Today most of us paddled Kayaks "Way down upon the Swannee River" as
the Stephen Foster song goes. He never saw the river before writing
the song, and he misspelled Suwannee, but that doesn't keep people
around here from making constant references to the song. It is a
classic American song and nearly every school child knows at least the
first line. It's a beautiful river and we paddled 6 miles in
individual kayaks. We were given a ride upstream to where the kayaks
were dropped off then we took our time returning to camp where the
outfitter was located.
It took about 3 1/2 hours to go the 6 miles because there was very little current. One of the guys who drove us upstream said to keep an eye out for alligators but I think he was having fun with the tourists. The day before, the ranger at the state park said he had seen 4 in the 20 years he had lived there. During the day we were looking for them but the suspects all turned out to be logs or rocks. There were several white sand beaches and we stopped at one for a leisurely lunch (more peanut butter and jelly sandwiches). Oliver and Jim took the longer route (because they are not wimps according to Oliver), 11 miles, and we half expected them to catch us but they finished about 30 minutes after us. Todd, Janet, and Spike decided to stay in camp. Todd had to shop and cook and didn't want to be rushed. It turned out that he produced one of the best desserts of the trip, cheesecake with cherry topping. Janet said that on previous trips she used to make it inside a frisbee. Tomorrow we ride to O'leno State Park, a 60 mile ride.
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