I think the most important thing about going on an adventure, is knowing when to bail. I also, think the second most important thing is knowing when to push your limits. Sure you gotta pack correctly, check the conditions and all that good stuff, but knowing when it’s time to press on and time to abandon ship can save life and limb.
The Nooksack is my local kayaking run, something that I can get to and run a few times after work. It is also notorious for having log jambs showing up every once in a while, often leaving a quickly as they came. The Nooksack mostly gets it water from a number of glaciers that are on Mt. Baker and Shuksan. Glacier fed rivers are often braided, due to the sediment picked up from the mass of ice moving around so much. So you can branch off on a braid and not see the main river again for a mile, or more, or less.
That’s what Nat and I had decided to do, follow one of the braids and meet up with Chris and Sam further down river whenever the river decided to meet up again. The branch of river were we on was pretty slow moving so we were pretty relaxed talking with one another. Then we came around the corner. With about 20 ft of notice we had to make the decision of either trying to push along through what looked like a river wide log jam, or bailing and trying to get to shore. Ok, really we had one choice, to bail. I was able to get my boat to shore, but lost my paddle. Nat was able to salvage his paddle but lost his boat.
We could see where the river met up with the main channel from where we had bailed, and could also see the Chris and Sam where down there, but they couldn’t see us. They had recovered Nat’s boat (which thankfully had made it all the way through two river wide log jambs). I could imagine that having Nat’s boat, empty, with no sign of Nat or I would have been very unsettling. After about 20 minutes we were able to touch base with Chris and Sam, and collectively decided there would be no second lap on the Nooksack that day.
for my friends who are moms 