The East Shore of Isla Carmen, April 21st 2008.

We continued up the east shore of Isla Carmen in the morning. As steep as the sides of this mountain island are, the arroyos still created gravel beaches that we could land on for a lunch break or to camp for the evening when the time came. In the afternoon I paddled into my first cave on this island. Also in the afternoon the wind came up from the north and slowed us down. We had originally planned to get to the northeast corner of the island but with this wind we decided to land early and make it up with an early start the next day. We paddled back and forth between three gravel beaches and chose the one with the fewest rocks in the water to land over and the smallest gravel to sleep on. This was a small beach and we had to put the tents pretty close together. We called it a “cozy” beach.

Today actually was Kate DesLauriers’ birthday and Andrea Wolfe had arranged to bring birthday cake. The cake was purchased in a plastic pudding mould that survived well while packed in a kayak. Andrea poured condensed milk (out of a can) over it to simulate a Mexican delicacy called “tres leches”. Pre-made frosting came out of a squeeze tube and birthday candles topped it off. A pretty good dessert in, or out, of a kayak! We also had small birthday presents hidden away in dry bags to bring out for Kate’s birthday.