It's been a long several days of slogging across the states of Montana and South Dakota since I said goodbye to my nephew in Missoula.
On Monday I was feeling so sleepy in the car that I made it only as far as Billings before checking into a motel. I'd hoped to get at least a hundred miles farther, but I simply couldn't keep my eyes open. I didn't have the easiest time finding a reasonably-priced room in Billings, so once I finally did I got on the computer and made reservations for the next three nights. While removing the uncertainty of where I would be sleeping, it committed me to a set itinerary for the remainder of my trip.
I put in a long day of driving Tuesday. By the time I was in the Dakotas the wind was really blowing from the south, making driving with a big surfski on the car a bit worrisome. A couple of times I stopped to check the racks and the tie-downs and experiment with where the boat rode in its saddles.
My plan was to camp in a state recreation area on the Missouri River, and I just barely had enough food to get me through supper and breakfast, so each time I passed through a town I kept an eye out for a grocery store where I could pick up a few essentials. I didn't see a single one. Where do the few people in this part of the world get their food? Do they drive to Rapid City? Or do they just eat what they can get in fast food joints and convenience stores?
And so I ended up having to make do with some pasta and a half bag of thawed-out frozen peas for supper and an aging bagel and half a bowl of cereal for breakfast. I'm glad I still had coffee.
My campsite was located near where the Missouri River crosses the state line from North Dakota to South Dakota. I didn't choose this place by accident: I had never paddled in either of the Dakotas, and yesterday morning I would adding them both to the list. My campsite, in South Dakota, was the closest river access I could find, and while I didn't know precisely how close it was to the state line, it appeared perfectly doable in an hour and a half or so.
I know. Famous last words.
I was in my boat just before nine o'clock. That south wind had abated some overnight, but it was really blowing again as I paddled out of the bay toward the main river channel. As I approached the turn toward the northwest I was paddling up and over some big swells, and I realized that I was in for a sure-enough downwind run. I had no complaints about that!
I spent the next hour mostly having big fun. At times my speed approached 17 kilometers per hour (10.56 mph), as fast as I had managed during my whole time in the Columbia Gorge. I gleefully moved back and forth on the waves looking for opportunities to link runs. I never thought I would be riding downwind swells from one Dakota into the other!
That was the one element of concern. I had brought my phone along in a drybag, and once in a while I had to beach my boat so I could get it out and see where I was on the G.P.S. app. Two times I got out of my boat thinking surely I had crossed the state line, only to have the G.P.S. tell me I wasn't quite there.
I made one more fun downwind run before checking a third time. I found a beach below what looked like an RV park up on the bluff. I got out my phone and checked the app, and this time I learned that I was quite some distance north of the line.
And this is where I had a problem. By this time I had been paddling for an hour and a half and covered about 16.5 kilometers, and now I faced the prospect of paddling that distance back to my campsite into the teeth of the wind. I wasn't feeling particularly exhausted yet and I didn't doubt my ability to make it back, but it would stretch my paddling session well past three hours, meaning it would be early- or even mid-afternoon before I began the 7.5-plus-hour drive to the motel room I'd booked in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
I walked up to the RV park to see if perhaps I could offer somebody a few bucks to give me a ride back to my campsite, but there wasn't a soul in sight. Not a single trailer had a vehicle parked next to it, and I realized that this place served as a permanent residence and the tenants had all gone to work for the day.
So I resignedly returned to the beach and got in the boat. Staying near the shoreline to avoid the worst of the wind, the best speed I could manage was around 8 kph. At that rate it would take me more than two hours to get back to my site. Forlornly I plodded along, trying my best to conserve energy while the oncoming waves pitched me about.
Fatigue began to set in and I kept my eye on the shore for any sign of egress. But for most of this section of the river, the nearest road is far away. At one point I saw a row of utility poles that I thought might accompany a road, but when I walked up to check I found only a dirt track for farm machinery.
As I approached the final bend before the bay where my campsite was, I was dehydrated and my left lower back was killing me. And rounding that bend was no easy matter: it had numerous points jutting out, creating a "false summit" effect--that is, each time I thought I'd reached the entrance to the bay, another point revealed itself. I was eager to be back in the bay because I would have the wind at my back once more, but my progress was painfully slow as the headwind became a beam wind.
At last my campsite came into view. I had some downwind swells now that became more direct the closer to the campsite I got. Somehow I conjured up the energy to sprint and get on them.
By the time I reached the boat ramp I had been paddling for just over three and a half hours. I hoisted the boat up on my shoulder and carried it to the truck, where I guzzled a liter of water and ate an apple. I loaded up the boat and drove up to the bath house, where I took a quick shower. I refilled my water bottle and added an electrolyte tablet and drank that down.
It was now about 1:30 in the afternoon, and I still had a long drive ahead. My G.P.S. app calmly stated that the trip would take precisely 7 hours and 20 minutes, but I knew that with rest stops and such it would easily take me nine hours.
The worst part of the drive was the first several hours: it seemed to take forever to navigate the network of state highways through interminable farmlands to get to Interstate 29, which runs north-south along the eastern edge of South Dakota. I'd failed to appreciate just how big South Dakota is, and of course I'd been camping and paddling right in the center of its northern border.
The good news is that once I had finally left that state and entered Iowa, there was just an hour and a half or so to my motel in Council Bluffs. I told myself that it was just like the drive I've made many times from Memphis to Jackson, Tennessee, to visit relatives. It sure seemed long at the end of an already long day, however. It was about 10:30 PM when I checked into the motel and had a bed to sleep in at last.
With a mere 6.5 hours to drive today, I'm enjoying a slow morning. Not that there's any compelling reason to linger: the neighborhood my motel is in is anything but bucolic. But it's nice not to be in so much of a hurry. The plan is to spend tonight in Saint Louis and arrive home midday tomorrow.
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