Page 34 - "Mississippi in the 1st Person" - Michael James Stone (Demo/Free)

I know Lori was pre-occupied with nerves about driving back, but like so many other adven-
tures we’d been on, she kept quiet and dealt with whatever was going on in front of her.

I was thrilled to have arrived on time, but completely worn out from the drive and with all the

gear I had to unload and repack to the kayaks…….adrenaline and anticipation can only carry
you so far.

The Cabins seemed old and nice enough even cute and would have been great another time and

another place but for me it was just a place to get ready to go and to catch up on sleep which
surprising to me, I did.

Sleep that is.

THE WALKABOUT

Before ever starting on May 1 2016 I took a Walkabout to scout

out locations, issues, solutions and planning for the “initial start”
of what some called a bucket list, but I would later call it a Great

American Adventure. “Reviewing the Rock” I would later discov-
er these rock were planted on top of a dam that controlled the
overflow to the “Mississippi Creek Bed” as I called it.

Leaving the walking stone I recall my biggest reactions I felt was two
-fold. One I was a little taken back by how small everything appeared
and how shallow the Mississippi River, AKA “the Creek” really was

past the stones I had stood on. But the second reaction was amazement
and awe in some ways of how far I would go and wonderfully beauti-

ful though still barren from fall the are was. I could have imagined
myself High in the Mountains and not actually about 3,000 feet low-
er than where I lived in Utah.

As I walked slowly up stream seeing how low the water really was
and how there was no way to go under the footbridge I began to plan
alternatives and solutions since I was kayaking about 1000lbs in two

kayaks and while portaging was not the issue. I began to think of the
“ceremonial start” to the Iditarod Alaska’s Dog Sled race and the re-

start later where there was year round snow. The “ceremonial start”
really was for tourism and spectators and not the actual race itself.

I decided I could do that…..