Jimmy Guidry, a paddler whom I've seen at numerous races in the Gulf Coast region, owns Hub City Diner in Lafayette, and this morning he treated Anne and me to breakfast. I enjoyed talking with him and eating some great food.
After that I said goodbye to Anne and began the trip home. But before I got too immersed in the journey I wanted to get in a recovery paddle, and there was a good place right off Interstate 10 a few miles east of Lafayette. Henderson Lake is part of the Atchafalaya Basin, and accessible from a public boat ramp next to an I-10 rest area.
Soreness was surprisingly mild after yesterday's race, but I'm having some pain today in my right deltoid muscle, as if I've strained it a little. Time will tell, I guess. I put myself through a low-intensity 60-minute session and enjoyed the first bright and sunny day I've seen since the race at Vicksburg eight days ago. Henderson Lake is basically a huge forested wetland with a network of open-water channels running through it, and I paddled through several of these channels, being careful not to get lost. I enjoyed gazing at the many cypress trees with Spanish moss hanging from them. The coppery-brown tannin-stained water was as smooth as glass.
After paddling I continued the trip home, an affair of some seven hours. I had earlier considered doing my recovery paddle on one of the reservoirs in north Mississippi--Grenada or Enid or Sardis--but I'm glad I got it done in the early part of the trip instead, because by the time I was on Interstate 55 north of Jackson all I could think about was how bad I wanted to be home. Now I am home, and there is no place like it.
No comments:
Post a Comment