Are We Lost?

Algonquin Park, Ontario 1995

"Are We Lost?"

It was dark and we were still paddling, looking for our campsite when that question was asked.

We were in the middle of a 5 day leadership course, designed by myself and a colleague, in the back country of Algonquin Park. This particular day had been participant led. We had paddled to an area at the other end of the large lake we were camping on.

We had done some good learning, it was a good, long day.

We headed back later than planned, paddled into the wrong bay and night crept up faster than we could find our site.

My answer, "Maybe."

Spending a night in a canoe isn't the worst thing that can happen and later everyone said they had been considering what it might be like.

I had also been considering what a dork I was to let us get lost.

One of our flashlights found our site as we almost paddled by it. Big cheers. Relief. I even remember what we had as a very late dinner that night by the campfire.

No one treated me like a dork.

You can learn a lot about leadership out there in the wilderness.