A Day On The Water

To quote Renee, I'm hooked!

Hooked up with Courtney, one of the team members for my first ever adventure race, which happens in late July. She hauled her big old flat bottomed canoe all the way down from North GA so we could indulge in a little paddling training. I've not been in any sort of paddled craft since I was very young and my prankster older brother got his evil kicks flipping me over in a tiny kayak. As I'm the biggest member of our team, I knew I'd mostly likely be paddling in the rear, meaning I had to learn about steering. Courtney was awesome, talking me through until I got the hang of it.

We started our adventure with plenty of ant killing. Court's mother-in-law and sister-in-law were coming to paddle too. They borrowed a two person kayak from a friend, only to find it infested with ants when we got it down to the launch. After much submerging and splashing, trying to kill the critters, we realized the boat was infested. Mom & Sis took the boat back to the friend and swapped for two single seater crafts. Here's Court and her sis-in-law getting one of them ready to launch.

I'm not sure why Courtney's doing the little leg kick thing...but hey...to each his own.

We spent some two + hours on the water...most of it was pretty benign paddling, though we found we were constantly pulled to the left a bit by the current. Courtney has some shoulder issues, so coordinating strokes was a bit rough, as she had to switch more often than we will during the actual event. We had a blast manuevering some of the large rocky areas of the river, as the water level was a little low. Sure, we came aground more than a few times, but between butt scooting, leveraging with our paddles and the occasional disembark we made it through. I mastered the back paddle and steering, though I did mess up from time to time in the heat of the moment. Court called out obstacles so we only had one potential tip occur. But we came out dry when we both shifted our weight properly as we barked up on the rock!

I can't forget our "third". Kali the wonder dog sat between us, grinning and sweet, for most of the trip down. She occasionally wanted some attention, so came and sat on my feet for a bit, and managaged to scoot up over mom's legs to pilot from the front as we came to our adventure's close.

Of course, no advanture would be complete without some foibles. As we wandered several miles and hours down the river, we remembered we hadn't moved a car to the landing spot. And all our cell phones were back in the cars. Luckily we figured that mom-in-law and sis-in-law could grab a ride from grandma and get the two vehicles back while Courtney and I drug the vessels up to meet them. Wow! That was an ordeal. Carrying the two single vessels was a workout, but manageable. Hauling the monster flat bottom canoe was another story. We had to take several rest breaks, but we managed it.

So, sunburnt (despite heavy application of sunscreen), buggy (despite careful application of repellant we both had a couple ticks) and tired, we loaded the canoe up in Courtney's SUV and called it a day!

My arms and back are a bit sore today, but not bad. I can't wait to get out on the water again!