Debrief Part 1

We were first into Lake Leberge. The lake was like a mirror, just a hard  50 kilometer slog. Just before we reached the end, the voyager and one of the double canoes over took us.
Soon after we reached the faster water we passed the canoe and just before the first night stop, we managed to pull back and pass the voyager.
We had practiced our over night stop and had eaten a hot dinner and in out tents by 11.45, and only a few minutes late out on the water in the morning.
Passing through Carmacks,  we were disapointed with our time compared with previous River Quest times, but the land crew estimated we had opened up our lead to over an hour.
Five finger Rapids was very tame, as a result of the low river levels which also accounted for our slow times.
That afternoon it rained, and we spotted a cabin come camp site on the map. This would save us the time involved in putting up the tents. Steve was feeling a bit crook so I powered ahead of him to look for the site. Steve caught up while I was looking and found the site occupied by an English group on a guided canoe trip, Carmacks to Dawson over 7 days. The cabin they were not using.
It was only just standing, the floor had collapsed as had some of the roof and there was a mouse in residence. But there were 4 slatted bunks and it was out of the rain.
Steve was looking very tired and saw, I felt a sick myself and I realized the first priority was to finish this race and not to push too hard. it rained all night so I thought we should go into a survival mode and rest in a bit in the morning. As a consequence we left over an hour late.

We new we could not get water from the river once the badly silted White River entered the Yukon, so at Kirkmans Creak we filled our bladders for the last time out of the Yukon. In doing so we spotted two moose crossing the river. While watching them we became trapped behind a gravel bank and an early lesson in river vigalence.
Once The White River enters the Yukon the Yukon runs much faster. Steve for some reason decided to paddle the wrong side of a gravel island. The current was too fast for me to follow, and he disappeared.
I waited for him for what seemed like an eternity about a kilometer down stream. I was just about to reach for my 2 way radio to contact him, when he turned up, coming down a different channel, altogether.

After that fright we set up camp on a nice little island, complete with mouse poo.

Steve was feeling better and we were only about 20 minutes late in leaving that morning.

We had stopped breifly at a stream to get fresh water when the ... canoe passed us. We dashed back into the kayaks.
Steve was like a man possesed and powered after them. We caught them within an hour .I am falling asllep, more in the morning