Deschutes River Camping (not rafting)

This year we were unable to go rafting for a few reasons:

The first being that we had a sweet 2.5 month old baby who needed me.

 Second, Brent had taken the majority of his vacation days to be with me and the baby.

 In truth, had we gotten the dates sooner we probably could have arranged for Brent to go but alas, here we are.

Every time I would go visit Annette she was very focused on the fact that we were not going rafting. This caused me a little bit of grief. I really hated not rafting. I love the time with the boys and the family. I love a dedicated week totally unplugged. Plus, I love time with Annette. As the years march on I know we are getting closer to a time where she will not be with us. Her life stories I can probably recite from memory, but I still enjoy listening to her. I love watching the boys playing on the river. Sometimes when I sit and watch them I see their little toddler selves playing. It is hard to believe how fleeting time is. Brent knows this, and because of all these things he had a brilliant idea to help with the rafting trip as good as we could.

By happenstance Mitchel was going to Twin Rock Friends camp on the coast so, we were in town sending him off the weekend the loading for the rafting trip occurred. This allowed us to be able to go over and help. We were NOT intending to do this.

We were only going to meet at the put in and provide dinner. However, Jay had called me and sounded horrible. He had bronchitis and could barely speak without coughing every few seconds. He was asking for assistance because none of the people going on the trip were able to come help save two. He was trying to spread out the loading because of how miserable he was.

Here comes the stress…

Even when I am NOT going rafting I get to be all wrapped up in the stressful part of it.

Often times most of our people approach rafting like a vacation. You might say, “That’s silly Lisa it is a vacation!” But not really.

The vacation really doesn’t start until the boats are loaded and we are pulling away from the put in.

This is where we are lacking. Nobody really includes the loading and unloading as part of the trip. This has been the process for the last 14 years that I have been on the trips, and so I do not foresee it changing anytime. As my immediate family goes, we have learned to just do what needs to be done, but it is still frustrating…especially since all of our passengers are getting older. Now this may seem like complaining, but in reality I am documenting the tiny bits of stressful things that can have an impact on the trips.

Generally the day before we head out to the put in we get all the coolers loaded, pull out the boats, oars, life jackets, tents, kitchen, frames…pretty much everything. The idea is that we load everything. People then take their river bag home, pack it, and show up bright and early the next morning so that we simply throw the river bags in and go.

 I believe this has happened twice! Since I have been on the trips.

What really happens is that a few people show up the day before and do what they can. The coolers can’t get loaded because the food is not there. Which in turn means that the frames and things cannot get loaded, since these things sit upon the coolers. Then the day we are supposed to leave people show up late. Haven’t packed. Haven’t gone grocery shopping (my personal favorite) or haven’t expected that everything would not be done. Granted it is getting slowly better over these last couple years. We have been getting most of the coolers loaded and things pulled out. Plus I think the mood has changed. We are trying to just enjoy the chaos and have fun with the friction. Sometimes acceptance is a beautiful thing.

Bringing us to this year. Yay! We were lucky to be in town to help. Spencer and Annette were there. Then came Justin. Jordan came over too, but I can’t remember if he stayed. August was actually pretty good. He ran around with the small buckets picking fruit. Tons of plums and pears (which got left there sadly).

Annette had to sit more than I have ever seen. She is definitely slowing down. We were able to do the life jackets, most tents, ice in the coolers and load the boats. Not too shabby. Still, I felt bad knowing all the work that was left for the other people (isn’t that silly).

Brayden was a huge help. He was happy to see everyone. In fact, he was so happy helping and talking about the trip he decided he wanted to go…without us.

This is huge. Especially for Bray. He has a tendency to be a little clingy. I am having to accept that he is *gulp* 12 years old and growing. On the drive home we talked to him about what camping without us entails, but he was sure he didn’t want to miss a trip. Brent had him practice setting up and taking down his tent. We also helped pack him to be able to go.

 

Brent had to work on Monday. I spent the whole day cooking and prepping food. We wanted to make something special that we don’t usually get on the river. We were thinking of taking the BBQ and making Shish Kabobs…we also tossed around the idea of burgers, stuffed cabbage, or salmon. We decided on chicken and steak fajitas.

I got everything ready and loaded the car. This would be Emmett’s first camping trip too, so I wanted to have everything thought out. (He ended up doing amazing though)

We drove to the put in and got there early. We set up our camp and went to go play in the water. Brent wanted to start dinner once they hit Maupin. Spencer ended up getting dropped off shortly after we started prepping dinner. This was great because Marie and I got to talk for about an hour as August ran around and played with bugs and other crawly things. When Marie left we got in serious mode. Unfortunately so did the wind. This added another element to our prep. Brent wanted the dinner ready when they got there, however he wrestled with the idea. He didn’t want the dinner to hold up their unloading. He had not known if they were picking up shuttle drivers or not. We were hoping that everyone could eat and then we could unload and get the boats totally prepped.

What actually happened was that everyone ate. Dinner was mostly done by the time they got there. They were able to get the boats blown up, but not really loaded.

Instead we enjoyed each other’s company and took it easy.

Bray was starting to have some second thoughts about going as he sensed the tension in the air. I tried to calm his nerves, but left the decision up to him. He does not like conflict.

So early Tuesday we got up and made omelets for everyone. I tried to just get away with muffins and bananas, but Brent insisted on something more sustainable. We decided on ham and cheese omelets. He did a great job turning out omelet after omelet. Emmett enjoyed being loved on by his cousins. He is a very content little thing anyways. He was all smiles the majority of the time.

After everyone ate we started getting serious about loading those rafts.

The sun crept onto the campground and it was soon very warm. August started realizing we were not going on the rafts. He was pretty sad about this. Good thing Charlie was there to cheer him up.

Brayden loaded onto Uncle Max’s boat.

It is such a weird feeling watching your kids float away down a river. I get anxious and excited for them all at the same time. I try to embrace this feeling and know soon it will be them going off to college, or moving to another city…or state. I try to tell myself that I need to hold on to these moments when I have them. And I believe I do. I want nothing more than my boys to be comfortable exploring the world on their own. Knowing I am with them always.

Once everyone floated off we broke down our camp and headed home.

It was an interesting week without my two older helpers. Somehow we survived and even had a bit of fun.

I got some of the pictures from the rapids Wapanita and Boxcar from a website. Some of them show Bray flying out of the raft...

The day came to drive over to the take out and retrieve Bray.

Brent was trying to arrange his time to make it out there, but he just wasn’t able to swing it. I decided the earliest I could expect to see them was about 3pm. And so I arranged my morning to get there about that time. Luckily I did. We were not there even 30 mins before I saw them floating under the bridge by the take out. I hugged my boy in my arms and tried to breathe him in. He of course was trying to pull away…typical tween. He opted to sit and watch the baby so that I could help unload. So that is what we did. Unloaded and then went and ate at the Oasis. Bray had my camera for most of the takeout so the pictures were a little less of a thorough documentation. It was lovely seeing everyone and hearing the rafting tales. Especially how Brayden almost flew out of the boat on Boxcar and Danika saved him by grabbing a foot and pulling him in.