Up at 5 am, again (okay, by now you get the idea we got up that early almost every morning on the trip). We took all unnecessary gear back to the vehicles and locked them up before eating breakfast in the Dining Hall. Collected our three large personal packs, two food packs and equipment pack. The Scouts toted them to the waterfront, where we loaded our three canoes. We got on the water at 9:15am and set off for the Canadian wilds. We reached Prairie Portage on the Canadian border at 11:30 am after paddling 6.3 miles past an incredible amount of blown-down damage. We left the canoes on the US side and walked to the Canadian Ranger's Office to take care of immigration. The Ranger was a wonderful lady who helped us get done before she took off for lunch. We got back to the canoes at noon and shortly after saw the first of many loons we'd see on the trek. We paddled to the first island in Birch Lake for a lunch break and our first real stop in Canada. After lunch, we paddled on and reached our first portage at the north end of Birch Lake at 3:00pm. Being our first portage, it took us 45 minutes to get onto Carp Lake. We wanted to end the day as far north on Carp Lake as we could and stopped at 4:30pm to set up camp on a small island only 200 yards from our next portage. We carried two GPS receivers and they showed we'd covered 14.5 miles today (not bad for our first day out with a portage thrown in). We set about fixing dinner and discovered that someone, somehow, had switched one of our food cases at the base commissary and we were short a full day's rations. Needless to say, weren't happy campers at that point, but had no choice but to work something out. After dinner, we had our first opportunity to hang the bear bags. One adult leader knew how to tie a monkey fist knot, which helped Tom W. get the rope high over a tree branch. We collected all the food and 'smellies' (anything that smelled, including fishing tackle) and roped the three packs together. It took seven of us pulling together on the rope and two adults lifting to get that 300 pounds of bear treats 12 feet in the air ... and we were all sweating by the time we were done. Everyone slept on a slope and rocks, so sleep didn't come easily for anyone and we all had a fitful night.