Canoe Tripping

This weekend is a spur of the moment canoe trip. I should stop to define spur of moment for a planner as we planned out the date a few weeks ago during the World Cup Semi's and we have not a more than a confirmation discussion about it since that time. Sure, it is only an overnighter on a river that I have been on before. We should only need one more planning session for our spur of the moment trip and we will be good to go.

However, it should be noted that the last time we went we tried (less than legally) to run a Class 4 rapid (after portaging our gear) that ended as you would expect. I say "as you would expect" as in you have two guys that have been out in the sun all day with limited experience in white water. I say "as you would expect" assuming you had predicted that we would not make the first cut to the right and we were flipped, I hit my head on a rock, blacked out and was pushed through the chute and surfaced later under the canoe without my only pair of prescription glasses only to blurrily watch some sort of water snake swimming towards me.

The first question everyone asks at this point, after the expected "You guys are stupid" or "What were you thinking!" statments, is "Was the snake poisonous?" Let me summarize my story to draw you to my response. Head hurt - Glasses Lost -- Snake. I can only say that I was doing my best Jesus impersonation (running on water) and did not stop to check the shape of the head. My apologies.

So this time we are older and wiser. My friend (of 25 years) has two kids now and is rather more responsible. Since this time we have also lost a childhood friend in a kayak accident. So I imagine we will be a trifle more careful.

After backpacking though, canoeing is a beautiful thing. When you backpack, you are attempting to carry the minimum amount shelter, food, water, and clothing in order to survive. Canoeing is like backpacking with a bunch of Sherpas -- you get to go along, but something else is carrying all your stuff...

For example:
Backpack Breakfast -- Oatmeal, Instant coffee
Canoe Breakfast -- Eggs (fresh), bacon, biscuits and Cafe Americano's
Backpack Lunch -- Twisted, hot sticky power bar (two on the tough days)
Canoe Lunch -- Subway Footlongs
Backpack Dinner -- Reconstituted Dehydrated Sweet & Sour Pork
Canoe Dinner-- Charcoal grilled (yes we bring both) thick cut steaks, baked potatoes and smores. This year, as a bonus, I am taking a contraption that makes homemade ice cream as well.

Oh -- and with the canoe meal we eat sitting in lounge chairs.