Chapter 8

It didn’t take the four of us long to unload the boat and get things set up. It was my turn to cook, and I opted for a hot lunch, with soup and warm “sandwiches” made with soft tortillas. I made a cup of bouillon, for Sarah, to try to get some fluids and electrolytes back in to her. I also mixed up some electrolyte drink that I’d formulated myself, with a lot less sugar than Gatorade.

We all ate heartily, even Sarah. I think the close call earlier was a bit of a wake up call.

As we ate, we got better acquainted. Jen and Sarah were both teachers at a private school near Jackson, OH. Sarah was a health and physical education teacher, as well as a coach for several ladies sports teams. She also taught Biology. Jen was a bit of a Polymath. She taught History (actually mentored an individual study class), Chemistry and Physics.

They had met in college (Ohio University) and become friends and roommates. They still shared a townhouse near the school. Sarah was an accomplished athlete, and occasionally competed in triathlons and other events. Jen was fit, but not a real competitive athlete, preferring to hike, paddle and hunt.

Jeff and I filled them in on us. I’d earned BS in Chemistry, and worked as a chemist in a local industrial plant until it closed, when I took up EMS as a second career. Jeff had a BS in Nursing, and was studying to be a Nurse Practitioner.

Jen and I were a month apart in age (I was the elder). Jeff and Sarah were six months apart, Sarah being the elder.

Finally, we ran down. Sarah was looking better (and claimed to feel better, but tired). Jen volunteered to clean up while Jeff and I worked at freeing their boat.

Jeff and I gathered all our tracking lines, throw bag and rigging.

“Jen, I assume you have tracking lines and maybe some rigging?”

“Yeah- they are in an orange bag under the bow seat. We don’t have a lot of rigging, just a bunch of carabiners and lengths of webbing. I don’t know why we never thought of pulleys. We have two 50 foot lines.”

“We have two 50 foot lines also, plus a 75 foot section for stuff like this. Our pulleys are also knot-passing pulleys so we can use small ‘biners and join lines. It’s stuff we’ve used in rope rescue classes.”

“Sarah and I have done some rock climbing with an women’s outdoor group, but we’re not into it all that much. Truthfully Sarah’s not as much into the outdoor stuff as I am, but we both like some adventure. We had a couple other women from the outdoor club lined up for this trip, and we’d been training for it for months, but they begged off at almost the last minute”, Jen shrugged, “We already had spent a bunch of money that we couldn’t get back, so we decided to go ahead. We got a lot of instruction in techniques and self-rescue, and we also have a SPOT Messenger if we need to get a message out. It’s one-way only though.”

“We had something similar happen with Matt and I. We only have an emergency beacon, though. We looked into SPOT but couldn’t justify the cost”

“We were able to get the loan of this from one of the outdoor group members, so the price was right (unless we lose it or ruin it).”

“Yeah- well, lets hope that we don’t need either one.”

“Agreed!”

Jeff and I stuffed all the gear into a couple of bags with straps and set off up the shoreline. It took about 15 minutes and some scrambling to get back to the girl’s canoe.

“How do you want to go about this, Jeff?”

“I guess the first thing to do is find or make an anchor. Then one of us will need to swim a line out there. I think we can probably get by with using the 75 foot line with one of the 50 footers, and leave the other 50 footer for the Z-drag.”

“I suppose it ought to be me doing the swimming. I can put your PFD over mine for some extra flotation. I can carry out enough webbing to make a halter for the end of the canoe facing us and fasten the line to it. If we can pull straight across the current, I think she’ll come loose pretty easily.”

“Matt, how about taking one of these long spruce trunks with you? It should float OK, and maybe you could use it as a lever. You don’t want to chance a pin.”

“Not a bad idea! I can let go of it if there’s a problem floating with it.”

We decided to bury a couple lengths of driftwood in the wet sand at the eddy to make a “deadman” for an anchor point. I used the edge of the entrenching tool to chop a few four foot sections and to sharpen some stakes.

We buried three sections about a foot deep for the bottom one and tied a piece of webbing around them. I used the flat of the tool to drive several stakes deep into the sand as reinforcement, and then backfilled the trench and shoveled a berm of sand in front of the stakes.

I rigged a quick-release to my PFD and after donning Jeff’s as well, clipped the loop at the end of the line to it. Wading upstream and paying the line out behind me, I got far enough up to catch the current. I kept the spruce trunk behind me as I rode the current down below the rock, and swam into the eddy. We had plenty of line. I tossed the trunk on the rock, and clambered up.

It was a short task to rig a halter around the bow, anchored to the bow seat. I attached the loop to the halter so that the pull would be parallel to the hull.

Jeff had rigged the Z-drag and took up the slack in the system. I got into position with my prybar, and signaled to Jeff to take a pull. The rope tightened and began to stretch as the pull got stronger. I heard the grind as the hull started slipping along the rock, and I kept weight on the prybar to take some of the weight. The hull moved a little faster, as the forces on it became more unbalanced. Once it started, the process didn’t take long at all. I fended the canoe off the rock as best as I could. Jeff kept pulling slowly on the Z-drag to keep the bow pointed slightly down stream to help the canoe keep moving, until finally it slid off. The stern of the canoe whipped around as the current turned it and pushed it toward the shore.

I tossed the spruce pole in the water and climbed into the eddy, then swam across the eddy line and let the current carry me downstream while I swam to shore. Once there, I walked back up to where Jeff had the canoe beached.

“Looks pretty good, Matt. They had things tied down really well, I think we can just dump this water and then float it down to camp. We can use their spare paddles.”

“That’s great- the hull looked OK to me. I hope nothing got too wet!”

It took the two of us, but we were able to slowly roll the canoe up on its beam end and let the water run out. The gear looked to be in good shape and barely moved.

I freed up the spare paddles, and then helped Jeff finish unrigging the Z-drag and stowing the gear. We tied it in the boat, climbed in and pushed off. It was only a few minutes paddle to the campsite.

Jen was surprised to see us back so soon.

“Wow! You guys did it so fast! I figured it would take longer,” Jen said.

“It really wasn’t pinned that tight We just tugged and pried it off the rock. There doesn’t seem to be any damage to the boat, and it looks like your gear’s all intact. We didn’t unpack anything to see if it got wet, though, Jeff replied.

“How’s Sarah doing?” I asked.

“Still washed out. Her back’s still aching, but I’ve been encouraging her to drink a lot. She’s had to pee a couple of times already. I think she’s fallen asleep now.”

“Rest’s probably the best thing for her right now. Let’s go ahead and get your boat unloaded and dragged up here so you can see if anything got wet.”

“Sounds like a plan to me.” said Jeff.

“Yup.” replied Jen.

With three of us working it didn’t take long to get everything up to camp. Fortunately, nothing had leaked during the spill, and we were able to get the lady’s tent set up, and their gear inside. We set up our tarp for a cook area. I dug a latrine pit in a swale behind the campsite and left a roll of toilet paper in a can beside it. Jen and Jeff gathered a big pile of firewood while I made a fire ring and set up the camp kitchen. I did a bit more elaborate job than usual, since I expected to spend at least a couple of days here.

I got some fire from the embers of the one Jen had started earlier and got a small fire going so I could have it burn to embers before I had to cook.

Jeff got Jen to dig out the ladies’ medical bag, and went through the contents, and the notes the Doctor had provided.

“OK- looks like you have about the same antibiotics as we do. Their Doc recommends Bactrim, 1 double strength tab twice/day/, for a UTI, so I’d say start Sarah on that right away.”, Jeff said.

“I’ll take it to her with some water, if you want, Jeff”, said Jen.

“Hang on a sec, Jen. Let me see if you have some Pyridium, it will help with her discomfort. If you don’t have it, we do ... OK, here we go, you do have some. She can take this for a couple of days, too. Make sure you tell her that it will turn her urine dark red-orange, so she doesn’t freak out. Lets also start her on Ibuprofen ever 6 hours for fever.”

“All right. I’ll give them to her now.”

“She’ll probably start to feel better in a day or so. Most times the antibiotic works pretty quickly.”

Jen took the meds in to Sarah, who took them and then came out of the tent and went up the hill to use the bathroom.

She came back over and sat by the fire.

“I feel better now, but I’m still chilling now and then. This fire feels good!”

“I’m glad you’re feeling better. I’ll get you some water. We want to keep you hydrated.” I said, handing her a cup and the treated water bladder.

“What’s for dinner, Matt?” Jeff asked.

“Well, I was leaning towards some of the loaded potato soup we’d dehydrated, with some hard sausages added. Maybe a dump cake in the Dutch Oven, if anyone’s that hungry.” I haven’t looked in to what Sarah and Jen have, yet.”

Jen looked at me and shook her head. “Matt, you don’t have to do all the cooking. I can cook, too.”

I smiled. “I’ll take you up on that, Jen. You can do breakfast. Jeff and I have been trading off cooking and washing duties. I don’t know how you ladies divvied up.”

“Pretty much the same ... but I tend to cook more then Sarah. I’m a better cook!”, she winked.

“Hey, now ... I represent that!”, said Sarah.

I laughed. “The proof of the pudding is in the tasting! I’m happy to share cooking duties! I expect we’ll be here a couple of days while Sarah recovers anyhow. Changing the subject a bit- when does everyone want dinner?”

We all did the classic”look at each other and shrug” routine, before Jeff stepped up. “I’m not really hungry. My vote would be around 6:30 or 7. That would give us time to relax beforehand, and still have daylight after.”

“Suits me”, I said. “I think I’ll get out my journal and write in it some, maybe sketch a bit, too.”

“I think I’ll lie back down. I feel better but not all that great” Sarah replied.

“I believe I’ll get out my tackle and try my luck fishing. Maybe we can have fish along with our loaded soup, if I get lucky”, said Jeff. Jen stood up. “I think I’ll get out my camera and get some pics.”