Lee) that mine stayed buried in my drybags all trip. We did get pushed off course a bit by the current, but said pushing off of course involved drifting into a pod of whales, so we didn't mind. And Frank's fancy-pants Garmin mapping GPS with the site already marked got us to our destination without any fuss, even if the fog was thick.

We got to the site ridiculously early. So early that the two parties there the night before hadn't even begun taking down their tents yet. It was, after all, 9:30 a.m. We had to land in a little bit of surf but, with Lee's help, I got out of my boat with a minimum of wet and freezing. Lee then grabbed the bow of my boat to help me past the reef and rock bit that was threatening to crunch my boat, and I took the stern. It turns out that I am not only wimply, but I have too much stuff, and I realized I couldn't continue to carry the boat and before I could communicate that to Lee I started going down. Sickened by the thought of a fibreglass crunch on an island that felt like it was far away out in the ocean, I put my body between the kayak and the rocks, and pinned my finger. Once I got it out from under the boat, I momentarily stopped caring if my boat turned into yellow glass slivers and went to sit on a rock with my hat pulled down to hide my wimpy tears and soaked my hand in ice water (ice water everywhere!). After I pulled my glove off, I saw a bit of blood, but I was mostly worried about the rapid swelling. I had visions of not being able to grip the paddle, but it turns out I'm just whiny, because I had no problems save some stiffness with the finger for the duration of the trip. Now, as I write this two weeks later, it is still tender and a bit swollen and not thrilled about bending, but everything is fine.

The beach was big, so we set up even though there were still other parties, and had a late breakfast. After that, we did what little exploring we were allowed to do. Ile Nue, though enticingly covered with tundra vegetation, some cliffs with caves, and I'm sure lots of other cool stuff, is off limits except the "developed areas" and the "littoral". Just in case you are tempted to forget that, there is after all a plaque of rules mounted in the deluxe outhouse at the site. And Sam claimed he'd signed something saying he'd force us to respect the rules. And we're a bunch of play by the rules people on this trip, after all. So Sam, Lee, Jim and I went on our "littoral" circumnavigation of the island. Along the way, we checked out the emergency shelter (which you are not allowed to use unless it is a *real emergency*. Yes, rules are posted there too), the dock which is installed for tour boats and interpreters, the backcountry interpreting schedule, and the monoliths! Very exciting that, monoliths.

When we returned from our circumnavigation, we discovered that the girls from Montreal who were still at the site had moved to give us more room, and that the rest of the crew was now doing the island walk (Marti had forgotten her running shoes and was doing so in Ron's sandals. No doubt I would have twisted my ankle and found another reason to whine! but she is more adept than I am). With nothing better to do, we ate lunch and put Bailey's in our hot chocolate and killed time. Lee disappeared into his tent to play with his new VHF toy, Jim turned his tent into hillbilly central with the addition of a blue poly tarp to combat the leakiness he'd discovered during the previous night's rain event, the rest of us sat around the fire. And then it started to rain, so we went to bed.