adventures in new lands

(more photos here)

My back hurts. I guess that's what paddling 12 miles and being in the sun for over 8 hours straight will do to a girl. It was well worth the pain, though, seeing the Wolf River in Mississippi and doing a bit (a lot, actually) of cleanup along the way.

I met up with two couchsurfers, Darryl and Erin (a Kiwi), and a New Orleans outdoor group guy, Adam, for a wee paddle down a small river near the Mississippi shore. It was thankfully less humid and only partly sunny, which made the day bearable (although my upper legs are a bit pink despite liberal sunblock applications). We took our sweet time paddling/drifting downriver, and the water was shallow enough that we could hop out to run around whenever we liked (or drag the canoes over fallen logs and shallow sandbars). There were a couple good swimming holes and a rope swing beneath an overpass that broke up the trip; all in all a good day.

The rest of the week is wide open, although I'm set to explore the city some more with Erin and some R&R with Miriam... I'll likely get on the road again by Friday, but plans have yet to gel for that.