De Pan

I use the Harrison Portage and talk with a swimmer when I get to the big lake.  She will swim up lake 3/4 of a mile and back.  Perhaps I am dawdling (I am, a bit), but by the time I am kneeling in my canoe, she is a surprisingly long ways out.  I won't catch up with her until the turn around point.

I think of Smoke Farm while I make my way up lake.  This is good because it tells me that I am transitioning from this project to that.  Mostly, I think about why the farm works so well.  It has something to do with the terrain, but it has everything to do with the people that meet there.  It adds up to more than one.

At Portage Point, I cross over and up the built east shoreline, but I stop in the middle of the channel.  The skyline of the burial island has changed.  It is a minor change that no one would notice, except with my familiarity, it stands out, almost alarmingly so.  I can see a snag that I never saw before, so a tree has come down somewhere in there.  The eagle perch tree stands just a few yards north of the new shape, and an eagle comes in to land as I watch.

In the NE lagoon, the recently exposed muddy shoreline is full of animal tracks (the only advantage that I can see for the Corps of Engineers lowering of the water).  I find and cast a somewhat small beaver hind print.  And, I get to just sit for a spell as the plaster sets up.  A tiny woodpecker comes and works over a willow tree a few yards from me.