Not an ordinary weekend

I had some gum surgery a few weeks back and missed a few blog events during the recovery, so to catch up I wanted to say congratulations to Molly about the post-doc and the upcoming trip (which just sounds really, really cool, I can't wait to hear about it). Also, congrats on your photo award, Abby. I'm glad we could all see the photo. I've actually been meaning to post an update on stuff here for us in Iowa but that post is going to get superseded by the story of an adventure we had this weekend....

We had been planning a Memorial Day weekend camping and canoe trip to Northern IA with some of Tim's relatives for quite some time, and so when it poured rain Saturday morning and the trip got postponed, many were disappointed. That afternoon the weather cleared up, and as we had the canoes and were eager to do something outdoors, some suggested that we just canoe on a river here in Ames. Here is a photo of some of us waiting to start our journey down Squaw Creek, which runs through town. We started out north of town several miles, with six canoes and twelve people. It was very lovely, paddling with the current, looking for wildlife, joking and laughing. But certain events had led to circumstances that we hadn't foreseen. Firstly, we had several ice storms followed by heavy snow this winter that knocked down many branches. And we also had heavy rains in April and early May that flooded parts of Ames, picking up these downed brush and branches. Squaw Creek is wadeable in places but after heavy rain that day and in recent days, it was quite swollen and had a very strong current. Maybe you can see where this story is leading.
We hit several log jams around a few bends, and at first it was really pretty fun to find ways around them. They became larger and harder to navigate the farther we got along, and when a canoe would hit a tree branch under the water or exposed slightly, it would stop the canoe, the current would swing it around and unbalance it. When one canoe capsized we began to take the river a bit slower and more seriously, because it was quite tricky to get the canoe, the paddles, and the occupants back safely into the canoe, while remaining ourselves in the canoes. Tim and I capsized next, and I think it would have been sort of fun except that the water was really very cold, very fast (thank goodness for life jackets), and although I think of myself and of Tim as good swimmers it was really difficult to get the overturned canoe over to the shore. In the end four of the six canoes capsized at some point. Along the way one overturned canoe escaped downstream. Ryan and Nolan (cousins) paddled after it in hot pursuit but got caught in a tricky place and their canoe became wedged and then sucked under a log jam. Ryan's leg had gotten pinned under the canoe for a few minutes and after he worked himself free, we decided to head for the shore and carry the canoes back to town.
We had to leave the submerged canoe and the other canoe, which had also become pinned against a log jam, in the river, but managed to collect the missing paddles, and in general felt like we had really escaped something much worse. And in the end, although it took us two days, we actually managed to pull out the other two canoes. The casualties for the trip were: one water bottle, one cell phone and one blue pen (plus sore muscles and some bad bruises). We were really thankful. All and all, it was quite an adventure, and two hours later, after warm showers, the family was cheerfully recounting it to others over dinner and even joking about taking on the larger and far more formidable Skunk River.
There were some really beautiful moments, aside from all the chaos. We saw some wildlife, including some herons, a frog, deer, a hawk, turkey vulture and, right after Tim and I made it back into our canoe after capsizing, we saw a beaver swimming in front of us. We watched as we drifted downstream and when it saw us, it slapped the water with its tail and dove under (we thought of you, Sparkling Squirrel!). I know this is a really long post but with such an unusual canoe trip I felt I had to share it. I hope you all had a lovely weekend!