The Envelope, Please...

For the Fall 2009 trip we are going to: the Red River.

This may come as a surprise to some of you considering how uncertain the river conditions are. It's true that we have planned and canceled at least two previous trips to the Red because of water levels.

But we're feeling lucky and the river goes down almost as fast as it goes up, so it will improve our chances of floating this beautiful river if we commit to it. We also have some (not yet fully developed) contingency plans in the area so if necessary we'll get creative about where we paddle. More about that later.

The strategy will be to go up Friday and be in a position to assess the river on Saturday morning. As you know, that system works best when we can stay overnight without having to get the tents and gear out.

It worked great on the Green River trip when we stayed at the turkey hunting lodge on Friday night...






And when we stayed at The Barn on a Friday in Spring of '08 we were able to redirect to Dale Hollow Lake on Saturday morning when the Sequatchie was still flooded...





So we'll do the same thing on this trip, except instead of just a barn on Friday night, we're going to take over an entire Robertson County farm.

This is it:



We'll have the whole thing to ourselves for a night. Bordered on three sides by the Red River.





With the farm comes a farm house (sleeps 12, not counting the porches):





Also numerous out buildings, barns, a farm pond and a farmer's daughter.

Beverage Manager: even though you're generally opposed to kegs, this might be the time to reconsider.

Shooters: bring some clay pigeons and a trap thrower.


Here is a high level view of the Red.



We're in the square shaped bend 1/3 in from the right. If you want to Google Earth it (which is fun), search for Adams, Tennessee and it's about five river miles upstream.


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It may be time to have a meeting.

The Prodigal Father and the Artifact

(Part III in a series)


The third miracle occurred April 12, 2003 on the Stones River. Between Goochie Ford and Trimble Rd.

Although not directly related, the first sign that something special was going to happen on this trip came during the shuttle. There was a zebra grazing near Halls Hill Rd. - right there in the middle of a Rutherford County pasture.

On the river, it was only a seven mile float and we were deliberately trying not to hurry. ("The hardest part is to get slowed down." Goodbye to a River, p. 22.) So we stopped at a big, clean gravel bar about half way down with plans to say awhile. Even though it was April, Josh decided to take a swim.

Afterward, sitting on a cooler, air-drying in his boxers, he remarked that this gravel bar looked similar to one he remembered long ago with his father. They had found an arrowhead and Josh considered it a prized childhood possession. But one day, while cleaning up the house, his unnostalgic father threw it away. It remained a sensitive subject all their lives.

As he finished the story, Josh looked down, lost in thought. Then he noticed something sticking out of the ground.

"Fucking-A," he said.

Right between his feet, half buried in sand, was a beautiful flint indian arrowhead. And at that moment, the Prophet Josuha was caught up in a rapture and he began dancing about the gravel bar clad only in his swaddling clothes and continued to exclaim these famous words over and over:

"Fucking-A, Fucking-A, FUCKING-A!!"




















And he rushed home to his father and they were reconciled. And they killed the fatted calf and said "It is a miracle!"



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Above there the old Painted Campground lies, twenty or so acres of worked-flint chips, potsherds, burn-marked hearthstones . . . There are dozens of places like that along the Brazos, traditional stopping places that, judging from the thickness of the midden in some of them, must have been in use for unknowable centuries before white men came, by tribes in migration or seasonally encamped. If you poke around any of them long enough, you can usually pick up a couple of arrowheads to rattle against each other in your pocket until a nephew or a friend's son begs them away from you - though, by the very principle of middens, most of what you find is fragmentary or faulty.

I've never heard why they called it the Painted Campground. In '72, settlers trailed a raiding band to it, waited till dawn, and were easing in on the their bellies when one of them lost the steel control that tactics require and let out a berserker yell. Fast wakers, the Indians hit the brush, leaving behind them a few artifacts, some stolen horses, and the distinctively long-haired scalp of Chesley Dobbs from down the river, whom no one till then had known to be dead.

Goodbye to a River, pp. 64-65.

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The Miracle of the Brother Bear Coffee Cup

The Club’s second miraculous event occurred on the Piney River trip. Back when we pulled the Vanderbilt trailer and corn was free.

We were going to leave Nashville early on Saturday morning for the ride to Hickman County. We gathered in the driveway as we always do, with the usual departure activities: drinking a little coffee, waiting for Tim. But you can’t tie a Trucker’s Hitch with one hand, and sometimes coffee cups get set down and forgotten.

Eventually we pulled out, and an hour and half later we arrived at the last Ser Sta Gro before the river, just up the hill from the put-in.



After re-icing the beers, and just before driving down to the river, one among us exclaimed – “Behold the Brother Bear coffee cup!”



And all the Club members cast their eyes where he was pointing, and they began to wrench their clothes and lash themselves, for there upon the roof of of the truck they saw the Brother Bear coffee cup which had traveled over ninety miles across interstates and bumpy county roads without falling. And all exclaimed – “Verily this is the second miracle!”




And now every year on the same day the members drink from the cup and sacrifice a virgin’s virginity and all members now address each other as Brother Bear when they meet. And the miracle led to a new era of harmony and brotherly love in the Club.

Miracle #1 - The Blessing of the Beer on the Sabbath Day

(Part I in a series)


The first RRCC miracle occurred on September 21, 1997.

It was on a simple day trip on the Duck River. Put-in would be at Dement Bridge and the take-out on Hwy 41-A, which would be about a seven mile float. The weather was great. There had been a few light rains the week before so the water was up but clear. The upper Duck had just been stocked with Brown and Rainbow trout from the Normandy hatchery. Everything was perfect. Except...

It was a Sunday, and the future Club members on this trip had failed to buy their beer the night before.

At that time, State law prohibited liquor sales before noon on Sundays. Fortunately, with a leisurely (late) departure, they would be passing numerous Ser Sta Gros after 12:00 pm for beer acquisition on the way to the river. Unfortunately, they failed to account for that other peculiar institution of the Bible Belt: the dry county. After stopping at every exit on I-24, and searching the back roads of Beford County all the way to Lynchburg and back, the hard luck paddlers finally resigned themselves to a dry canoe trip and pushed off downstream.


About three miles into the trip, halfway between Dement and Hwy 41, they came upon Three Forks Bridge.





Although this bridge was known to be on a remote, rural highway, it was suggested that someone should get out and take a look up and down the road - "just in case." Jim Myers volunteered and climbed up the concrete stairs, then disappeared out of sight. He reappeared just a few minutes later, confirming that there were no beer stores on this highway.





But lo! What was it that Jim was carrying in his arms?




Vessels! Vessels of barley and hops. Cold ones, like he was returning from the wedding feast of Cana.




And they said unto themselves: Truly this is a miracle!





Some say it was an angel that Jim encountered that day. An angel who had too much nectar of the gods in Shelbyville the night before, and was puking his guts out in the gravel parking lot of Three Forks Bridge. They say that when Jim approached, the angel beseeched him: would Jim please relieve him of the remaining beers in the back of his truck? For they were causing him great pain and he was anxious to be rid of them. Besides, he had only minutes ago made certain vows and promises that meant he would no longer be needing this devil's brew so long as he lived, which "might not be long."

And so Jim accepted the gifts that the angel bore unto him, and the paddlers continued on their journey down the River Duck. And they drank of the Sabbath beer. And it was good.

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Note: Three Forks Bridge is about two miles from the George Dickel distillery tasting room, which provided all of the inspiration and courage necessary for this reenactment.

To kill time while the river levels sort themselves out, today we begin a three-part series on the stories of divine intervention that are now part of our lore. Moments in the Club's past when natural law was interrupted by some unexplained force. Together they are "The Three Miracles of the RRCC."

Click

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