Summer 2004 Trail Mix

One Fabulous July Fund- & Fun-raising Flotilla
- by Aaron Anderson

Disregard crying babies and an overstuffed campground. Add a dose of hot weather, good and new friends, wonderful and adventurous guides, rafts, paddles, those all too sexy PFDs, and the American River outside of Sacramento, and you get a wonderful mix for the July rafting fundraiser for BAWT.

It all started as a germ of an idea by Delton Johnson, one of the steering committee members. Thinking, "hey, how can we raise some cash for BAWT and have a great time doing it." Delton Johnson put together a crack team of river guides, all of whom donated their time to help several veteran and novice paddlers get down an approximately ten mile stretch of the American River. Incidentally, if you can believe it, the list of novices included our own Kyle Macdonald, who had never rafted a river before this adventure. I would like to report that the ten miles or so was filled with class IV and V rapids that we had to negotiate as the hair on our arms and necks stood on end and our eyes blazed with fear. But alas, the water level was down as California's precipitation levels march along toward yet another drought situation this year. Because we couldn't convince the municipal damn operators that the BAWT fundraising adventure was important enough to fully open the sluice gates mid day on Saturday and Sunday, we all had to settle for a calm ride. Even so, there were several punctuating sets of class III and near IV rapids, interrupted by a fantastic lunch prepared by our fun loving river guides.

That said, the whole affair was quite wonderful. On two days in July, six or seven rafts were filled with adventure starved city dwellers and friends of BAWT. One set of riders did the uppers section of the river past Sutters Mill and to the take out at Lotus Camp. On Sunday, another set of donors embarked on the lower stretch of the river from Lotus down through the gorge. This was the leg I was on. Most of us were astonished to pull into an already double-stuffed campground in the middle of, what appeared to be nowhere. As it turns out, the campground in [was it Cool?], California is THE central location for many different professional river guiding outfitters. After squeezing our tents into the camping area, the adventures began to connect. That is, cold beers were opened and bottles of wine uncorked as we set about the task of laying out the smorgasbord. Those of you that have been on such camping ventures know how elaborate meal time can be when camping so close to the car. Garden salad abundant with fresh vegetable accoutrement, Asian soy noodles with a Tai chicken basted in peanut sauce, were two of the numerous dishes ported in. You get the idea. Let's just say, we ate very well. Next day's breakfast complete with cereals, bagels lightly toasted (okay, some were burnt), coffee thick, we braced ourselves for the journey ahead. Post breakfast, and the requisite automobile shuttle to the pull out point, we donned our PFDs, listened to the safety briefing and mandatorily gulped water while slathering on the sun block. Flashes preceding photographs, we mounted our trusty rubber steeds with stars in our eyes and a song in our hearts that only venturing into the unknown can bring. We were ready.

The shakedown aspect of river rafting involves the guide's litany of commands. Paddle left, paddle right, forward, reverse, and the seemingly simple yet challenging to execute, STOP command. We were eager, and we learned. After a bump or two, we began to relax and enjoy the day. The pace of the river allowed us to unwind, forget the mundane triviality of city living, and such things as who was winning or loosing whatever ballgame that day. The day-to-day travails slipped away with the current, even as each stroke brought us closer to reality once again. We paddled with abandon. We enjoyed the rapids. We enjoyed simply floating with the current. We splashed and were splashed. And yes, some of us yearned for the freedom of the tailing kayakers, who frolicked in the rapids like dolphins in the surf. Above it all, fun was had by everyone. Even a few of paddlers and guides managed to execute rodeo style bronco busting maneuvers on the last rapids before the pull out. Just ask someone you know who was on the trek to explain it, because it is hard to describe that one in words.

In the end, I was astonished but not surprised to see our own Kyle Macdonald - no longer the novice - guiding his boat to the pull out, and was reminded as to why we were there. It was our belief in the BAWT mission of teaching and learning - the experienced and the inexperienced going hand in hand into to the woods to then, in turn, lead others - that we all bothered to be on this trek at all. To paraphrase Frost, we all had at one point decided to take the river less traveled by, and through our contributions, that had made all the difference.

Aaron Anderson is both an avid windsurfer and proud dad of two little ones (see photos) and the husband of Darby Davenport, BAWT's Steering Committee chair.