Canoe Rain

This morning, the weather radar was clear and the swamp at the Francis Beidler Forest was a sea of mud. The close-of-camp canoe trip scheduled for tomorrow was in doubt with few ideas for replacing that exciting event. Someone noted, "What we need is some rain!" Really? Obviously, they hadn't checked the radar.

As camp was coming to a close with animal track identification and plaster casts of tracks, thunder could be heard to the south. Ah, but that's downstream and we remember enough of our 8th grade earth science to know that rain downstream won't help our canoeing prospects. By 2:00 pm, there were some terrifyingly close lightning strikes, but no precipitation. Eventually, the thunder cells that popped up to our south drifted east and the sun shone once again. We checked the weather radar and saw a 2-hour gap between Beidler Forest and some small cells forming to the west. That gave us just enough time to move the canoes from their secret location to the near-boardwalk launching site. We are nothing if not optimistic.

As the 5:00 pm whistle primes to blow, thunder can be heard to the west. A quick check of the local prevailing winds and Four Hole Swamp's orientation verified that thunder to the west is a good thing. All the reds and oranges on the weather radar confirm that there is "rain in them thar clouds." Hopefully, enough will fall in the swamp to buoy our canoes tomorrow morning!

Canoe rain two summer camp sessions in a row? Obviously, Francis Beidler Forest is more special than we knew!