Canoes and Tacos

It started off innocently enough. A gift certificate won at a really lame activity fair. Canoe or kayak rental in the pristine waters that is the Annapolis River. What a great way to spend Donald's 33rd birthday. A day of fun turned into a two and half hour death ride. Thanks Julie and Nah. So thus began the reenactment of several would be canoers, some non athletic folks, a cockeaser..teaser..she denies that one and one expert boat plan builder. Ten people, three canoes, most built for two, one built for one and a kayak without a skirt...and a partridge in a pear tree. We launched from a spot about 7km from home and fought over who got to go in the boat with Cap'n Laurie. Julie, cockeaser...ahahah and Ernest, movie maker extraordinaire, got the pleasure. They also were in the one person watercraft which was mere inches from taking on water. Lifeboat 2 held Shannon, or G&T as some like call her, our Southern Belle Melinda who refused to ride with her husband Ernest and slow and steady Mark. The Bluefin Special held me in the middle and power couple Nahleen sans red wine and hubby JC with some sort of Tilley hat on. Lastly in his bicycle built for one came birthday boy Donald in the kayak. The first part of the journey to tacos was the worst. By far the widest piece across and white caps rolling like the ocean surf we knew this would be trouble. Gripping my canoe for all it was worth I held steady and Nahleen navigated and JC annoyed her by paddling on the same side.

A few waves lapped into our canoe leaving me sitting in a 2 inch puddle for the rest of the trip. Ahead in what we now refer to as the bathtub of the sea, Shannon fearlessly paddled on while Melinda spoke of such things like cotillions and the DAR to keep their minds off the inevitable sinking and Mark coolly tried to knock our boat off course. Donald meanwhile zipped and zagged over the water like a dragonfly, showing his prowess for maneuvering the big water. We couldn't see Laurie and his ship, but could here the faints sounds of Julie's rhythmic voice...stroke, stroke, stroke. An hour later we all seemed to be within shouting distance of each other and thus began the taunting or from our boat the french taunting. Much was made of the driving skills or lack of, from my french mates as Melinda stepping up to the plate grabs the paddle and does this wide flung at an attempt to move the canoe. It looks like its working and I hear grumblings in my boat. There is no way for me to paddle, I'm the only thing keeping us from going into the river so I tell myself, plus I don't want muscles like Popeye and Nahleen. Another hour later Donald zips up next to us and I complain that I would like to dock the boat and walk to the road and hitchhike home. He believes me and sails over to Ernest, Laurie and Julie who promptly dock their boat as they are close to the shore and what's this...they pull out beers and start drinking. As we and Shannons tub are on the other side of the river we decide we would rather get home first and drink more beer and eat tacos and with renewed vigor we paddle furiously for about ten minutes thinking that home is just around that bend. Two bends later Mark has lost the his cool, Shannon is crabbing that they drank all of her beer and probably hitched home, Melinda is sweetly singing Row Row Your Boat and my butt has developed its own version of wrinkly hands...wrinkly butt. I can't move for sitting on another wrinkle and cry out in pain from time to time. Nahleen and JC have stopped talking to each other and I must gently duck as she attempts to swat his head with her paddle that is actually more oar shaped and makes all the difference in the world when navigating these waters. As we near home, trees start to look familiar, houses are peeking out of the trees that belong to neighbours and we start to move faster towards shore. We get bumped from behind and see easy going Mark grinning like a man possessed shove us off track to take the lead, but wait remember our beer guzzling friends and Donald who have disappeared for the last half hour? Here they come with Ernest in the front, dipping and pulling his paddle through the water like he's parting the Red Sea and slowly gaining on us. Screaming at my boat mates to "paddle effing faster they're going to win" Julie and friends pull ahead and touch shore. We lost, Shannon and crew in third and lazily paddling up Donald in fourth. We get out, share one beer per canoe as the other beers have mysteriously been emptied and get ourselves stuck in the mud flats. This isn't the wharf. We still aren't home.....
To be continued on the other blog