(Click on map to see in entirety)
The Finley is absolutely gorgeous. It's actually technically the "Finley Creek," if you look at it on a map, but everybody from the area calls it a river, and I have to agree. If you follow the little squirley blue line from the NE corner of the map above, (there arrow is Lindenlure, where we put in) all the way down, it goes under 13, and then keeps moving all through there. The V made by the two rivers in the SW corner, just at M hwy is where it connects to the James River. We headed south there and ended at the "A" marker.
I love being spontaneous. Growing up, Mom was always game for last minute plans. There were countless mornings that we'd be up, doing our chores, starting on the day's school work, and a friend would call and say "We're going to Silver Dollar City, you wanna come?" Within an hour we'd have peanut butter and jelly packed and be loaded into the van.
This weekend was kinda like that.
Saturday morning, 'bout 9:30, I was in the kitchen and Quinn was signing into facebook. The night before I had made a comment about taking the canoe out that afternoon, then pumping up an air mattress and sleeping in the back of Quinn's truck, under the stars. It sounded fun, and easy. Lo and behold, when Quinn signed in, one of his friends was talking about floating the Finley Creek and the James River over the next two days. Quinn pulled up a map. There was a spot 22 miles downstream of where we've been keeping our canoe, that was a campground and a public access. We have a big two man tent and a tiny one man, so we figured if we packed the one man in the canoe we could stop over night if we didn't make the whole 22 miles that day. The next two hours were insane. In about 30 minutes we had food packed in two separate coolers, (one for the truck, at the camground, and for the car, to go in the canoe with us) blankets, tents, bug spray, sunscreen, dry clothes and cooking gear sotrted into the two vehicles and we were off. Quinn to WalMart for an air mattress and bottled water and to the library to print our map, and me to Marshals for river clothes and to the bank for cash.
We met at the library and headed to the campground to drop off the truck. It wasn't quite 11 yet. We were still banking on being in the water by noon, and having 8 hours of daylight to float. Then I followed Quinn while we got lost on back roads in Nixa, and almost an hour later made it to a campground that had absolutely no available spots. We parked the truck at the state access next door and prayed it wouldn't get towed if we didn't get back that night, and headed off to find the canoe.
30 minutes later we had the canoe on the car and were headed across the road to put in below the dam. That particular area is a MASSIVE party hot spot year round, and it being Memorial Day weekend, it was swamped with party goers and.... cops. LOTS of cops. They were checking every driver's license of every car there, and there were a lot of us. They had a couple people in cuffs and a prisoner van there, so it obviously wasn't without cause. It took almost 45 minutes for us to get Quinn's licence back and finally get the canoe in the water. Then Quinn had to drive the car back across the road and walk back down to me.
By then it was after 2:30. We were gonna have to camp.
The first six miles were gorgeous, but excruciatingly slow. We had over a hundred pounds of gear in the canoe, and had to portage around at least 6 fallen trees in the first 5 miles. Some times that meant (Quinn) dragging the canoe as much as 20 yards through deep river gravel. We had to unload at every stop and reload before we could head on. It was difficult.
When we hit the park/dam at Ozark we decided to take advantage of the grills, mown grass and public bathrooms, so we had a 40 minute dinner stop, then carried the canoe over the highway and down a steep hill to reload below that dam. Another 2 miles and it was getting dark enough that we decided to stop. At some point between the Ozark dam and camping, I lost one of my flip flops.
Yes. I wore flip flops.
Hey! Don't judge me!
We pulled up on a gravel bar, then set up our tent in a small clearing just above the river. No air mattress, no dry clothes, just a one man tent, 55% humidity, a can of bug spray and two blankets. One we folded in half and put underneath us, the other I wadded into padding for whatever area of my body hurt the most at the moment. It was way warm enough to live without covering up until probably 2ish, at which point Quinn covered up with half of it and I wadded the rest of it up underneath me and snuggled close to him for body heat. It was more then sufficient. I was thoroughly awake around 5. I'd only dozed all night, so once the birds were singing and there was a little bit of light ,there was no going back to sleep. Quinn, on the other hand, was finally actually truly asleep, so I let him sleep for an hour, then we got up.
I went to try to start a fire on the gravel, but our lighter was dead. Darn. So we ate cold leftovers from dinner the night before and got on our way.
Progress was much better that morning. We only had to unload, carry /drag and reload once before we hit our 12 mile mark... the next dam.
Down the other side and we were feeling like we were home free. The River had widened and picked up some speed, so we were making really good time. We covered the next 5 miles in about an hour and a half.
Then... Well... We lost some time. And a lot of other stuff.
Coming around a corner we could see a birch limb that was fallen over the water and laying over a fallen tree that looked like it was laying along the right bank. It was close to three feet above the water, so after a quick conference while back paddling, we decided to duck under it. The current looked straightforward enough to carry us through, and we could pull it along the fallen tree if it got stuck.
What we didn't see was a) the fast side current about 10 feet before the limb, b) that the fallen tree that looked like it was on the right bank was actually in the middle of the river, hiding an inlet that was allowing the side current to quicken/strengthen.
About 5 seconds later we were thrown against the downed tree on the right and our canoe was thoroughly swamped with our things very happily floating down river. The canoe was creating a whole new current, and with its nose over the birch limb, it was stuck. I had grabbed the ziplock full of our wallets, phones, maps and etc, and was braced against the gravel bottom keeping the canoe from turning all the way over and getting swept into the massive mess of brush, deep water, and fast currents on the other side of the tree while Quinn grabbed an armload of stuff and waded it to land. When he got back, I took my load and put it ashore, then we stood by the canoe and tried to figure out what the heck to do.
With the current actually pushing its full 16 feet of length into the tree and keeping it full of water, there was no way we could move it back up stream like we needed to. We tried a couple different things, then I realized that the water was actually digging a trench underneath it (that I was starting to slide into...creepy, that) that was beginning to free up one end of it. We jumped at that, and within a few minutes had it standing on end, and therefore, mostly emptied of water and out of the current. From there we flipped it upside down, guided it under the tree and pulled it against the current onto the right bank.
It's exhausting just to type it out. It was stressful, and difficult, and the whole time we were trying to turn the boat over I was thinking "Thank you Jesus, that we saved the phone, 'cause we're gonna have to get hauled out of here." We took a short break, then walked the canoe up the bank about 10 yards. We had to get it to the left bank in order to portage it around the whole mess, but the water was waist high and fast and I was exhausted, so I stood in the shallow water while Quinn walked one end through the deep area, then I walked into the deep water and hung onto the canoe while he pulled it across. It meant more work for him, but it kept me from trying to fight the current on my bare feet and shaking legs. lol.
I sat in the canoe for about 20 minutes, just talking to baby and trying to get him to move around. There hadn't been anything that had happened that could have possibly hurt him, but anytime I get my heart rate up or get stressed out he goes still and silent, and at that point it was just another thing bugging me. So I prayed for just one little kick, and within seconds he was rolling and kicking far more than I had wished for. God is so good that way.
In the mean time, Quinn went fishing for any of our stuff that he might be able to recover, got everything moved downstream to a new put-in point, then came and half carried me to the new spot where we sat in the gravel and ate raw hot dogs, and were very glad for them. All of our soda and water was gone, and our sunscreen, and one of our blankets, and some of our clothes, and our first aid stuff, and etc, but we had our phones, wallets, keys, tent, and food, so we were grateful that neither of us had gotten hurt and that the essentials were all there, and got a move on.
That was about an hour long set back, but we were only about a mile and a half from the James, and then we only had an hour to go to the truck. The James was LOADED with people. They were everywhere. Canoes, kayaks, fisherman, coolers, all in the water. Tons of people on the shore fishing, or picnicking. It was crazy.
We got to the truck around 2, threw everything in, strapped the canoe into the bed, ate cheese and bread and orange juice and went home. Quick showers, clean clothes, and we left again... for Cheddars. Chicken tenders and fried butterfly shrimp and strawberry daiquiris (virgin, of course) were screaming our names, and we were more than happy to oblige them.
Believe it or not, that was one of the best 36 hours of my life, and even though I still can't raise my right arm above my head due to a sore shoulder, and even though I'm bruised and scraped and sunburnt and bug eaten...
We're planning to do it again.
Soon.
