Alaska Part 1: Juneau

Thurs, 7/3

The trip starts out with the usual indignities of air travel - shoe removal, swabs for explosives, waiting like cattle as the more privileged classes of travelers board. The first really amusing thing is a shop in the Sea-Tac airport selling grunge rock paraphernalia, apparently an airport branch of a famous Seattle record store. Glisteningly clean, well-lit shelves full of Nirvana records - in LP format as well as CDs, of course - boxed sets of the best of 1990's anti-establishment music, with a smattering of selections from other Washington-rooted rockers including Jimi Hendrix and Ann & Nancy Wilson of Heart.  The place was staffed by hipsters of a clean-cut sort (no creepy beardie weirdies). The store was exactly what I envision a Disney version of Seattle would be.

A genuine nice touch at Sea-Tac is a big lounge area with a giant window wall looking out over the tarmac and runways. Rocking chairs. Live folk music, which provided the setting for a surprisingly relaxing half hour of plane watching while waiting for the flight to Juneau to board.

On both flights V & I both booked aisle seats - sitting together across the aisle rather than either of us squeezing into a middle seat. On the DC to Seattle leg V sat next to a chatty 40-something gay couple and gave them the full litany: stories of Teddy and David (our GAY son), pictures of our lizards, etc., etc., etc. On the Seattle to Juneau flight it was my turn to get the talkative neighbors. In the window seat was an 80-something former Navy pilot, still doing pilot style chic in a vintage leather flight jacket and khakis, who was heading to Juneau to charter a boat to do some fishing. Into the middle seat squeezed a goofy Christian manufacturer's rep for a boat building company on his way to make some dealer visits (I only know of the Christian part based on his reading material - fortunately he did not raise it as a topic of conversation). The good news is that the two of them conked out not long into the flight, leaving me to my own devices.

V & I shared a cab to the hotel with a British couple who were taking a cruise on the same line, departing Saturday. We checked into the Baranof Hotel, a vintage hotel more shopworn than charming, though serviceable. We took a stroll through downtown, taking advantage of the (apparently unusual) lack of drizzle. Downtown Juneau was dominated by a number of towering mega-cruise ships which were in port, and many of the downtown shops clearly catered to cruise ship tourists ashore for the day. we came to realize as we stayed there for a few days that the rhythm of Juneau is driven by the arrival and departure of these mega ships. Yes, it's the state capital and so there's a lit of government business and yes, there's a population of locals, fishermen, layabouts, and the like - but the real industry is servicing the cruise ships. I suspect this is the case for all of the coastal port call towns.

Despite the dominance of cheap tchotchkes in the downtown shops we mentally bookmarked some stores for later browsing. We also stopped in at the Tourist Information Center where V exchanged life stories with the woman behind the counter (originally from New Jersey, moved to Anchorage when her husband was stationed there during Vietnam, has been in Alaska ever since ...). At this point we had been on the road for sixteen hours; however it was still only 6 PM. We wanted to see the midnight July 4th fireworks, so after dinner at a Japanese restaurant (local salmon teriyaki!) we went back to the hotel and napped. 

Juneau Fireworks

The Info Center woman had warned us that on the night of a holiday "all hell breaks loose" downtown and when we emerged from our hotel at around 11 PM it was indeed a chaotic and drunken scene, though of course on a much smaller scale than, say, Times Square on New Year's Eve. It truly felt like Saturday night in a frontier town. It didn't feel dangerous, but it's been a while since I've been somewhere with such a high percentage of inebriated people in the streets. We made our way down to the Gastineau ship channel, which was also crowded with revelers. The day's cruise ships had departed, leaving a clear view of the water and the mountains across the way. There were also some interesting Alaskan touches - like a commercial fishing boat cruising back and forth with a brass band on deck. The fireworks display itself was nice and when it was done we headed off to bed.

V Watching the Fireworks

Fri, 7/4

I woke up feeling pretty stiff and sore and spent some time stretching while drinking a cup of the hotel room coffee. Do you know what happens to coffee beans that are rejected from regular commercial sale? They get inspected again and if they fail the second inspection as well they get packaged up for use in the complimentary coffee makers in hotel rooms - at least that's what it seems like based on the uniformly weak and bitter brews I've experienced from these devices. Still, bad coffee is better than no coffee at all and after a cup, stretching and a shower I felt a lot better.

V and I headed straight to our #1 breakfast destination of choice, Silverbow Bagel Bakery. We had become aware of this place while researching the trip: a reputedly good quality bagel shop owned by expat New Yorkers, one of whom is a SUNY Binghamton alum. We both ordered sesame bagels with local salmon lox. The bagels, coffee and hot chocolate were all really good. We asked after the owners but they weren't around; alas, a missed opportunity for Binghamton reminiscences.   After breakfast we browsed the few local shops which were open (it was only 9 AM and it was July 4th) including a vintage knickknack shop (the proprietor was sitting outside dressed as Uncle Sam) and a local book shop. The woman in the book shop (originally from Hoboken via Texas) was very nice and gave us some local tips after V, of course, exchanged life stories with her.

From there we headed to the Juneau July 4th parade, which was a nice small town parade with some Alaskan twists. In addition to the Boy Scout troops, politicians and pipe bands you see everywhere there were participants like the mine safety patrol, representatives of Tligit and Filipino groups (Juneau has a large Filipino population), local fishermen and supporters of some ballot proposition regarding oil drilling profits.  After the parade we browsed a few shops and had lunch at a local bar. Who would have expected felafel at an Alaskan saloon? There was a sign above the door saying the place had been established in 1881. While the feeling inside was modern dive bar, I still wouldn't have been surprised had a prospector with a big beard and suspenders hitched up his mule outside and trundled in for a shot of whiskey. We also came to realize that in addition to cruise ships, another dominant feature of Juneau is alcohol. The town has an impressively large number of bars, which seem to be among the first businesses to open in the morning. There's also a considerable wino population hanging out in the streets; Again, not hostile or threatening, but just there as befits a remote town with months of darkness and little economy outside of the government offices and seasonal tourism.

Native Dancers, July 4th Parade

I've already mentioned that we shared the streets with a lot of cruise ship passengers on port call for the day. Locals in the shops would ask us what ship we were on, and always seemed to warm up a little bit when we told them we weren't from a ship (though we did always 'fess up to being in town to get on a small ship cruise).

We had hoped to take the tram to the top of Mt. Roberts, but the day was drizzly and foggy so instead we went back to the hotel and relaxed - read and napped. Downtown Juneau doesn't have a lot of restaurants (you have some more options if you have a car) and so after some time online searching for a restaurant that had good reviews, wasn't too touristy, and didn't feature seafood (we don't eat shellfish) we settled on a pizza place. The pizza there was almost more of a flatbread, but it had good flavor and the accompanying salad was fresh and tasty. The walk to the restaurant also took us past a spot further down the ship channel and we took the opportunity to spend some time gazing at the view out over the water to the mountains. While we stood there and gazed a bald eagle swooped in and nabbed a fish from the water, then soared off into the mountains.

We had thought about going to a local art house movie theater for evening entertainment but ultimately wound up going back to the hotel and watching a slight, though entertaining TV movie (all-star cast, TV movie script).

Sat 7/5

I am increasingly in awe of my colleagues who jet back and forth "back home" to various South and East Asian countries and show up for work all chipper with very little recovery time. Day two into a mere four hour time change and my rhythms are still bolloxed up. In addition to napping for an hour and a half yesterday afternoon I conked out for half an hour or so during the TV movie we watched last night, went to bed at midnight and popped awake at 5:30 AM. Just like yesterday, I stretched while downing a cup of the vaguely coffee-like liquid the room's coffee maker produces (shame on me for forgetting to pack my supply of Via Brew instant coffee packets!), then headed over to Silverbow for an egg & cheese on a bagel and a real cup of coffee. A good breakfast was in order since I had a morning kayaking trip to the Mendenhall glacier on tap. while I munched my bagel I overheard two local guys debating whether to go for a run or stay and watch the World Cup soccer game. I wound up striking up a conversation with them about running (one was an ultra-marathoner who had run a 100 mile race in the mountains around Juneau the previous week), paddling, and general Juneau sight-seeing. Unfortunately I had to cut our conversation short since I knew the kayak outfitter was due to pick me up soon. It was a good thing I didn't linger since the van arrived ten minutes early, piloted by a young woman named Hannah who turned out to be very knowledgable about the flora, fauna, geography and weather of the area. It was about a 20-30 minute ride out to Auke Bay including picking up a family at the Travelodge along the way. We stopped to pick up gear and boats at the "kayak shop", which was really just a shed serving as an office and a tent full of gear. The boats were already loaded onto a trailer, which Hannah hitched to the van. As we headed out I noticed a bald eagle sitting on a piling by the public boat ramp. Mendenhall is not far from Auke Bay and so we were there in about ten minutes.

The view even from the put-in at Mendenhall Lake is spectacular, offering a vista across the lake encompassing both the glacier and Nugget Falls in the distance. I was grinning from ear to ear before we even got the boats off the trailer. Mendenhall is apparently receding fairly quickly. It wasn't that long ago that there was no Mendenhall Lake; it was part of the area covered by the glacier.  We got a quick safety briefing from Hannah, including how far to stay from the glacier and a description of how to do paddle float and assisted rescues that would have been incomprehensible to anyone who didn't already know how to do these things, not to mention the fact that the 36 degree water would have made it hard to keep your wits about you and manual dexterity long enough to do any kind of rescue. Hannah gave us each a water bottle and a snack bag comprising a couple of granola bars and some Halloween style mini candies, loaded us into our boats and sent us on our way.

About that water: back home I would never, ever got out in water that cold without my full cold water regalia - dry suit and insulating layers, thermos of warm liquid, warm gloves, and neoprene hood. The folks here, on the other hand, seemed utterly unconcerned about sending people with unknown kayaking experience out into the cold - a risk that admittedly was mitigated by the warm air temperature, glassy smoothness of the lake and the use of wide, stable kayaks (Perception Carolina 14's). Still, it was unsettling for me to be paddling nearly freezing water in street clothes. I launched and hung around for a bit, figuring the six of us (family of four in two doubles, plus Eddie from Washington state in a single) might hang together for safety. I soon realized that Eddie had headed off across the lake on his own and the family was going to be moving slowly, so I started paddling around the perimeter of the lake towards the glacier.

Kayaking Mendenhall Glacier

As I've mentioned, the glacier is partially visible even from the launch site but when I rounded a point and it came fully into view it was truly breath-taking. A giant wall of blueish ice, larger than you could imagine, sandwiched in a valley between two mountains. Eddie and I got to the entry to the glacier area at about the same time and we paused to both gawk at the glacier and exchange cameras to take pictures of each other. Then we continued in closer to the glacier. Hannah had given us information about how close we could get (the risk is that the glacier would calve and we could get sucked under by the shifting ice). In addition, we were given maps that also showed the line. Being a safety-oriented person I followed the rules, but Eddie and at least one of the doubles, as well as other people on the lake, paddled much closer in. One thing of interest is that glaciers create wind. The giant mass of ice cools the air around it and the cooler, denser air flows down into the less dense air around it, creating a glacial, or katabatic wind. The wind was clearly in evidence as we approached the glacier and I was glad to have worn some layers.

After gawking at the glacier for quite a while and snapping a zillion photos I headed around past Nugget Falls and then beached my kayak to climb out and have a look. I wasn't sure if this was permitted either by the outfitter or the park, but I figured, what the heck. I was the only kayaker there and I got some strange looks as I walked around in my PFD and spray skirt - one guy even asked me what the heck was up with the gear. Nugget Falls would be worth a visit by itself, though of course it is second fiddle to the glacier. The falls are 377 feet high, tumbling down directly into the lake, and you can walk up pretty much right to the base of it. I'm glad I got a chance to see it up close. From there I wended my way through the ice strewn lake (another warning - don't get too close to the icebergs) back to the put-in, where Hannah soon arrived and whisked us back to Juneau.

During the time I'd been kayaking V browsed the downtown shops. We met back up at the room. The staff arrived to make up the room a few minutes later so we went downstairs and shared some peanut butter crackers, since neither of us had eaten lunch, then sat and read for a bit. V went upstairs to relax and I went out for a walk. First I browsed a couple of shops - the outdoorsy shop across the street and the bookstore up the block. Then I got coffee and a snack. As I was ordering my coffee I got the brilliant idea to go geocaching. I'm not that active a cacher anymore but I really wanted to log at least one geocache find in Alaska. Coffee in hand I headed out to look for caches. After brief attempts at two Nano caches (teeny tiny caches usually used in urban locations - often very frustrating to find) I found a nicely hidden cache in the garden of the historic Russian Orthodox Church (the Russian Orthodox won over a lot of the natives by offering services in Tlingit language, while the American missionaries insisted on English). While I was there I finished my coffee and took some pictures.The church is in a cute residential neighborhood a little outside the hustle and bustle of downtown and so I decided to continue exploring and strolled up the mountainside through this funky neighborhood. When I got tired of walking uphill I decided to try for another geocache and headed down out of the neighborhood. This whole time I was carrying my empty coffee cup. It's hard to find places to throw things out; because of the large bear population in the area people keep their trash locked up tight. Even the trash cans in the downtown area use bear resistant lids. As I'd see firsthand the next day, this concern about bears in downtown is not an idle one.

I did successfully find the second geocache, chatted briefly with a guy working on an old 1960's vintage Jaguar "saloon", then headed down one of the incredibly long flights of alleyway stairs in this mountainside town, back down to Franklin Street and our hotel.

We have a long tradition of eating Chinese food wherever we go in the world and so for dinner we chose to go to the closest Juneau had to offer, a multi-Asian restaurant with a menu that included Chinese, Japanese, Thai, and Vietnamese dishes, which in itself should have been a warning. The New York Times in its,"Thirty six hours in Juneau " write-up remarked that Juneau is not a place for five star dining. Well Let me tell you, this place deserved negative stars. It was the worst restaurant meal I've had in a long time. The food was like the packaged Chung King Chinese dinners we'd eat as kids. Egg drop soup that I'm pretty sure was Campbell's chicken soup with eggs added. Ketchupy, gloppy Pad Thai. The Chinese dish we ordered, tofu and vegetables, was marginally better, but still frozen dinner quality. Juneau just isn't a restaurant town.

After dinner we went to a local theater production, a two-man show based on the book The Blue Bear, about the friendship that develops between two men as they search for the elusive Alaskan blue bear. The story takes place locally, and the author had lived in the area (the bookstore owner had recommended the production). It was surprisingly well done and we really enjoyed it. Then, it was back out into the 10 PM light, and back to the hotel and bed.

Sun 7/6

The folks at the information center had recommended a restaurant called the Sandpiper for breakfast. After our mixed experiences with Juneau restaurants we were suspicious but decided to forego a last day of bagels at the Silverbow and give it a try. During our walk over I looked across the street and saw a black bear in someone's yard! It was quite a tableau: the bear on the front lawn, a woman (who I assume walked out of her house to find a bear there) cowering behind her van, and three lauabouts hanging out in front of an office building across the street laughing and getting the biggest kick out of the whole thing. V and I scrambled for our cameras but by the time we got them the bear had disappeared.

The Sandpiper itself was smaller and more of a typical diner than I had expected (from the description I expected a breakfast heaven) but the food was, in fact good - even if the service was typically Juneau indifferent. We had a good breakfast of french toast, augmented with Yukon Gold (of course) hash browns and (for V) bacon.

From there we went up the tram up to the top of Mt. Roberts - a spectacular view of Juneau and its harbor. I convinced V to go on a half mile hike up at the top. A half mile doesn't sound like much but there was quite a bit of elevation change along the way. The hike provided us with yet lots of vistas to ooh and ahh at. I kept putting my camera away thinking I had snapped enough pictures of snow-capped vistas, only to pull it out again around the next bend. Truly a beautiful place. We of course browsed the gift shop and we also watched the demo of a native carver working on a totem pole. He was carving a big trunk of western red cedar and was a little surprised when I said, "oh, that's the same wood I use to carve Inuit kayak paddles." When we got back down to town we grabbed lunch at an out of the way sandwich shop called Grumpy's, which turned out to be a surprisingly good meal.

Juneau from Mt. Roberts. Out ship is one of the two teeny ones tied up next to each other near the center of the photo

In the late afternoon, after yet some more browsing, we headed for a meeting room at the Baranof, the gathering place for the group heading out that day aboard the Safari Endeavour. We started chatting with some of the folks who were going to be our boat-mates for the week. As always, we found ourselves in a baby boomer crowd, that is, most of the people were older than we were, though there were a few couples our age and here and there some younger folks. One of the first people we got to talking to was David, a dentist from Connecticut. As we talked V, who has the skills of a top-notch police interrogator, slowly dropped bait into the conversation until she was able to hook him and reel in the fact that he and his wife were Jewish. Aha! Not the only ones on the boat. 

We got a warm welcome from the crew as we boarded the ship and our evening was spent in a whirlwind of unpacking, socializing, briefings, life boat drills, more briefings, a beautiful sunset, dinner (choice of prime rib, salmon, or a vegetarian dish), cocktails and more cocktails, and meeting more people. We told one woman we spoke with that the trip was for our 25th anniversary, to which she responded, "Mazel Tov!" Her Jew detecting technique lacked V's subtlety, but I have to admire her bluntness; we confirmed that this was indeed an appropriate choice of words. 

Our cabin

Our tribal bonding completed for the day, we moved on to dinner, which was quite tasty, and the service was very attentive, though there was a minor glitch in that they forgot to serve us dessert - a minor oversight which turned out to be typical of the attentive but imperfect service on-board. We turned in at around midnight, looking forward to our first full day on the ship.

Sunset, Day 1

SUP Experiment in Georgetown

So, I've been meaning for some time to try SUP. "What's SUP?" you say? Nothing much, what's SUP with you?

<Rimshot />

SUP is stand-up paddle boarding, and it's been all the rage for the last couple of years. A lot of people who would have been casual kayakers in years past are now up SUP-ing instead. It's never seemed very appealing to me, to tell you the truth. You're paddling along standing up on a wide surf board. It's supposed to be a good workout, but it seems rather uncomfortable and limiting. 

Anyway, one Sunday Ted and I headed into Georgetown to try SUP rental, but it was so crowded and hard to park that I just gave up and went home. I hate to be thwarted, so the next day, my telework day, I planned for a long lunch break and headed for Key Bridge Boathouse. I was there and parked in under 15 minutes, as opposed to 40+ just to get there on Sunday. 

KBB is, unfortunately, no longer Jack's. It's like running into someone you know after the zombies or the Borg have gotten to them. Yes, it's still recognizable by sight, but its spirit different. The old school connection to the river is gone. Frank Baxter and the various river rat hobos who worked the place (or just spent time there) - all gone, replaced by college kids in matching t-shirts and an impersonal, efficient rental process reminiscent of a fast food restaurant. 

All that notwithstanding, I was soon standing on a paddle board, heading upriver towards the Three Sisters Islands. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I had no problem with balance on the thing. I got up and down from my knees several times without incident. I shouldn't judge first time paddle boarding against kayaking skills honed over the years, but boy, paddle boarding is SLOW. It took me about 30 minutes to cover the short distance from Key Bridge to the islands. I had a little current against me, and every time the wind blew it brought me to a standstill, as when you're on a board you act as a pretty big sail. 

As expected, the trip back downriver was faster as I had the wind and current with me, and I paddled back to Key Bridge Borghouse -- oops, Boathouse -- without incident.

Can you sense a lackluster response on my part to my SUP experiment?

Provisional Verdict: Meh. Better than not being on the river, but much less sensible than a kayak.

Long-term prognosis: I'll likely try it again so as not to make a snap judgement.

Clearwater Festival 2014

After a hiatus last year I attended the Great Hudson River Revival, better known as the Clearwater Festival, this year. I have written about this festival before and so won't describe it at length here, but being a weekend filled with music, jam sessions, camping in a beautiful setting by the river, kayaking, lightweight hippie-dippiness and really good felafel, it hits a lot of high points for me. If only there was an on-site coffee roaster, it would be pretty much perfect :)

This year I managed to convince a couple of my kayaking friends to attend, including Suzanne from Baltimore and Jen from the Adirondacks. The trip up was a logistical and traffic nightmare that I will not describe, except to say that it involved driving from Arlington to Baltimore, Baltimore to Manhattan, then Manhattan to Croton on Hudson, all in heavy traffic. Eventually, after about what seemed like ten days on the road, Suzanne and I (we carpooled) got there. Jen was already there, had her part of camp set up, and had dinner and cold beer ready for us (we had texted our travel travails from the road so she knew what we had been through). We settled in and made camp just in time as the light was fading, despite a slight equipment failure on my part (the bungie in one of my tent poles broke). Alas, it was too late for an evening paddle, but at 9PM the campsite jam session started, led, as usual, by Mingo Lodge of New Jersey band Big Boss Sausage. As usual, I was the best accordionist there (by virtue of being the only accordionist there). We were joined by Tom Chapin's bass player, which was pretty cool. I left the jam a little after midnight and crawled back to my tent, exhausted and a lot more relaxed than I had been when we pulled in.

Clearwater is a lot of fun, but it is not a restful weekend. We got up fairly early Saturday to get some kayaking in. First, at Suzanne's insistence we headed down to the festival and got in just as the gates opened so we could stake out some space with our tarp and chairs at the Rainbow Stage. We bumped into Ken, my friend Sherry's husband, who was also there staking out territory. Then we headed to the car-top launch.

Red hawk by the kayak launch

We paddled about 8-9 miles: over to the "working waterfront" area to eyeball the sloop Clearwater and the schooner Mystic Whaler, then downriver around the Croton Point peninsula, under a railroad bridge, and into a pretty little stream. On the way back we detoured across the river to get a look at the Lettie B. Howard, another schooner that happened to be anchored there. Mystic Whaler is a fairly modern replica, but Lettie. B. Howard is an original 19th century ship. Both are beautiful.

Mystic Whaler

 After paddling we changed and ate lunch at the campsite, then headed down the hill to the festival. Wow, there's almost too much music to describe, and more than one person could see. Dar Williams, Rufus Wainwright, Richard Thompson, The Mavericks, and more. Plus breaks to walk around through the ultra-leftie politics area, the ultra-leftie food area (kombucha, organic seed crackers ...), the hippie-dippie vendor area (tie-dye shirts and djembe drums) and the working waterfront. Plus felafel. Suzanne was clearly clicking with the vibe of the place as she was already talking about what we'll do differently next year, now that she knows how the place runs. Her only concern was that she had brought the wrong wardrobe - camping clothing rather than flowy clothing appropriate for a folkie baby boomer gathering. This surprised me since I don't usually think of Suzanne as being someone whose #1 concern is having the right outfits. In truth I usually see Suzanne in settings like paddling and camping where wardrobe is totally about function, not appearance, so maybe I was just seeing a different side of her.

The Mavericks at the River Stage

After the music finished Saturday at about 8:45 we schlepped back up the hill, showered (a trailer with shower stalls was an exciting new feature this year!) and then headed to the camp site jam session. Saturday night Mingo was sharing hosting duties with another guy. This guy was a talented musician and entertainer, but he was clearly more interested in being the center of attention than in creating an inclusive jam environment. This made for a much less enjoyable jam. For that reason, coupled with my exhaustion, I didn't stay long at the jam before heading off to bed.

Sun

Another day starting staking turf at the stage then kayaking - this time a shorter, 4.5 mile paddle upriver. We grabbed lunch to bring with us to the festival and then headed down. I wanted to see Lake Street Dive (a hot up and coming band recommended to me by Mingo) but my friend Charles was coming to the festival for the day with his wife and kids, so I went to meet them at Tom Chapin's set - good folk music from an old pro. Then we got into that festival mode of wandering to different stages, losing and finding each other again and again. Charles and family went to see Laurie Berkner, while I headed to The Klezmatics. Charles and Suzanne found me there, then Suzanne and I (and eventually Jen) met up at the River Stage to see Toshi Reagon while Charles went off to meet up with Ken and Sherry to see David Bromberg. In the late afternoon Suzanne, Jen and I broke camp and said our farewells. Jen headed back up north and Suzanne and I headed south. The festival was being broadcast live on a local radio station and we were able to listen for quite a while - heard Nora Jones and a little bit of Lucinda Williams before losing signal. Suzanne was behind the wheel on the way home and pushed through as fast as possible - no dinner break. I dropped her off and then headed the rest of the way home, digging into my leftover supply of energy bars and snack foods along the way because I was starving. I made it home around midnight and of driven by compulsion unloaded everything except my kayak from the car. 

The Klezmatics at the Dance Tent

 Yes, I went to work the next day (well, teleworked). How productive I was, I can't say. But I felt good, having spent the weekend good friends, music, paddling, and food, along with great weather.

Belle Isle Trip

Because my schedule this summer is pretty busy with other things I haven't signed up for too many Chesapeake Paddlers Association camping trips. Fortunately, I had a free weekend to go on Ralph's Belle Isle trip. Belle Isle State Park is a pleasant little park right on the shores of the Rappahannock River in the Northern Neck of Virginia.

Friday

I made plans to carpool with Susan G. I was expecting her to show up at 9:30, but she was at my door at 9 AM. I guess there was a small miscommunication between us on timing, but no worries since I was just about ready anyway. I95 was a mess all the way down due to construction and the 2 1/2 hour trip wound up taking us 3 1/2 hours. We finally made it to the park at 1 PM, ate lunch and set up camp. The campsites at Belle Isle all have electric power. We didn't need it since the nights were cool, but we could have brought an air conditioner as well as an electric coffee maker and big screen TV. Alas, no WiFi - how primitive!

We made it out onto the water at about 3:30, launching into Mulberry Creek from the park, and kayaked for about two hours in some light chop on the Rappahannock. Our timing getting back was fortuitous, as other people from our group were returning at the same time. Ralph and Beth returned just ahead of us and were loading their boats as were Mike and Linda. Steve, Jim and Rosemarie hadn't been out on the water but had meandered down to the launch. As Susan and I loaded our kayaks we also talked with another kayaker (not part of our group) who was landing as we were coming in, a retired electrician named Hunter. Hunter is from the local area and was a font of local history (like that Stingray Point reputedly got its name when Capt. John Smith accidentally stepped on a stingray there). Hunter sounded very southern Virginia. I am certain that he would have pronounced "dog" to rhyme with "vogue".

In the evening we didn't all gather into a single big gathering as often happens on these trips. Instead Susan and I went over and shared appetizers with Steven, Jim and Rosemarie. The three of them had plans to make grilled chicken and pineapple kebobs, but something was wrong with their grill. It was a little bit of a comedy of errors as they experimented with the grill for a while. They had a working Coleman stove and ultimately changed the menu to pan-fried chicken and pineapple. When they got the Coleman fired up and started cooking in earnest Susan and I went back to our site and ate our pre-fab no-cook dinners (I had a cold tortellini salad, and Susan had some sort of lentil and rice mash). Susan retreated to her tent at about 9:30. I just can't turn in that early and so I stayed up for a while reading and writing.

New Yorker paranoia moment #1: When I was in the bath house washing up for the night a teenage kid came in to get washed up. One of the things he did was to wash off his large pocket knife, which he then dried using the air drier behind me. So there I am, standing at the sink and looking in the mirror at this kid behind me with a big knife and so of course I thought, "what would I do if he made a move to stab me." Now I'm sure this was just a wholesome, all-American kid with his pocket knife, but that's the way New York folks think.

Saturday

One thing I've learned about Ralph's trips is that if you're on time, you're late. If Ralph says he's going to head out at 9 AM, he's probably really going to roll at 8:30, and the rest of the group is going to leave with him. This morning's stated departure time was 9. Susan and I left at 8:40 and were near the back of the group in arriving at the launch. The trip plan was to do go part way around Fleet Island (at the mouth of the Rappahannock River). Ralph likes the outside part of the island but considers the winding path through the marshes and guts around the back of the island to be "hot, shallow and boring" and so his plan was to do an out-and-back trip on the exposed side of the island. A subset of the group liked the idea of circumnavigating the island and so after our lunch break we split into two groups. Sue, Rich, Linda, Mike, Wayne, Susan and I went for the circumnavigation, while Ralph, Dick, Jim, Steven, and Rosemarie retraced their steps around the bay side of the island. The hot, shallow and boring route turned out to be quite enjoyable. Yes, there were a couple of shallow sections, but there were also pretty marshes, cute houses, and a greater variety of scenery than the outside of the island offered.

Semi-selfie with paddlers - off of Fleet Island

 

New Yorker paranoia moment #2: The place we launched is a public beach and so there were lots of other people milling around there. A guy asked me some questions about why we had such big kayaks, how far we were going to paddle, did I make the wood boat, and so on (amazingly, no questions about the skinny stick paddles). When he asked how long we were going to be out my first thought was of course that he was asking so he'd know how much time he had to break into our cars. Yes, it's groundless paranoia, but that the way New York folks think.

Taking a break: Ralph, Mike, Susan, Steven, Dick

The "hot, shallow and boring" group made it back first, since we were paddling a slightly shorter distance and the other group had a slow paddler with them. As we loaded our boats Sue made a lot of noise about stopping off for ice cream on the way back to camp, which sounded like a great idea since it had gotten pretty hot out. While we loaded we again chatted with the friendly folks at the little beach: three middle-aged ladies from Richmond who were making a rather poor showing of trying out a stand-up paddle board (and who offered to let me try it), and two young women who asked Susan and me why only one of us got a "sexy wood boat".

Susan and I headed out and drove slowly as we passed through the town of Kilmarnock, on the lookout for ice cream. Sure enough there was an old-fashioned soft serve stand there. Old-fashioned but not old - we were waited on by owner, who told us that the place had been open since 2007. I ordered a small vanilla with Heath Bar, which is my usual order at the Frozen Dairy Bar in Falls Church - except here the "small" was enormous. There was simply no way I was going to finish that portion. Susan felt the same way about her overflowing waffle cone. Linda and Mike showed up and the four of us ate together - and lo and behold, the entire gigantic "small" portion and waffle cone were consumed. Interestingly, Sue and Rich, whose idea this was, passed right by the ice cream place and went right back to camp. 

Artsy Photo: Fleet Island

 

Our paddle had been fairly short and so even with a stop for ice cream we got back to camp early, at around 3 PM. That left plenty of time for showering, relaxing, reading and writing (this entry) before our 7:30 PM dinner reservation at The Lancaster Tavern. Susan and I pulled into the tavern's parking lot at about 7:15. Ralph was already there, of course. In fact, a number of our group were across the street from the tavern examining the town's monument to the brave service of its sons in defending the Southern way of life in the Civil War.

A swan on the "hot, boring and shallow" route

Lancaster is apparently a fairly old town. The tavern has been there in one form or another since the 1790's, as have some of the other surrounding buildings. The place is quaint and definitely a step above the usual kind of places I stop off after paddling, but the food was mediocre and - perhaps our group of twelve overwhelmed the staff - the service was exceptionally poor. Better than the dinner after last year's Potomac Swim where the restaurant never served us food, but very slow and the food came out in dribs and drabs. Still, it was a pleasant evening with good company. Conversation about paddling topics, interesting launch sites, entertaining outdoors mishaps and so on. A number of the people on the trip are birders and so there was some conversation about birds that had been spotted. Was that a yellow-bellied farshtunkeneh tanager, or a yellow-chested oysgeshpielt warbler? Out came the Audubon apps on people's phones, followed by a debate about whether Audubon was really a reliable guide. Jim's contribution to the conversation, a description of the ticks he'd seen crawling around his campsite, creeped some people out - perhaps not the best dinner conversation topic. 

By the time we got back to camp it was 9:45, which is late night for kayakers, so we all just went back to our campsites and settled in for the night. Pretty night, lots of stars. Saw the knife kid again. Is he stalking me?

Sunday

Our plan for Sunday was to paddle from Carter's Wharf, which was on the way home and offered views of some cliffs. We broke camp and rolled with the group (earlier than the announced departure time, of course). Susan's GPS couldn't find the address of the landing, and so we started by navigating from the written directions and promptly made a wrong turn. Fortunately others from the group were right behind us and so we spotted that we were heading in a different direction. At that point we ditched Apple maps in favor of Google Maps, which was able to find our destination. Interestingly, it said it was 15 miles away and that it would take four hours and forty minutes to get there. This unnerved Susan, but since the destination location looked right on the map and I know that the travel time is a second order derived calculation, I advised that we ignore the weird travel time and follow the app's route - which indeed turned out to be correct. 

Semi-Artsy shot of an abandoned boat

 These "landings" that we launch from are generally historical ferry boat landings, used way back when in the transport of tobacco, passengers, and who knows what else up and down the river. Today they're typically just out-of-the-way public launches. This one, despite the dilapidated condition of the boat ramp, was pretty active as a launch for power boats. We paddled upriver with the tide, pausing to look at the cliffs, which are said to contain lots of fossils (like Calvert Cliffs in Maryland). There were more eagles out than I could count, plus the usual array of ospreys, herons and other water birds - plus quite a few vultures. After looking at the cliffs we continued up the river, poking a little bit into one creek then heading deep into another. The trip back down river was a slog into the wind and against the tide. All told, this wound up being our longest paddle of the weekend.

Susan and I, having been burned on the way down, took Maryland 301 home rather than risking I95 again. This was a pleasant, if slightly slower trip, and needless to say the people who took I95 home reported that it was smooth sailing all the way home.

Beautiful weather, good company, and a pretty and remote part of Virginia to paddle in.

A few more pictures are here: https://plus.google.com/photos/104764324610301945404/albums/6023463269086881073?authkey=CL773ZrKpv2WGg

Two Outings, One Weekend

I generally consider any weekend when I get to go kayaking to be a good weekend. By that criterion this must have been a pretty awesome weekend as I went on two, count em', two, excellent kayak trips.

 

First, on Sunday Tall Tom and I went out with our wives for a paddle - which is only a slightly less surprising a sentence to have written than, "Saturday I went over to the American Nazi Party headquarters for Shabbos services." The genesis of this spectacularly unexpected event was Tom's plan to twist his wife's arm into a kayaking outing. V has been making noises about wanting to do some kayaking and generally prefers doing things with "other people" (other than whom? Other than me, I suppose). V likes Tom's wife and so, when I presented her with the idea of a joint paddling outing she unexpectedly jumped at the idea.

V on the water

 

We launched at Pohick Bay. Pohick on Memorial Day weekend has a warm nostalgia for me, as it was the time and place of my first camping trip with the boys (when the campground was full of biker groups in town to participate in the Rolling Thunder rally). We headed up into the creek. V was very unsteady at first, feeling like the slight chop was going to capsize her, but once we got into the creek she was OK. I think she really appreciated the creek's beauty, too. After about 30 minutes of paddling Tom's wife abruptly announced that it was time to head back. I later learned that what she was really doing was giving V the opportunity to head back without having to be"spoiler" who asked us to turn around. Ironically, V, while unsteady at first, told me that she was fine in the the creek and could have gone further. Go figure.

After getting off the water we stopped at a resaturant for a light lunch - where the waitress actually came over to our table to comment on Tom's height. 

Pax Paddlers

The next day Tom, Suzanne, Susan G2, Yvonne and I paddled the Patuxent River. Tom and Suzanne had the ulterior motive of checking out a location for a kayak camper they are planning for later this season; Susan and I were just along for the ride. We launched at the Patuxent Riverkeeper building - the same place from which Tom and I had been turned away a few weeks earlier when the river was declared off-limited due to sewage contamination, paddled down to their intended campsite where we landed and did a little exploring. We then paddled back upriver into Jug Bay. Beautiful day, nice outing- but nowhere near as distinctive as the couples outing!

Landing at Tom & Suzanne's campsite location