Nothing was unusual about driving my green Volkswagen Rabbit
down the Pennsylvania Turnpike on the way to Towson, Maryland.
I did this trip frequently. But, this time, my car sported a silver canoe on
top. I thought it looked pretty slick. The canoe was mine, an Aerocraft—rated
second only to Gruman. I was very proud that I had saved the money to buy it. I
couldn’t afford a Gruman, but my Aerocraft had high sides and good balance, cut
nicely through the water and was perfect for me. On this sweltering Friday in
mid summer of 1978, the Susquehanna River was
calling.
Sister Andre to others but just Andre to me—my good friend
and colleague from Bishop
Boyle High
School joined me on the trip. In Towson,
we would stay with another friend, Chris Mc Bride, who I also met as a teacher
but at Resurrection
Grade School. Andre and
Chris had never met though both had heard of each other from me. I was the
friend in common among us three. I had hiked and camped individually with both
Chris and Andre. The three of us, in our 30s, viewed ourselves as rugged women
and anxiously anticipated another outdoor adventure—this time canoeing down the
Susquehanna.
We launched our adventure at 5:00 AM
the next morning over a breakfast of oatmeal, eggs, bacon, toast and coffee.
The cooler, packed with fruit, brownies, beverages, sandwiches for lunch—and
sandwiches for dinner just in case our trip was longer than expected—was loaded
into the car. We had calculated the canoe trip to last until two or three in
the afternoon though I don’t remember how many miles it was. Excitement grew as
we began this journey.
As is typical of a trip down the river, we took two cars. At
our final destination, we parked Chris’s VW Bug. Then we drove back to our beginning
point in my car. We removed the canoe—it took Andre and I together to lift it
from atop the car—and put it near the edge of the water. The cooler, two
paddles and the life jackets and were placed inside. Finally, we moved the car
just off the bridge and parked it. Susquehanna River
here we come!
I sat in the front of the canoe calling to guide the
direction of the paddling, and Andre paddled in the rear. Thus, the quiet
journey was occasionally punctuated by my vocalized “paddle to the left” or “paddle
to the right.” I paddled on my left and
Andre paddled on her right. Chris sat in the middle, from her position around
the food. Chris was the novice in the group although Andre and I weren’t that
much more experienced. Having never been on a river in a canoe before, we
eagerly proceeded on this enterprising trip.
It was a beautiful sunny day. The riverside was lush with greenery
at each bend. At one point, however, the river took a turn to the right, and
before me, were about 20 cows spread out all over the hillside and spilling
into the river. I yelled, “Paddle to the right!” Both Andre and I paddled to
the right vigorously to get around the cows. They never bothered us—and they
never seemed to be bothered by us. But they didn’t look like they were going to
move either. To us, it felt like a close call.
Taking note of the beauty on either side, we roamed through
the winding Susquehanna River taking note of
the beauty on either side. The river was calm with a steady flow and an
occasional small rock with white water. This is when we would “paddle to the
right” or “paddle to the left.” And our quiet and peaceful morning moved into
lunchtime.
A tree limb on the bank invited me to grab hold so that we
could pull ashore and tie up to it for lunch. As I grabbed the limb, I saw a
bees nest there and yelled, “Paddle backward,” as I flopped myself back on the
seat, Chris and the cooler. Andre paddled us out before the bees even realized
we were there. Relieved, we paddled on and looked for another tree limb, found
one, tied up and enjoyed our sandwiches, fruit and beverage. This was the
life—and quite adventurous for us. It was our first river excursion.
We continued to paddle down the river, veering to the left
or right, as small obstacles cut through the water. Then Chris asked if she
could paddle. Andre and I agreed, and Chris proceeded to the front. Chris was
doing well, when, all of a sudden we saw a huge rock to our right with white
water all around. Chris did not warn us fast enough to clear the rock. Soon, we
were sinking, and the canoe was being squeezed into the rock. All three of us
were out of the canoe, but there was ground below our feet.
With as firm a footing as we could manage, we held on to the
canoe and lifted the cooler and paddle to the top of the boulder. One paddle
floated away. Then, we turned the canoe on its side and began lifting it—to the
chant of “1-2-3 lift”—the adrenaline was flowing as we proceeded to remove the
water a little at a time. Finally, we bailed out all of the water and lifted
the canoe to the top of the rock. We were jubilant. We had succeeded and saved
the canoe, one paddle and the cooler. The life jackets had saved us. We could
manage with one paddle—people did that all the time. It was time to celebrate,
so we sat on top of the boulder, broke out the brownies and ate ravenously!
We then carefully lowered the canoe down the other side,
and, while Andre was holding on to it, Chris and I put in the cooler. Off again
to finish the last part of our journey, we felt proud about overcoming such an
obstacle. However, soon stress returned: we were near the time of finding our
car, and we realized that we had forgotten to tie a cloth on the bridge to
identify where the car was located. We came up to a bridge, discussed whether
it looked familiar and concluded that it did. I climbed up the hill to check.
Amazingly, our car was there. Loading things into the car and tying down the
canoe followed. Now, relaxed enough to
be hungry, we devoured our reserve sandwiches. But we were pleased that we had
done so well—we had been successful on our first river canoe trip.
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