Yesterday morning was warm and a strong wind was blowing from the south. I paddled out of the harbor onto the Mississippi, where I found some low-grade downwind conditions. It was mostly like a washing machine out there, but there were definitely some small runs hidden in the chaos and I had fun trying to catch them. I wasn't exactly styling it out there, but it felt good to throw in some sprints after a whole month of nothing but steady paddling.
An isolated thunderstorm came through town last night, and this morning the sun was back out and conditions were calm and still quite warm. I went back down to the river, where I had some company: Adam Davis met me for a couple of hours of paddling. We went up the Mississippi to the mouth of the Wolf River, and then up the Wolf to the Danny Thomas Boulevard bridge before turning around and coming back. We talked about all the stuff we've been up to since we'd last seen each other, but we also got in a good solid aerobic session. We're hoping to meet again on weekends for the next little while.
The most exciting moment this morning occurred as we were paddling upriver just above the Hernando DeSoto Bridge: a big fish (probably an Asian carp) jumped up and hit me in my right side, causing me to flip. I've had my share of encounters with those invasive fish, but this was the first time I'd ever been flipped by one. Actually, a few years went by when I hardly saw any Asian carp, but their abundance seems to be ticking back upward these days, and today they were very active near the bank. Fortunately, I don't think one of those carp is capable of inflicting the kind of harm on me that that seal almost did back in January.
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