OVER THE BOW: THE OTTER TAIL RIVER

The first river you paddle runs through the rest of your life. It bubbles up in pools and eddies to remind you who you are. -- Lynn Noel

It has been a long time since I've got to paddle the Otter Tail River in Minnesota. I started thinking about that while packing up and getting ready to move. Something about moving makes us feel nostalgic about the place we're leaving behind. We think about the things we'll miss. A neighbor, a restaurant or bar, and if you're like me, a favorite paddling place.

The Otter Tail River was the first river where I got a taste of whitewater. It's Minnesota's eighth-longest river running through the western part of the state before dumping into the Red River. It starts out as a narrow crystal-clear stream as it meanders downhill through the countryside's lakes and marshes. It doesn't move particularly fast but offers canoeists plenty of opportunities for wildlife views along the tranquil river trail. However, east of Fergus Falls, the Otter Tail River picks up speed after making an abrupt turn toward the west, running through a valley filled with Class I and II rapids.
Whitewater is uncommon in western Minnesota. The gradient of the land just doesn't drop that fast. In California, the gradient for popular whitewater sections is measured in feet per mile; but in northwest Minnesota, the gradient is gauged in inches per mile. So don't look for big drops. It has been said that a second-hand pool table has more of a slant to it than a northwestern Minnesota river.

That said, the Broken Down Dam site on the river just east of Fergus Falls has been offering thrills and spills for canoeists and kayakers wanting to take a small bite of whitewater. The crumbling dam has been mostly forgotten since its collapse over a century ago. Busting through its center, the river tumbles, swirls, and drops between two massive concrete walls. During the spring runoff or after a good summer rain, the stream can rage into a fast-moving Class III rapid. Combined with a boulder garden stretch of class II waves before reaching the dam's remnants, it's a perfect place for a whitewater kayak in a place where rapids are hard to find.

About ten years ago, I was just getting into paddling, and of course, just as I do today, I wanted the thrill and challenge of paddling rapids. With Sigurd Olson's words echoing in my head, "I know this: as long as there are young men with the light of adventure in their eyes and a touch of wildness in their souls, rapids will be run."
My son Cole and I dove in headfirst. We bought two used whitewater boats at a Twin Cities kayak auction. Probably, not the best fit, but it got us on the water. We took turns running that foam-laced section of the river one afternoon, feeling a sense of triumph after bounding through the crashing waves.

This move will be shorter than my move to California from the Midwest and the Otter Tail River. My wife Debbie and I are leaving Fair Oaks and moving up into the foothills of the Sierra Mountains, where we all know the rivers do rush, tumble, and fall. I will miss the closeness of some of my favorite paddling spots in the valley, but, unlike Minnesota rivers, I'll still be able to visit them from time to time.

 

Over the Bow is a feature from Outside Adventure to the Max, telling the story behind the image. If you have a great picture with a great story, submit it to us at nickayak@gmail.com

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OVER THE BOW: THE KETTLE RIVER

Only fools run rapids, say the Indians, but I know this: as long as there are young men with the light of adventure in their eyes and a touch of wildness in their souls, rapids will be run... I know it is wrong, but I am for the spirit that makes young men do the things they do. I am for the glory that they know. --- Sigurd Olson

The fast-moving reddish-brown root beer colored rushes over the rocks past rugged cliffs and a heavy forest of black spruce, pine and aspen making Minnesota's Kettle River one of the state's most scenic and wild rivers. Offering an array of complex rapids along a stretch at Banning State Park filled with waves, holes and many play spots, it's a place I just had to paddle.

My son Cole and I had traveled all the way across the state just to get there during a father-son kayak camping trip in the fall of 2011. It was a chance to practice our developing paddling skills and play with our whitewater kayaks.

Just past the park's boat access, we paddled the river's Blueberry Slide (a Class II in low water rapid; Class IV in high water).  This rapid is considered to be one of the most challenging in the park as the water tumbles over sandstone ledges and rocks, forming the rapids. In the springtime, this spot can offer some pretty tall waves, but in that fall the water was very low giving us chance to surf and practice running the bumpy water. We found the slide mostly dry with the deepest water in a channel along the left side brushing up against the rocky ledges for about 100 or more yards.

Like kids in an amusement park, we ran down those dancing waves and over the ledges over and over again.

The next day we packed up our kayaks and headed toward the North Shore of Lake Superior, but that's another story.

Over the Bow is a feature from Outside Adventure to the Max, telling the story behind the image. If you have a great picture with a great story, we would love to see it. Submit it to us at nickayak@gmail.com

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ADVENTURE ON THE HORIZON: 2019

Rather than saying, good luck and good fortune to you this New Year, let me say work hard, laugh often, continue to learn, be kind, help others, pray for wisdom and then good fortune will see you this coming year. --  Robert Rivers

So what’s on your adventure horizon for 2019? As we stride into the new year, here are 5 trends we will see more of in the next year and beyond. Onward.
 
MORE BOATS IN MORE STORES

We don't have to tell you that over the past decade, that there has been an increased awareness in healthy lifestyles accompanied by a growing number of water sports enthusiasts across the US. According to the Outdoor Foundation's 2015 Special Report on Paddlesports, participation is on the rise, with almost 22 million Americans hitting the waterways in 2014—three million more than in 2010, the first year the study was completed.
"Paddlesports are gaining a lot of steam due in part to three factors: accessibility, affordability, and approachability," Joshua Silva, the Brand Marketing Manager at Jimmy Styks SUP Boards, told the website Very Well Fit.
Expect to see more inexpensive recreational kayaks and SUPs not just at the crowded boat launch but also in the big box stores like Costco and Sams Club along with other stores like Target, Walmart and TJ Maxx as the trend becomes more and more popular.

MORE PLACES TO ACCESS THE WATER

As the paddling community continues to grow to expect to see local municipality constructing long sought access areas to river and lakes. Paddling groups and community partners across the country are working to develop sites that will provide paddlers and boaters an improved put-in and take-out along popular stretches water.
"We've heard from the community that they would certainly like to see the river access improve at that historical boat launch, and I know that the folks that own dogs will appreciate an area," City of Eau Claire Forestry Director Todd Chwala, told WEAU-TV about a proposed project on the Chippewa River.

MORE SOLO TRIPS

“I wanted to follow a drop of water all the way from the Continental Divide (in Colorado) to the Gulf of Mexico,” Hannes Zacharias told the Kansas City Star about his 2,060-mile river trip from the Arkansas River’s headwaters near Leadville, Colo., to the Gulf of Mexico last summer.
It seems that those quiet me time paddling session are on almost every paddler's bucket list. Expect to see more tales of long journeys down river or around the circumference of a big lake alone. Who knows? Maybe they will inspire us to take even a trip of our own.

MORE WOMEN PADDLERS

Ladies were born to paddle. According to the Frontenac Outfitter's website, women represent about 45% of the kayaking enthusiast population and at that rate, their segment is growing, they will soon outnumber men. Kayak and SUP manufacturers, suppliers, and outfitters will continue to take note of this trend and eagerly adapt to meet their demands.
"I started paddling around and fell in love with it," wrote world-class kayaker Anna Levesque on her Mind Body Paddle website, "The challenge of having to balance combined with the body-alignment awareness and the great workout that it provides can’t be beat. Not to mention the fact that it allowed me to take my yoga practice to the water!"

Courtesy of Nick Troutman via Facebook

MORE HIGH TECH GEAR
Never before in paddling has there been so much high tech gadgetry. Pro paddlers now use everything from fitness trackers that can count paddling strokes to cameras to them keep their competitive edge. The kayakers use GoPro cameras while practicing tricks to get insight into their body mechanics after viewing it in slow-motion
“You can really figure out, ‘What am I doing?’” Pro-paddler Nick Troutman, told Digital Trends, “Either ‘What am I doing wrong’ or ‘What am I doing right? Why did this trick go bigger or better than the other trick?’ You can really slow it down and analyze exactly the difference between the moves.”

SHUTDOWN AND THE PARKS

The partial federal government shutdown, which began on Dec. 22 last month, has forced furloughs of hundreds of thousands of federal government employees and leaving many of our US National Parks without most of the rangers and others who staff campgrounds and otherwise keep parks running. Unlike shutdowns in some previous administrations, the Trump administration has left parks open to visitors despite the staff furloughs.

Courtesy of the Boulder Daily Camera News

At the Grand Canyon, the state of Arizona is paying for trash collection, custodial services for bathrooms and snow removal from sidewalks and trails. Stores and restaurants that aren’t run by the government are open. Campgrounds are open, but there is no reservation and check-in and check out process.
Meanwhile in California, at Yosemite National Park, trash collection, along with visitors’ centers and the park’s restrooms have been closed since the shutdown began. Joshua Tree has been operating with some staff, but beginning this past week, it's not allowing camping because of health concerns about near-capacity toilets. Earlier this week, Volunteers have been working to keep the beloved desert jewel as pristine as possible hauling out the trash and keeping toilets stocked with supplies hoping to keep the park accessible.

In Minnesota, officials at Voyageurs National Park issued a statement saying that "park roads ... may remain accessible to visitors, but will not be plowed.
Other affected parks in Minnesota include the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway, Grand Portage and Pipestone national monuments, and the Mississippi National River and Recreation Area.
Services at Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River and Ozark National Scenic Riverways in southeast Missouri have also been disrupted due to the shutdown.
“We’re deeply concerned about the approach the administration has taken,” told the New York Times, "John Garder, the senior budget director at the nonprofit National Parks Conservation Association. “Keeping the parks open is clearly causing threats to health and safety of visitors as well as wildlife and natural and cultural resources. We are worried about parks themselves, about park rangers who are demoralized, and the many businesses that depend on visitors.”

PADDLE DAY #141

Had a great time over the Christmas break paddling with my son Cole Carlson as I paddled to a new personal record of 141 paddling days in the calendar year. Onward to 2019.

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2016 IN REVIEW: PICTURES OF THE YEAR

San Francisco Bay with Bayside Adventure Sports

In everyone’s life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit. -- Albert Schweitzer

I have to admit when it comes to kayaking, I could be classified more as a fanatic than just plain enthusiast. I think about paddling all the time day and night. I dream about my next trip on the river and visualize my last trip to the lake. I consider a day that I don't get out on to the water as almost a day lost.

Professional paddler and filmmaker Rush Sturges wrote on Facebook, "I go to sleep thinking about this river and I wake up excited to paddle it.  People ask me if I ever get bored?  And I never do at these levels. This is the first section of the Little White we call "Gettin Busy" at 4 feet today. It's fast, technical, and steep. But when you're in control of the flow, there's nothing better."

On Lake Tahoe with Cole Carlson

Lake Natoma with Taylor Carlson

I can picture myself in the same way. Anytime I cross any river bridge I look down wishing I was there.  Like Sturges pointed out, there is nothing better than being on the water. So as 2016 draws to a close,  I look back at some of my favorite places and people I had the good fortune of kayaking with this past year. My two sons who both came out to California for a visit this past summer. It was thrilling to take Cole on his first trip down the South Fork of the American River and both got to on an overnight trip to Lake Tahoe. Father and son camp-outs are always special no matter how old they are.

Any day on the water on with Dan Crandall, Kim Sprague, John Weed and the rest the gang at Current Adventures Kayaking School and Trips and The River Store, is always a great day. If it was just a job to them they would have quit it a longtime ago. But, it is their passion for kayaking that flows through them like an untamed river. They are deep in experience and share their thirst of paddling with first-timers and veterans with assurance, confidence and conviction. After paddling with them, you only have one question. When can we go again?

The Lower American River with Current Adventures.

And only to go again and again with Erik Allen, Brian Hughes and members of Bayside Adventure Sports. God created the Earth to RIDE IT. CLIMB IT. CATCH IT. EXPLORE IT. PROTECT IT. I'm hoping for some more trips like the one to Angel Island along with many day trips to some area lakes and rivers.

But mostly I couldn't do any of kayaking without the support and encouragement from my wife Debbie. Always up for an adventure, she shares my same passion of being outside whether on the water, snow or trail.

Lake Jenkinson with Debbie Carlson

In Chasing Niagara,  a film directed by Sturges and produced by Red Bull that focused on Rafa Ortiz’s journey of being the first person ever to go over Niagara Falls in a kayak, Oritz offers this lesson. “I don’t really believe in regretting things, you know?” said Rafa Ortiz. “I believe in that anything that has happened in my life is for a reason and you know there is definitely things that have happened in my life that I would, you know, if I could I would think that I want to change but I think that anything that happens is for a reason and it just makes me who I am.”

Like Oritz, these experiences made me who I am. So as the year comes to a close, I look forward even more adventures on the water, in the years to come and wish you all the same.

The Lower American River with Bayside Adventure Sports

Eppies training on Lake Natoma

Eppies training

Kids Class with Current Adventures

Eppies Race Day

Barking Dog Rapid

The Rainbow Bridge

Lake Valley Reservoir

Loon Lake

Loon Lake with Current Adveentures

The Shoe Tree on the Lower American River

Sunset on Lake Natoma

THE WATER GENE

We are never far from the lilt and swirl of living water. Whether to fish or swim or paddle, of only to stand and gaze, to glance as we cross a bridge, all of us are drawn to rivers, all of us happily submit to their spell. We need their familiar mystery. We need their fluent lives interflowing with our own. ---John Daniel  

"Will I really need this?" Cole asked me.
I looked down at the fast flowing  South Fork of the American River,  our kayaks and then to one of my two crumpled up wetsuits I was handing him. The full neoprene wetsuit would be warm on that day, however, the water was even colder.
"It's pretty cold, " I said, "That water was snow a few weeks ago."

That is how I offer fatherly like advice. Usually by stating the obvious.  El Nino had provided moisture for a great spring runoff quenching the thirst of Northern California's dry rivers. However, my youngest son Cole didn't know that. This was his first trip down the South Fork. I promised Cole since moving here,  I would take him whitewater kayaking to coax him to come for a visit. He had experienced some whitewater back in Minnesota and Wisconsin, but he had never paddled anything like the South Fork before. It would take a learning curve.
He also hadn't paddled in over three years. That's not to say he hasn't been on the water most of the time. He was on leave from the U.S. NAVY and just back from a deployment. I joked with that he needed a bumper sticker saying "My Other Boat is the USS Arlington."

As I watched him roll into his west suit, all my memories of paddling and trips with him flooded into the back of mind. It wasn't so long ago I was taking him on his first canoe ride on Lake Trowbridge and camping trip to Lake Bemidji State Park. In those days, I was sure he would always be eight-years-old and hoping he would inherent my same love of paddling.

"This is why I am teaching you to kayak rivers," wrote Canoe & Kayak Magazine contributing editor Christian Knight in a 2014  Father's Day letter to his daughter, " The river will be the objective disciplinarian I can never force myself to be. It’ll reward you with euphoria when you do well and punish you when you don’t."
"I realize, of course, you are only 8-years-old now." he continued in his letter,  "I haven’t even taught you how to Duffek or how to roll. I’m still sheltering you from eddy lines that stretch and yawn into miniature whirlpools. I still clutch your cockpit through rapids that are whiter than they are green. If somehow, you do flip, I’ll pray you’ll have the composure to remember the steps I have instructed you to repeat back to me before sliding into every river we’ve paddled together."

Everyone knows that blood is thicker than water. But, when they're mixed together with an enthusiasm and determination to kayak or canoe, it becomes an overpowering energy, consuming of one's genetic makeup. It's the natural and instinctive need to be on the water, or as  fellow paddler, Kim Sprague calls it "The Water Gene." And when passed down to one's children, they will have an ingrained deep-rooted essential need to seek out rivers, lakes, and oceans. Hence: They were born to paddle.

When Cole and I slid into the South Fork we were paddling together for the first time in three years. The river carried us away swiftly through a line of standing waves.  He lights up smiling and says to me "This is fun!"
His "Water Gene" ancestry had kicked in with each dip of his paddle. I have no idea where I got mine. My dad wasn't a boater, but he took our family swimming every summer in Nebraska lakes and made sure I took part in school and church canoe trips. My dad would marvel then on how I could single handily turn the 17-foot Grumman aluminum canoe past the bridge abutment and back through the eddie line and right up to the landing. He might not have paddled, but at least he helped get me to the water's edge.

"My Dad showed me the importance of finding my own serenity." wrote Wet Planet Whitewater's   Courtney Zink, in a tribute to her father,  "His love for water stems from that, and from spending that time with him in canoes on calm lakes, rowing through rapids, and fishing from river banks, he introduced me to that connection as well. That has brought me back to the Northwest as an adult, to stand on the banks of the Washington whitewater and find a sense of peace and balance in the chaos of the river."

In running the popular surfing wave area paddlers know as Barking Dog,  I told him to wait upstream while I cruised down along the side of it so I could get some video and pictures. Now I'm sure many have gone through "The Dog" backward before both planned and unplanned. But, probably not on their first time through it. Cole paddled down after my signal and positioned himself looking upstream on the edge of the wave paddling with all of his might to stay there, before rolling back into the rapid. I held my breath and thought he hasn't paddle for a long time as he disappeared underwater. A moment, to my relief he rolls upright.  He has the water gene alright.
"I kind of hurt my shoulder when I rolled back." he later told me, "That's why I couldn't get right away. The second or third time I got back up."

I was proud like all dads would be. It was just like he'd scored the winning run or came in first in the race by handling that wave so well. A little family honor was upheld. The current Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau knows about that family “rite of passage”.  When you grow up in Canada you need to know how to canoe early, especially if your father Pierre Elliott Trudeau. The elder Trudeau was Canada 15th prime minister and had a passion for paddling in the Canadian wilderness.

"Maybe my most indelible canoe memory from that cottage was one of the rites of passage for the Trudeau boys," the younger Trudeau recalled in an essay in Cottage Life magazine,  When we hit five or six years old, our dad would put us into the canoe and we’d shoot the rapids on the stream that went down into Meech Lake. There’s a little dam there, and in the spring they’d open the dam, and there would be a huge V and a standing wave. With much trepidation, we’d sit in the front and go down the drop. I look back on it now and laugh because my father was sterning, and there was nothing I could do from the bow to aim it right—but it was very, very important for us to do it. To get into the bow of a canoe with my father for the first time, to be the bowman for the first time, and to go down this big, scary rapid."

High flows mean high times on the South Fork of the American River. We followed each other along trading off the lead back and forth the rest of the way through the bouncy waves and churning rapids.  It was a treat to paddle with him after such long time. Every day in Father's Day when I get to paddle with him and see him challenging the currents and lines of the river. He is my paddling legacy flowing from my water gene pool.

We had just finished the run to add to our memories, when Cole said, "I'm sure glad you brought those wet-suits. That water was cold." Once again I stated the obvious. "Well, it's my job to take care of you"

OVER THE BOW: LAKE SUPERIOR

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down, Of the big lake they call Gitche Gumee, The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead, When the skies of November turn gloomy--Gordon Lightfoot

It was late fall in Minnesota. Winter comes quickly there. It pushes the season of autumn out rapidly like an out-of-control locomotive. The beautiful colorful leaves one day are swept away by the rain, ice and snow on the next. Veteran paddlers of Lake Superior will tell you that when the weather turns to winter, the lake can become extremely hazardous for vessels no matter the size. A single storm on Nov. 28, 1905, damaged 29 ships calling for American novelist James Oliver Curwood to write, "It is the most dangerous piece of water in the world. Here winter falls in autumn, and until late spring, it is a region of blizzards and blinding snowstorms. The coast are harborless wildernesses with...reef and rocky headlands that jut out like knives to cuts ships into two." The alarm went out and in 1907 the US Congress appropriated $75,000 to build a lighthouse and fog signal southwest of Silver Bay, Minnesota, on the North Shore of Lake Superior.   

Split Rock Lighthouse is considered one of the most picturesque lighthouses on Lake Superior. The lighthouse long since retired by U. S. Coast Guard is now part of the Split Rock Lighthouse State Park and is operated by the Minnesota Historical Society. It has been restored to the way it appear in the late 1920s when it guarded the treacherous and rocky coastline against its 130-foot cliff perch overlooking the lake. Only once a year is the lighthouse lens re-lit in tribute to the SS Edmund Fitzgerald sank in a storm on November 10, 1975.  All 29 crew members perished in one of the Great Lakes' worst shipping disasters forty years ago this month. On the anniversary of the ship's sinking, the names of the crew are read and the beacon is lit at dusk.

Against lake, the imposing and beautiful lighthouse seems to shrink. The forests and rocks on its edges have been diminished. I have never felt so small in a kayak than on Lake Superior. The lake, powerful even when calm bounced me up and down like a float toy as I paddled around the island and bay below the lighthouse. My son Cole and I were on a late-season camping trip on the North Shore. We had brought our Wilderness Systems Tsunami 140 to experience paddling in Little Two Harbors Bay and under the lighthouse. This place has special meaning us. We had visited it several times as a family and had good memories there. Now we would have one more.

While Cole paddled out into the bay, I climbed to the top of nearby Ellingson Island across from the lighthouse's rock face wall. Cole braver than I went out further under the lighthouse. Unprotected from the windswept waters, I watch waves break over his bow. Alone in the vastness, from my viewpoint, he was only speck on the giant sea. Like, novelist, Joseph Conrad said, "The sea has never been friendly to man. At most, it has been the accomplice of human restlessness." It is like that with Lake Superior, sudden storms, very cold water and an unforgiving coastline. It's an uninviting place that seems to call for us home, even in the days before winter.
 
Over the Bow is a feature from Outside Adventure to the Max, telling the story behind the image. If you have a great picture with a great story, submit it to us at nickayak@gmail.com

Kids & Kayaks

We sat on the bank and the river went by. As always, it was making sounds to itself, and now it made sounds to us. It would be hard to find three men sitting side by side who knew better what a river was saying.  Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It.

This Father's Day weekend I will enjoy the company of my oldest son visiting from Omaha. We will try to fit many things into his week-long visit, including reminiscing about our previous kayak and camping trips we have enjoyed together.

The other day, my wife asked me when I had developed such a keen interest in water sports and if I had kayaked growing up.  In Nebraska, we really didn't have access to water outside the public swimming pool where I learned to swim. My dad was a hunter. He took my brother and I hunting almost every fall weekend for upland game birds and fishing only a couple of times.  He would pack up the family station wagon every summer with camping gear and take us on cross-country trips to central Nebraska, the Black Hills and even to California. He would often pick scenic state parks to visit that included a lake or river for swimming. It was those summer camp outs and hunting trips that offered my first taste of exploring the outdoors.

My junior high school offered canoes trips along the Missouri and Niobrara rivers which were my first paddling experiences. Those great trips that I took with friends and classmates planted a seed in me that would later grow into a passion.

However through college, building a career and raising a young family those canoe trips turned into someday-dreams. In Fargo where the lakes are 45 minutes away, I didn't have the time and I didn't make the time. There was always a something else to do such as a work assignment, a doctor visit or another bill to pay. The water might as well have been a million miles away.
But then something great happened. My kids transformed from babies to creatures of action and adventure.
They wanted to camp. They wanted to canoe. They wanted to explore.
My kids were attending and working at summer camps offered through Boy Scouts and Campfire. Adults were needed to supervise and insure safety. That is what I told myself, but I came because it was fun. It opened a whole new world for me that I had forgotten. I was hooked again.

Before long I was attending the camps with them and taking them along on our own family adventures. Back on the water for at least a few days a year, my enthusiasm was just beginning. A couple of years later I bought three kayaks, some PFDs and paddles. I wasn't a real live kayaker yet, but I was getting there. The next season we added some whitewater boats and a tandem kayak to the fleet. The tandem meant we did not have to leave the dog behind.

On our paddling and camping trips into Minnesota, we stayed at scenic state parks with water access. After setting up the tents and exploring the lake or river, we remembered the day's journey fondly that night by the campfire. Some of my best fatherhood memories have taken place fireside with my kids. Laughter and reminiscing circled like the smoke from the fire.

"Remember the time at camp?" Taylor, my oldest would start.

"You mean the time that kid's swimsuit was hung on the flag pole?" added Cole, my youngest while roasting marshmallows.

Along with a collection of others, I had heard that story a dozen times before. I'm sure the trees that surround the campsite have heard thousands more like it.  I listened to the telling and retelling of their tales again like it was the first time. The jumble of camper's hi jinx and mischief have turned into family fables. Taylor has a way of stretching one story to another and another providing nostalgic entertainment. I have often said there is no one better around a campfire than Taylor. Even the trip we were on would later be a story at some distant campsite to come.

The next day brought more paddling, exploring and spending time together. The trip would end too quickly with a stop for ice cream or pizza or both on the way home.
 
So on this Father's Day weekend, may all dads and their kids build classic tales of their time together along the water. Those adventures will live in their memories and will be told over and over again as long there kayaks, canoes and campfires.

Kayak Journals, My History of Paddling

Lake Journals

May 27, 2010...Cole and I put our kayaks into the water.  The day had finally came. It is a beautiful day in Minnesota.

That's it. That is how it all started.  My son Cole and I put our brand new Perception and Old Town kayaks into Red River Lake just east of Elizabeth, Minn.  The day was bright and warm. The water was clear and smooth. We had just found out how to adjust our seats and our footpegs. I guess we were a little shaky at the start.  But, soon we were watching the turtles jump off the logs in the quiet spots of the lake

 The only reason I can remember this so well is that I began to write a kayaking journal that very day to keep track of my paddling adventures. I have chronicled every day since I have put a kayak in the water. With three completed journals and one just begun, I currently have documented 300 days of kayaking. The books are small little travel journals with about 200 pages, offering spaces on each page for several paragraphs. The top of every other page of the journal contains a "highlight of the day" section. I usually reserve this space for a map, newspaper headline, but most often a photograph.

May 2010 on the Otter Tail River

 The pictures have documented my complete kayaking experience. Some of my favorite images include Cole and I holding our paddles over our head in triumph, the many over-the-bow shots of sunrises and sunsets in places called Itasca, Bemidji and Clementine, rustic campsites by lakes and rivers where I  hear the cry of the loon and those postcard memories of both whitewater and calm water from Superior to California.

  The pictures also include friends and acquaintances that I have taken out on the water with me.  For many, it is their very first time in a kayak.  Most of them start out with the same question.
 "Is this going to tip over with me in it?"
  And at the end of the day when we are loading up the boats, it is always the same question.
 "When can we go again?"

Photos of my kids, my wife and even my dog blanket the pages. Like the shots of Cole white-watering on the Kettle River,  my son Taylor and daughter Alia sitting around a fire on a campout, or  Noel on leave from the Navy in a much smaller boat than her USS Nimitz, while paddling on the Otter Tail.
The pictures record the courtship with my wife.  There are images of Lake Natoma backwater on our first kayak outing. A great shot of our bright smiles after placing in the Race on Red Canoe & Kayak Race. Plus travel snapshots of a northern Minnesota camp out complete with mosquitoes, a thunderstorm in Colorado and coming back home again at Lake Natoma.

 July 4, 2013...This river has a way of slowing downtime. The sun hangs like a big orange ball sinking just slowly, slowly, slowly. The trees reflect in a mirror image of the water.  It is very still, till the echoes of fireworks shatter the silence. After all, it is the fourth of July.

 There are essays about being lost on watery trails. Bodies of water have a way of revealing beauty and tranquility in the world  It is awesome to kayak in wonderful places. However, my pictures don't even come close to capturing the splendor of seasons surrounding my kayaking.  My words, has hard I try, don't come much closer. I try to embrace the fleeting spirit of the lake or stream of the day in my passages. Rivers leave no footprints. Each time it is a different memory. The old cliche, "It's the journey that matters" still rings true.  I look back through the pages of stored experiences reliving those hot summer nights on Minnesota lakes, the touch of autumn in Maplewood State Park, my freezing fingers of a first snowfall and the high water voyages during spring runoffs.

 Sometimes the entry is a combination weather report and a laundry list of where I went, who came with, did it rain or shine? and what did I have for snacks? Those entries are pretty simple. I usually describe what I saw along the way. If the lake was full of kayaks or if I had it pretty much to myself.  Did I see any wildlife? Was the weather pleasant or breezy? A record that I got for a 90-minute paddle across the water on a mid-week late afternoon.

It is second nature to me now.  I have made it a habit that either at home or by the campfire, I put down a few lines about the day's paddling. I have even expanded to other journals to keep track of my cross-country skiing, biking and hiking outings. I like to look back, to see where I went and how I traveled down the trail that day.

 August 16, 2012...The night is cool, but still very beautiful and even peaceful. I could have paddled even more, except for the setting sun.

 It is not for everyone, I agree, but for those who enjoy remembering their days on the water, I would recommend it. It will make each trip, whether a long day's journey down a river or a quick outing on the lake, an odyssey.

Otter Tail River Memories

  The Otter Tail River is Minnesota's eighth-longest river, running through the western part of the state before pouring into the Red River.  It starts as crystal clear water while moving downhill as a narrow stream through several lakes and marshes. After Fergus Falls the river flattens out, as it runs through prairie grasslands and farmland on its way to Breckenridge.
  Rapids are not common in western Minnesota.  The gradient of the land just doesn't drop that fast. A second-hand pool table might have more of a slant than a western Minnesota river.  However,  just east of Fergus Falls,  the Otter Tail makes an abrupt turn toward the west running through a wooded valley filled with Class I and II rapids along the way. The turmoil continues all the way toward Broken Down Dam.
  Broken Down Dam has been crumbling into the Otter Tail ever since it's collapse 1909.  The dam was improperly built over a spring the year before. The riverbed quickly gave way at the foundation of the dam causing a major flood at its time. The dam broke right through its center leaving two huge concrete walls in which the river flows in between.  A boulder garden of debris was left behind.
  During the spring runoff or after a good summer rain the stream rages to fast-moving Class III rapids. It is perfect for practice for white water kayaks. It is also a treat to get my son Cole out on the water.