For their annual canoe trip this year, youths from Saint Mark's Anglican Church in Orangeville went north to the Kawartha Lakes, leaving town with high sprits and high hopes.

The trip itself went smoothly, with no more than a minor leak in a canoe.

Unfortunately, the car trip to Coon Lake (the starting point) did not go quite as smoothly.

A trip that usually takes about three and half hours with one rest stop, took about nine.

We stayed positive the entire time, although many Halloween candy bars were distributed along the way to keep us going. The extra six hours added onto our trip were because of flat tires and a leaking transmission.

When we finally arrived, we were exhausted after our trip. We put on a BIG pot of spaghetti and had an early night on Coon Lake. The next day we were joined by five more people, to make our total of 16.

On the Saturday, we did many portages and lots of canoeing. That night we put up our tents on Buzzard Lake. Later in the evening we had a large rain storm. It rained for most of the night.

The morning (Sunday) of our final day was beautiful as we canoed down Long Lake. We did about five km of canoeing that day.

The drive back to Orangeville was uneventful. When we arrived back at the church we collected our belongings and headed home to go to bed so we weren't too tired for school the next day.