Down The River

 Jason, one of our two river guides in the family, had been trying for a long time to get a family river trip put together.  In the end, with the exception of Evan and Nash (he was just getting off of a guiding trip through the Grand Canyon himself),  we were finally all able to make it this past weekend.   The plan was to head down to Moab on a Friday, camp that night and get on the Colorado River early in the morning for about a five hour river trip.  With no rooms available anyway (Roger did try), we all joined up at the Slip Rock RV Camp where Allison and Rob had reserved the camp sites for us.

 So up went our tent - our kids recognised it from camping trips when they were kids - and out came the mattress.  Roger blew it up with an electric air pump and we were ready to go.  Did you really think I was going to sleep on the ground? 

 Our group included nine adults and five children as Grace's brother DJ, his wife Debbie and two daughters were able to make it as well.  After dinner we ended up at the local park to cool off on the shaded grass before heading back to camp.

 After the excitement of setting up camp and playing at the park, the grand kids slept well  that night  (well at least I couldn't hear them).
Getting them up and going the next
morning took a bit of work.

Jason has his own boat, but for our group he decided a second raft was needed.  His is a 14 foot inflatable row rig while the one he rented is a six man paddle boat.  Luckily, no one even asked which one I would be in.  Hint - the one with no paddles.

After we dropped off the shuttle vehicles at the take-out point, it took just a few minutes to blow up the boats, get the life vests on,

 have Jason  go over some important safety tips and get on our way.

 Can you tell why I wasn't in the boat below?  We started off with the kids in ours, but by lunch they had figured out who was having the most fun and
abandoned us to the yellow boat.

 Lunch time and the the squirt guns came out.

Initially Daniel and Roger shared the rowing duties.  After lunch Jason came on board and we got going again.

 I must tell the truth at this point.  While it was great fun to be with the kids and the scenery was to die for, it was hot - high 90's, and the
wind was gusting up to 30-40 miles
an hour up river.  This meant that we were fighting the wind the entire trip and there were rapids where there shouldn't have been.

 It took us five hours to get to the half way mark at which point we called it a day.  Luckily, smart thinking drivers had left one vehicle at this point as well.  While the guys left to round up the other cars,  we deflated the boats and soon were heading back to Moab.

As always - amazing country.  The

above photo shows the part of the
Colorado we rowed through.  How
great is that!

Dinner at the local eatery ended the
day.  One more night at the camp-ground and we all parted ways to wind our way home Sunday morning.