Day 7 - September 13

Sunny and Warm

Leg 5 - Day 7
Island in East Arm of Cross Lake to Dam Boat Site
( 3.7 miles)  (click to enlarge)

Got up at first light and had a glass of OJ with my daily meds. Made coffee. While waiting I set up the solar panel to generate as soon as the sun came up.  Went back to my Bible study and coffee and was reading when I heard something go clunk on the fire ring. Thought at first it was just some expanding metal as the sun heated it up.  But I decided to go check. I could not see anything obvious and decided to adjust the solar panel on the roof when something hit me on the back and another hit on deck.  I saw a cone and looked up expecting to see squirrels throwing them at me from above as I've seen on the TV insurance ad!  No squirrels but the tree was definitely throwing them!  

Went back inside to my study and prayer time and read a bit out of the book I purchased for my neighbor called “Lights in the Sky and Little Green Men” by Ross, Samples, and Clark.  Very interesting! 

Early morning, "sea smoke" forming over the warm water in the cool air.
(click to enlarge)

I plan to move again today, not much reason, just because I can!

Had breakfast, blueberry pancakes, sausage, and OJ. Cleaned up and started getting ready to move.  Went up to the top of the hill to check things out and thought about the move...hesitated, but decided to go.  So I pulled the lines and tried to back out, but no go. I was stuck fast!  After much maneuvering and shifting my weight aft I finally broke loose.  Beautiful sunny clear day, light breeze.

Saw one fishing boat and the same two houseboats on an island in the south part of Cross Lake previously observed.  I spotted them when I first came into Cross lake.  Must not have moved?  Anyway, I headed south to the dam area and perused some sites en route for future consideration.  It narrows considerably as you get close to the dam and outlet of the lake. More like a river in places.  

I finally arrived at the boat site around 12:30 pm and was glassing the approach carefully trying to figure out the best place to land and tie up when all of a sudden the boat lifted up on one side and ground to a halt!  I was aground in the middle of the river and there was nothing showing on the chart!  Fortunately, I was not too hard aground and with some maneuvering was able to get off the spot but in the process the activity pulled up a large tree branch from the bottom!  I later took some video of this spot (see video below).  It should be on the marine chart (Navionics), but it is not!  Got tied up okay but did need a stern line to keep the boat straight due to a cross wind.

Boat Site Near The Dam
(click to enlarge)

After I got settled I went ashore with some cashews and a glass of white wine and my book to sit in my chair and read.  A red squirrel came down to chew me out scolding me soundly because I had no food to give him! Likely he was used to being spoiled with food regularly.  He scampered around all afternoon trying to beg some grub, but I did not cooperate.

Squirrel scolded me soundly for not providing grub while I sat and enjoyed the site.
(click to enlarge)

Got the solar battery charged up fully before arrival so everything is charged.  After I read awhile I decided to try to fly the drone and get some pics.  Unfortunately, there was no clearing open enough to go up straight which means I had no way in an emergency to return home and land without crashing through the trees!  

I determined to fly out through the trees and not let the battery get any lower than 40 percent before returning.  Even with that I had a few close calls and bounced it off a tree coming ashore.  I think the key is to turn off collision avoidance since it did not like flying between the trees and got real squirrely (sorry for the pun!) when I tried to fly through them.

These were the trees I was trying to fly the drone through to get over the water.
(click to enlarge)

Drone Overflight of Boat Site Area & Kayaking

I read some more, then went to make dinner.  Tonight it's burgers, chips, and a cold beer.  Wine and chocolates later for desert.  After dishes it calmed down a little so I decided to put the floats on the drone and go out in the kayak to try some more tracking shots.  It was successful with a few wrenches thrown in!  

First I discovered the hard way that the dynamic home point (moves with you) only works in the active track mode and not in other modes!  It was heading back toward the boat, so I had to paddle back to get retrieve the drone when it did not follow me!  No big deal but I did not expect that.  This happened every time, so I must not be doing something right?  I did get some shots but discovered I need to use lens filters more or perhaps set a fixed aperture/shutter speed for the reflective light of the setting sun shining off the kayak. More to learn!

All this running around and the warm temps today, in the 70’s, I worked up a light sweat so decided to shower, even though I showered last night. I figured why not, that’s why I have it and it always feels good after a nice hot shower.  

After cleaning up and putting everything away I went up to read some more but the mosquitoes began harassing me so I came back inside to transfer pics from the drone and my camera to the laptop.  I ran out of memory a couple times before so I have to be diligent about that. I still can’t figure out how to transfer pics from my phone to the PC.  I did it at home but it does not show up on the PC when I connect now? Either the cable is specific or I have to set something I'm missing in the phone. Currently I just transfer stuff from internal memory to the SD card in the phone. Hopefully, that will hold me until I get home?

An evening of peaceful solitude
(click to enlarge)

Time to go to bed, it is just before 9 pm.  I have everything charging up for tomorrow when I hope to try a portage into a small lake nearby.  I will stick to this spot one more day.