A2A - Trip 1; 2 Kayaks, 18 Miles, 1 Lost Camera, and Too Many Hours (FINALLY Out of Atlanta)
I can honestly say that I never intended for our first real trip of the A2A - Paddling from Atlanta to Alabama expedition to take place in August (mid August at that), but with the busy summer we've had and all the work travel I've been tackling, it has simply worked out that way. The good news is that, despite some stumbles, this trip finally does get the journey started. What better way to kick it off than with the longest trip Tony and I have been on; 18 full miles – mile marker 304 down to 286. Check out the progress on my Kayaking & Canoeing Google Map.
For those that have been following Tony and I on these trips, you'll quickly notice that we had to backtrack 5 miles to Paces Mill that we already did in A2A - Trip 0; Powers Island to McDonough Power Plant (We Finished up the ATL50). Why? Well, because of the totally frustrating event I captured in Andy, Can I Put My Bullet In!! That said, adding these miles in helped us stretch this out to the longest trip yet and also helps us plan for the rest of the A2A trips as we were quite a bit slower than that last time we ran these same miles. That day, when the water was more than 2 feet higher on the river, we ran a total of 8 miles in 2 hours. For this trip those first 5 miles up to the power plant took us 2 hours. In fact, as I know you're wondering, we took almost 7 hours to do all 18 miles.
Our first real understanding of how low the water was surfaced when we got to the big drop off that we hit last time and is marked as "A" in the image below. When we last hit this we blindly soared over this edge which I now know was even more rocky just under the water than I realized. Thankfully, we did great last time with no wipe outs. Despite Tony's desire to simply portage past all of this, I padded down to the flume marked by "B". It was roaring hard and I was hung up near the edge against the protected area checking it all out. I eventually got fired up to give it a run and decided to cross over to Tony who was on the other side to give him my camera so that he could take some action shots of me "shooting the 'hooch". Well... I now know I was way too close when I started across the top of the falls and was (more than!!) surprised to find myself being sucked in. I got pulled in backwards and then my kayak started swing to the right which then had me entering the flume sideways. Yes... you are imagining this right... I didn't last long and was dragged underwater just after the water flipped my kayak.
I'm not going to lie; there were a few second there that I actually was a bit scared. The force of the water kept me down despite my life jacket and my kicking trying to get me to the top. When I finally did come back up, I did a couple more of these bobs, but each one was shorter than the last and by the fourth time I came up it was clear I was going to get to keep my head above water. My heart was pumping by this point. So much so I didn't even mind the freezing waters. Fortunately, I was able to get myself and my kayak over to the little sand bar identified at "C" above.
This next picture is a bit closer of a zoom on the water hazard that gave me such trouble. It probably looks tiny to many of you, but take notice of the scale of the cars to the right of it. I still content (although Tony doesn't agree with me) that I could have taken it, but it surely got the best of me. Heck, I would have felt less crappy about the whole thing if I wiped out giving it a real try; not just being accidentally sucked into it.
You'll quickly notice that I don't have any other pictures to share. Why not you ask? Because I lost my friggin camera from the little pocket on my life jacket that I keep it in. Major bummer, but if anyone now needs a good Christmas gift (or my birthday is coming up!) idea check out the burnt orange Nikon Coolpix AW120 waterproof camera.
As for the rest of the trip, it was mostly uneventful, but surely loooooooooooooong. It was nice to travel under 285 and 20 signifying the true end of the formal Atlanta boundaries. We even floated past Six Flags and got to hear a bit of a concert. Much of this section of the river could be summarized as "it looks bad, but it's not as bad as it looks". Meaning there was plenty of downed trees, and a generous amount of trash, but overall it was much better looking than I was imagining based on prior stories I've heard and read. I guess the shear absence of anything other than mother nature sure goes a long way to make this part of the trip enjoyable.
When we finally got to Buzzard Roost Island at mile marker 291 (13 miles in) we both agreed to take the rest of the trip as easy as we could. Those last 5 miles did take their sweet time and while I always enjoy being on the river, I was glad to finally see the bridge over Highway 166 which meant the boat ramp where I left my car many hours earlier that morning. I'll probably take, at least, one weekend off just to try to catch up to my real life especially since the family is so busy and I've still got some serious travel ahead of me. I'll be sure to post more on the A2A - Paddling from Atlanta to Alabama trip when we get out there again.