04/04/09 Float Trip

I got to float with Bill and Beth Howard and Chris Cearley down the Buffalo River this weekend. We went down Friday and Bill provided the kayaks for us all to float in. Got on the river at 2:00 starting at Steel Creek and floated down to Kiles where we were camped. We stopped to look at two fantastic waterfalls feeding into the river from Thursday’s rain and I had messed up and forgot my camera to take some shots which was disappointing for sure. The river was flowing fast and full and made for some good rapids the best I ever had been in solo in my own raft. We made the eight miles in three hours and Chris and I rescued an overturned canoe for two floaters just as we arrived at camp for our good deed of the day. Chris feed us kabobs for the evening meal and I consumed far more Alcohol than I needed as Bill was whipping up some pretty strong drinks. Breakfast was my treat Saturday and we got back on the river at around 1:00 for a 5.5 mile trip to Eurby where the rest of the gang had spotted the vehicle while I guarded camp. The swift water made the trip over to fast for me but it was fun anyway and I remembered my camera this time but no waterfalls on this stretch. The Howard’s made steaks and baked sweet potatoes for the evening meal and we all were in bed by 10:00. The next day we were leaving camp by 8:00 AM and the Howard’s followed me home as my Jeep had started to miss out just as we had arrived at camp Friday. It gave me no problems on the way home but I did need a new distributor when I got back home. We stopped at the Ponca Bridge and seen 44 Elk grazing there for Sundays treat. I did miss out on a Whippoorwill cave trip with the BMG Sunday though due to the Jeep giving me issues.

03/28/09 AACS Project

This Springs Project was the smallest I have ever attended as the earlier ice storm, Funerals and NCRC training at Camp Orr keep a lot of the regulars from coming. I got involved with doing a pit called Arrowhead Pit which we had two teams of three to accomplish our survey of the cave. We netted nearly 1000 feet over all with one team going in the day before as well. The pit consisted of two twenty foot drops with the last one having a way around it that my team discovered and surveyed. There was a very large boulder in a big room at the end of the second drop which we surveyed as well. From there the cave continued as regular cave passage for 600 feet that was done by the rest of the team. We for some reason didn’t end up taking the tour of it but a good day of caving at any standard. Getting two and from the cave was the most challenging aspect due to all the downed limbs from the ice storm, it was a real disaster. Patsy feed us all chili at the end of the day.

03/21/09 Speleo weekend

Speleo weekend started off with a crazy letter from President Grant in Washington about an Airship crashing near Roswell and needing a task force to convene near Smithville AR to investigate. This took me several minutes to figure out it was about Speleo weekend and this year’s theme was the Wild Wild West but it eventually dawned on me. Was a five hour trip over there and attendance was smaller this year but we were able to come up with four teams of four to five people. Our mission was to document crash sights and record what we found as well as figure out what was wrote on the wreckage and a word puzzle using the translation code given to us by a strange Indian named Tom Tom. Task involved some compass and pace work, a Tyrolean across a small stream (I did that) and swinging on a rope around a tree, our mission involved four different stations. One of which was a small cave where we constructed a reflection device from materials we collected on the way. The weather cooperated for the most part but we did get some rain in the evenings but I had a good time. We had a community feed twice on Saturday and the food was great. Only issues were a late start on events and Jackie and Dan broke their camper winch and had to run to town and get another in order to raise their camper which kept them from participating in the first two stations. A few jokes were cast about them picking up a “Winch” from town of course. I once again managed to Bribe my way out of winning with decals and next years theme is to be “The Rocky Mountain Horror Show”.

Red Rock Canyon March 9 &10 2009

On this years excursion to the VDTA in Vegas Grace and I did Red Rock Canyon which is just seventeen miles from Vegas but the drive there we never really was out of the city until just the last two miles. The area is very impressive and has a 13 mile scenic drive through the park which we did on Monday. The next day we decided to go back and forfeit a trip to the Grand Canyon to do the Skywalk because we heard it wasn’t such a good trip. I decided I wanted to make the climb up to the top of the huge sandstone deposit so we stopped at a Wal-Mart to buy a pair of hiking shoes and got to see a local argument between some Vegas natives for our fist adventure of the day. We then headed of to the canyon and stopped at a very colorful formation I am sure the area gets it’s namesake from. A sign said that this formation was at one time the largest deposit and sand in the world that later solidified into sand stone. This area is very popular with rock climbers and in fact I saw a group on my way down. The pictures you see do not do justice as to just how large this thing is but it was a very challenging trip to the top for me. Getting there involved a lot of route finding and backtracking and was sporting enough for me to be a real joy. About half way up I got a call from Oklahoma from Abby on my cell phone. Still amazes I the technology of the day allow such a thing yet I couldn’t get a hold of Grace who stayed at the bottom reading a book while I had my adventure. After an hour or so I reached the top and had amazing views for sure. You can see all the tall casinos of Vegas from here as seen in my self portrait at the top. The climb down was interesting as well and I took a different way to get to the bottom. My best guess was I did about two to three hundred feet of elevation in all. This area is desert and we saw many different plants and interesting terrain when we were here. We even got to get up close to some Pictographs left by the real natives to this area.