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Wednesday, March 17, 2004
Went on our first overnight paddle trip into the Basin last weekend. Six of us: Bill Lindsey and David Singleton from Texas, local political reporter Lou Rom and his son Gabriel, local contractor Shawn Jolet and myself.
We put in at Butte La Rose boat launch and paddled down the Little Atchafalaya for about eleven miles until we passed some guys at a camp on the riverbank. We were about six miles from our planned destination, but they invited us to stop, so we pulled over. Their camp was made out of an old silver-painted ARCO oil storage tank, about a hundred feet across and three stories high. They had built a house inside the tank, and added a porch, windows and doors to the outside. It was pretty impressive to look at. They had everything from a welder to a washer and drier. Lou had flipped earlier, so we cleaned his clothes. After the introductions and a tour, we got down to business: dinner. We agreed to contribute our few steaks to their huge stockpile of hamburger, and soon sat down to one of the best rice-and-gravy dinners I've had, definitely the best I've had while kayaking. Then we got a fire going, and drifted off from there one by one to sleep in tents or bunks. The next morning they jumped up and made a great breakfast for everyone and saw us off. I'm sending them APT hats as soon as I get them made.
The rest of the trip was nice but uneventful. We made our way down Bayou Crook Chene and Alligator Bayou, crossed the Grand River and ate lunch, then pushed another mile-and-a-half upstream in the rain to a little boat ramp. The rain made a mist form over the water that was kind of nice.
Spring is here. Last week I took a Canadian couple paddling around Lake Henderson. The gray skies and gray of the Spanish Moss combined gave a kind of wintery effect that was nice, in a way, but since then everything seems to be blooming and budding and generally pushing forth the green. The first sign was a baby spider water-skiing behind its silk thread.
James 1:49 AM [+]
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