Refuge can only be found buried in the sand under the canoe
Shelter constructed out of branches and leaves - looks good! Right?

The Survivor 1 TV series had just finished airing on TV and we were all pumped up about the show. Doug and I decided we would do our own little survivor weekend thing on a Saskatchewan lake. We packed up the canoe and set off for the weekend. After reaching Diefenbaker Lake, we set out with a canoe, two fishing rods, a pot, some matches, a bag of rice, two oars, a hatchet, and the clothes on us. Basically, if there was no fish, it was rice for the whole weekend. By the way this was Friday morning. So we fish all friday and don't catch a single thing. That evening we made a fire and cooked our rice with lake water. It turned out disgusting and gooey… but satisfying.

It was about that time that we spotted a porcupine on the beach. We grabbed a big rock and the hatchet and went after it like wild bushmen. But as we got closer we realized that we weren't that hungry and needed to make a shelter before night. We built a nice shelter out of the trees and it was beautiful. We laid down for a good night's rest under the stars. That's when the bugs came out. They were horrible. The mosquitoes weren't bad – it was the stupid biting flies. They were unbearable. We tried canoeing out into the water but they followed us. We tried sleeping on the beach but they followed us. We tried burring ourselves in the sand but we got way too hot. Finally we turned over the canoe and put sand up against the edges. Under the canoe we slept (half buried) for a couple of hours of the night.

The next morning our hair was matted with sand and we stunk like fishy water. It was time to catch some serious fish this morning. 10 hours later… nothing!! We met up with other boats occasionally and although using the same bait, we caught nothing. The other people couldn't reel them in fast enough. They were catching one after another. To make things worse, this was supposed to be the best fishing weekend ever because a trout stocking farm broke it's walls and released some 100000 fish into the lake. Still nothing. By this time we were so so hungry and out of rice. If that porcupine would have walked by again… i tell you.. That is when we decided that the trip was over. We paddled back to the car and drove straight to a buffet dinner.

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