20-Jul-2007
Well I had three different offers to go paddling this weekend in order of distance:
1. The Ottawa … will be there next weekend – 370 KM one way
2. The Black River Festival in Watertown, NY – 430 KM one way
3. The East Race water park in SouthBend , Indiana – 797 KM one way http://www.sbpark.org/parks/erace.htm
I had never been to options 2 and 3.
I really did not feel like going to a big drunkfest party so decided on option 3. And what makes this choice even more bizarre is that I will be paddling with people I have never met in a place I have never been in a different country. Grant and Sherry offered to let me crash at their place on the Friday night which is pretty cool for being complete strangers. For all I know they could have been psycho open boat killers. I guess I am not practicing what I preach. We tell our kids to be careful of meeting people they only meet online … blah blah blah blah … and here I am doing the opposite.
Friday:
I already had all my crapped packed up in the new car. As you might have read in a previous TR, my POS 1991 Corsica packed it in close to the Ottawa River two weeks ago. I now have a lovely 2002 Ford Taurus. I had to figure out my roof rack situation and found out I only had to buy a 90 dollar fit kit for my existing Thule racks to make them work with the new car which was way better than buy new racks.
I left home around 09:15 Friday morning and made a quick stop at the post office and bank. Wilderness Tours was nice enough to send me a copy of the trip video with my carnage scene of getting trashed in Right Side Phil’s and broke my paddle.
After that it was a four hour journey to my first stop at the Costco in Windsor. I picked up a sweet little external 160 GB hard drive for a 100 bucks. I keep running out of disk space on my laptop with all the pictures I take.
After that it was time to cross the border. I was only in line for about 10 minutes which was really good from what I have been told. I was really polite to the US Customs guy. I handed him my passport and he asked me where I was going and then asked the big question of WHY? Even though it was kind of obvious as my girlfriend was strapped to the top of the car …. I said paddling of course and he gave me my passport back. Even though it seems like an eternity when you are being asked all the questions this whole process took less than 45 seconds and I was off. Now I only had to find Grant and Sherry’s place.
Glad I had the laptop with MS Street Maps and the GPS receiver. I made it to their place just after 3pm. I had to wait a couple of hours for them to get home but it was better than being stuck at the border in rush hour traffic. Introductions were made. Grant started getting their stuff organized and packed up and after that it was a late dinner at Chili’s and back to their place for watching kayaking videos and shooting the breeze.
Saturday:
I woke about 6am and got cleaned up and had some Cap-N-Crunch cereal for breakfast. We had to wait a bit for Bernie to show up. He apparently had the customs guy from hell. After some re-packing of Grant’s vehicle we were off. Bernie road shotgun with me. There was no sense in him being crammed into the back of Grants Scion when I had lots of room and plus I could use the company and most important of all he knew the way to East Race.
We arrived in the lovely town of South Bend about three hours later. I was getting kind of hungry so we made a slight detour through McDonalds and then off to the river which happens to be in the middle of town. Talk about urban paddling. The water flows from 12pm until 5pm on Saturdays and 1pm to 5pm on Sundays. It costs 12 bucks a day. I met quite a few people in the parking lot. Boris from Chicago, Cathy and family from Windsor, Mike from London, Jeff who I met at the Gull two years ago, Ray, and lots of others on the river.
The course is very interesting. I took a quick run down to check it out. There are ample of interesting eddys and a quite a few places to get in some sweet surfs. I played down at the bit. I decided to re-adjust my foot pegs and outfitting a bit and then it was time to have fun. I put back on the course at the half way point. You can only put in there or at the top as the river is fenced off on both sides. It is a 1900 foot walk from the bottom to the top.
I took a couple of runs down from the mid-point for a warm up trying to catch more and more eddys as I went. I had been watching some kayakers side surf this one hole. I decided what the hell and drop into to it sideways. I managed to have and excellent side surf which turned into a back surf and back to side surf. I actually had to reach back and turn the pumps on as I was filling up with water (joys of open boating). I finally decided I had enough and went down into the next eddy to allow the water to be pumped out. The safety people on the river were quite surprised to see water being pumped out of my boat as they had never seen pumps in one before.
I walked back up to the very top. It is a weird feeling to have to look both ways before crossing the street carrying a big a$$ boat. I had visions of getting hit by pickup truck or a bus. I did a couple of runs from the top. I was getting the hang of catching most of the eddys. A lot of the eddys behind the big artificial rocks have really squirlly water behind them which makes the course interesting. I did see the end results of a 13 foot Mohawk open boat being wrapped around one of the wooden bridge tressles. All I can say is to bent/broken thwarts, tandem outfitting ripped out, blown airbag, and who knows what. I took a quick look at the boat and assured the guy it was repairable. I have seen way worse come back from the dead.
On my last run down I decided to drop onto a wave backwards. It was steeper than I thought. I had a really excellent front surf before I lost my angle and window shaded. I grabbed my boat and emptied it out. The kayakers in the eddy lineup said they were very impressed by my front surf as the bow was just slightly below the waterline and water was basically spraying over my body. I was standing up to my waist in water but managed to hop back into my boat and head down river.
I was getting tired and it was almost closing time. We all re-grouped in the parking lot. We had to figure out where Greg lived as we were all invited to a BBQ for dinner. All we had was a phone number and were trying to get an address. We managed to get that sorted out and everyone went separate ways to clean up.
I decided to head over to the Notre Dame campus. I passed it on the way to the river from the interstate. It is not often I get to tour around too much and actually see a piece of old history. I spent about two hours walking around taking pictures. The place is absolutely gorgeous. It was a photographers dream with the old buildings and they way they were being shadowed by the light at the end of the day. The big church is absolutely stunning inside with the paintings and stained glass. Make sure you stop by and see this place if you have never been.
After that it was off to Greg’s for dinner. I had on my fugly shirt and pimp hat with my Canadian tie. I was definitely a mis-fashion statement for sure. It was nice just to relax and shoot the breeze with the others. After two hours I was getting tired and still had not sorted out where I was crashing for the night. I decided to grab a room at the Motel 6 where Grant and Sherry were staying. I figured I would rather lay around in bed in the morning waiting for the river to open than be uncomfortable in my tent at the KOA.
Sunday:
I lazed around in bed until about 10am. I met Grant and Sherry in the parking lot and we all headed off to breakfast at the American Pancake House and then back to the river for another afternoon of paddling.
Dave from my MKC Solo course showed up from Fort Wayne, IN to say hi on his way up north somewhere. It was nice to see him again.
My paddling today definitely sucked. It was bad from the get go. I ended up out of my boat for the 1st time after side surfing a small little wave below the dam. I ended up doing the ping pong … 14 foot boat in 16 foot space … thing back and forth and when my boat bounced off the wall I lost my angle and went over. Now luckily I was only standing in three feet of water and I just grabbed my boat and emptied it out. I had to swim it to the other shoreline as I could not get back into my boat where I was.
After that it was try to catch eddy time. I caught the first one behind the big center rock only to find out the water had changed and it was now a whirlpool which ended up sucking me in and stern squirt. I managed to lean all the way forward but had a crap load of water in my boat. I fired on the pumps and slowly made my way down to the next eddy in order to wait for the water to leave my boat.
The rest of my runs down were pretty uneventful. I managed to catch quite a few eddys … not as many as I wanted but enough to be happy. I did not get any surfs in at all. I kept getting flushed off. I should have quit when I was ahead. I took one last run down the river and ended up out of my boat for the second time. It was until I go to the bottom that I realized my paddle shaft was bent. I guess it must have happened when I tried to roll up by pushing off the bottom. At this rate of paddle destruction I will be using rafting paddles I find on the Ottawa River as my personal supply is dwindling to say the least.
After that it was time to get off the river as I still had an 8 hour drive home ahead of me. I stopped for gas and some snacks and headed off to the freeway at 5pm. Things were going great until I hit the Ohio border. I got stuck for about 15 minutes at the toll booth. After that it was smooth sailing to the duty free shop where I filled up on gas and bought my step-mom a 60 ounce bottle of Bacardi’s. Crossing the border took less than a minute as no one was in line.
I started getting tired just before 11pm. I pulled over into this picnic area and hauled out the pillows and sleeping bags and set it up on the picnic table and crashed. Next thing I know it is 3am. After that it was easy drive to work. There was no sense in going home. I made it to work for 5:30am.
So here is a short synopsis of my trip:
1. distance traveled – approximately 1700 KM
2. 1 province, 2 countries, and 3 states (Michigan, Indiana, Ohio)
3. money spent – lots
4. had fun – hell yeah
5. do it again – yep
6. watching Grant run the river in an open boat for the first time – priceless …he only swam three times
The only thing I would do differently next time on a trip with so much driving is take the Monday off for the drive back.
East Race
South Bend Indiana Pictures
Notre Dame
Notre Dame Pictures
