For the second year in a row, I operated as a 1B from a park on an island on Cranberry Lake in Vilas County in the North Woods of Wisconsin. From my cabin, I drove the boat the one mile to the island where I noticed a bunch of occupants at my desired spot watching me as I pulled up. I knew that I would have to be very diplomatic in securing this best area where I had the room to hang my dipoles. Fortunately as I gingerly walked up to the picnic table, the 25+ geese with their goslings graciously walked off into the woods! With rain in the forecast which had hampered my activity last year, I brought a tarp which I strung up over the table. The gear was an FT-817 to an amplifier running 50 to 150 watts on 20 and 40 meter SSB and CW to end fed dipoles. I made 166 contacts which were 6 better than last year. Two friends, WB9OKC in WI and KH2TJ in CA, who were operating club stations recognized my call and said “Hi.” Heavy rain and wind came in at one point and for almost an hour I had to cease operating in order to hold on to the tarp which was billowing up and waving around in different directions. I also had to keep watch on the boat tied at the dock since heavy whitecaps from the lake were crashing on the shore and pier. I only got slightly wet but kept the gear dry. The sun came out for while but the rain started up again as I packed up to head off the island since overnight camping is not allowed. It was dark when I departed and had to use the boat navigation lights en route back to shore. Due to inclement weather on Sunday, I elected to stay at the cottage and give out 1E points with a KX2 at 10 watts on 40 meter CW for a few hours. All in all, it was another fun Field Day in the great outdoors with unexpected wildlife. While I had geese to contend with this year, in 2006 a black bear visited us while a buck deer strode into the campsite at midnight when I was operating 20 meter CW. In 2007 while on Santa Barbara Island, we had to contend with noisy sea lions. Check out my Soapbox entries for those years. 73 de Scott