Trevor heard a moose splashing across the river early this morning.  We know they're harmless, being vegetarian and all, but their sheer size is overwhelming, so he got out his bear spray.  Fortunately he didn't have to use it.

It rained at about 7:00 this morning, not too hard, but we stayed in our tents until it stopped.  I really like my tent (Trevor's actually), it is 7' x 7', lots of room, I can arrange all my stuff in sections, the way I like it.  I am using Joy's self inflating mattress.  It's shorter than I am, as is Joy, and I hang over at both ends.  On top of this is Joy's wonderful fleece blanket, which is longer and which serves double duty as a pillow in the canoe.  On top of this is Trevor's new camping blanket which he isn't using (he says).  Then comes me, with my new sleeping bag on top.  I tried sleeping in it, but it's too narrow and comes with me when I move around.

My hips are fine in the day but at night!  I have tried every position possible and they still hurt.  Sometimes I can sort of sneak up on a comfortable position on my stomach with one of my pillows jammed under my left hip, but it doesn't last long.  I kind of doze around it.  For pillows I followed Joy's suggestion and brought pillow cases, in which go my clothes - voila!

We finally packed up when the tents were dry and left just before 11:00, into a headwind.  Today was our real adventure day, because of the wind.  It blew us around and slowed us down and made large scary waves.  We did some exploring on side channels, some evidence of mining, couple of abandoned and derelict cabins.  We saw a couple of canoes in the distance, and occasionally a jet crosses over high above, but we are basically alone in the wilderness. 

The current is a phenomenon to me at least, it has such power.  It counteracts the wind, although the wind slows us down.  There are many islands of all sizes in the river, and sometimes we simply can't choose which side we're going on, the river has its own idea.

Trevor is really good at spotting which way we're likely to go, but we often find we're paddling like mad in order to explore a stream, at the mouth of which Trevor likes to make a few passes with his fishing rod.

Trevor is also very sharp-eyed.  This morning we were whipping along close to shore and the whisper 'moose' floated to me from the back, and sure enough there was a moose on the beach just ahead of us.  He spotted us at the same time and trotted anxiously along the beach away from us looking for a way up.  He finally found one, but we got a really good look at him in the meantime.  He looked to be quite young, we felt badly for disturbing him, especially since he found tiny us so frightening.

We reached the confluence of the Yukon and White Rivers just before lunch, and had to cross a vast expanse of river in the howling wind, so we just hunkered down and paddled like mad, then rounded the corner close to the cliffs, at which time the wind switched to our backs and the current really picked up.  We felt quite tippy at this point, it was quite a charge.

A little later we found a lovely little stream and Trevor used the filter and pumped some water for us.  It was fun.  So self sufficient.

About 4:00 just past Stewart Island the wind became really dangerous.

We pulled into a side channel, or rather were blown into it, and there was a homestead!  We tied up and walked up to the house.  It was a large log structure, with a vegetable garden and many outbuildings and tractors and equipment scattered about.  No one was home, but there was a notepad and pencil hung at the door, so Trevor wrote a note about our predicament and we started to unload the canoe.  We had just finished when the wind died.  We waited for a little while, Trevor sitting in his chair and me racing back and forth slashing at mosquitoes.  We re loaded the canoe and carried on.  The headwind came up again later, but we were used to it by now and just paddled away.

The White River is full of volcanic ash, so it is quite a different colour from the green Yukon.  After it mixes in, the water is a milky grayish colour, with zero visibility.  The paddle disappears completely at the water line, and the hissing sound of the silt intensifies.

The mainland is mainly rocky cliffs, some are clay.  We saw many cliff sparrows nesting, we could hear the hungry cries of the baby birds.

The land that is not cliffs is mainly island, often so large you can't tell it is actually island.  The water and ice has eroded the underburden, leaving the trees leaning over the river, eventually falling in.  The roots are all exposed and hang down like stalactites.  Sometimes the forest surface is like a carpet, and it drapes over the underburden in a most attractive way.

We found a suitable island at around 7:00 and set up camp. 

The river deposits a layer of whitish ash in this area, and it is quite sticky, in fact makes quite a mess.  We retired early.

We have become quite casual in our approach to bears and life jackets.  "We" cleaved to both the first day, but now don't wear the life jackets and sometimes forget the bear spray, as both seem to be unnecessary.