When we returned from the afternoon's jaunt on the portage trail back to where we began it, our canoe patiently awaiting us, looking out over Mallard Lake and the sky above it almost seemed as though the sky might begin to clear, the wind seemed less hubristic, and although it was clearly colder at this end than where we had departed from at Wet Lake, we thought it possible that when we returned to our camp site the wind might have abated and allow us a little more creature comfort.

A family of loons appeared in the near distance as we took off from the intake of the portage. Again the pickerel weed swaying gracefully in the wind and our disturbing of the calmness of the water at the shoreline, as though waving us a fond farewell. Another, single loon surfaced elsewhere on the lake, and its loud piercing cry reverberated across the water, hitting the granite cliffs at the far end of the lake.

The rain had held off, though, and that was something to be grateful for; aside from the morning's several light rainfalls the afternoon had been free of rain. We paddled leisurely back to our camp site rounding the length of the island, and as we gathered toward it, the waves increased in their intensity, shoved by the wind. There is a lovely, even pattern that presents on the sand under the water lapping the shore of our campsite, one of nature's incredible micro-canvasses of natural art.

It was clear the wind was stubbornly resistant to toddling off anytime soon. And the cold prevailed, but the rain held off, under those dark, threatening skies. But the views were superb and we drank them in, grateful for this opportunity given us once again. Another fire was lit, and the competition between the fire and the wind was mitigated by the windbreak stretching across that part of our campsite.

We watched and waved as two canoes loaded with provisions came into view alongside the island, people obviously looking for vacant camp sites. Knowing from our own experience that there were plenty to be had, we knew they wouldn't be searching for too much longer. In the distance, later, we saw a canoe rounding the lake with its two paddlers stopping occasionally, hoisting fishing rods. We had ourselves decided against a fishing license for this trip.

Our son began preparations for dinner; this time it was linguini with tomato sauce, fresh vegetables stirred into it as it cooked, and tons of cheese to be added later. When we eventually sat around the comfort of the fire having dinner, dusk closed in quickly as it is wont to do when surrounding hills mute the effect of the setting sun. A light drizzle descended with a short life. Enjoying the leisure, we suddenly realized that the wind had indeed gone down, the first time in days, and we basked in the comfort of it all.

Then, looking up into the canopy of the pine needles above us we realized we could see the fiery brilliance of stars and planets, larger, brighter than we could ever see them within the light-polluted skies of any urban centre. Breaks in the clouds had arisen with the falling wind, and we tore ourselves away from the fire toward the beach, fascinated with the aspect of stars blinking back at us from a now-becalmed lake surface. We heard a mournful loon cry in the distance.

And then, another sound, one muted to my hearing-deficient ears, but clear and compelling to the hearing of my husband and our son. A low, murmuring, then rising, ululation, repeated and repeated, a wolf chorus. We looked at one another, incredulous with the experience, but remembering it, though not as hugely present, at other, earlier such camping expeditions.

That night, we watched for hours as the sky clouded up again obscuring those magnificent orbs of blinking brilliance in the sky, then progressively gapped, and cleared again, then clouded over in gradually repeated episodes of uncertainty, giving us a balcony-view of an celestial operetta, that incited and motivated the Algonquin Park wolf population in the area of the park we happened to be in, to a mass impetus of wilderness-life celebration.