Day 41 (10/23/20)

Atchafalaya Dreamin’

Start: River Mile 30

Finish: River Mile 60

Day Total: 30 Miles

Segment Total: 1,007

It was hard to leave Danny Majors Cajun brand of hospitality this morning. He’s just to easy and fun to talk to. That and he feeds his paddling guests really, really well. We fresh eggs from his hens, bacon, biscuits and some kind of amazing homemade jelly, from some local fruit I’ve never heard of (nor can I remember!) 

We launched late, partly because we didn’t want to leave, at 9:15 am. It was a nice overcast day, so the heat was not as bad as the last couple days. The paddling on the Atchafalaya seems slower because there is no current, but the fact that there are almost no barge tows kind of makes up for it. Not sure Jon would agree, but hey, it wouldn’t be the first time we had different opinions on something!

We paddled for 16 miles before coming to a boat ramp on river right. We walked up to meet an old timer named Roy who lived in the campground at the top of the ramp. We told him our story, and it took a while for the scope of the trip to sink in for him. Once he did, he immediately asked us what we needed. Cold water or soda is our usual lunch time reply. He came back with half a dozen bottles of frozen water. We almost passed out from the shock! Frozen anything on the river is unheard of. So we gratefully accepted his gift. Paddling through the heat while sipping ice cold water was amazing. We can’t thank Roy enough for his selfless give to us.

The forecast called for thunderstorms in the afternoon. We luckily dodged the 2pm to 3pm storm which passed just south of us. We found a nice campsite just south of Interstate 10 on a high sandbar with a breeze and a nice view of the river. Jon made a really good dinner of Mac n Cheese, tuna (another gift from Roy) and Panko bread crumbs. We ate until it hurt. Around 6 pm the next round of thunderstorms rolled in, just as the mosquitoes invaded. We made a mad dash for our tents and we’ve been hold up in them since 6:30. Gonna be a long night!

Tomorrow we hope to cover another 28-30 miles, leaving us about 55 river miles from the Gulf of Mexico. We are in the home stretch!  

The sign on Danny’s patio says it all

River wild flower near mile 60

Paddling through the fringe of thunderstorm

Jon preparing another of his camp dinner delights