Spring Break Surprise

This past year I’ve been blessed with the opportunity to travel to many different great kayaking destinations and I’ve spent most of my time far away from home. In the mean time, back at home, a group of friendly folks that call themselves Ozark Mountain Paddlers continued to show a lot of enthusiasm for the sport without me.

                Now I sure hadn’t forgot about these people who got me started on the sport that I would eventually completely commit myself to, but I got caught up with moving forward and lost touch with them. When I got back home for spring break, I found out that Ozark Mountain Paddlers was having weekly pool sessions to do what they do best . . . bring new people into the sport of kayaking. I decided to show up for this to help teach and when I got there Ed McClung (club officer for safety and education) immediately handed me a monthly news letter with an article about me and my adventures with New River Academy. Later I talked to some other folks who were excitedly asking me questions like, “What’s the water like down in Chile?” and “How’d you get so lucky?” Many of them said they had been reading my blogs.

                It was really a thrill to discover that the people involved in Ozark Mountain Paddlers still see me as one of their own. I guess it pays off to stay in touch with all those people that made a big difference in your life early on.  

We found the carnival, or, you know, you could say- the carnival found us. Us with our ideas and cameras with the extra long lenses, our colorful river gear, our sun bleached hair, our scrapes and bruises and stains, (each one with a story behind it) our we’ve-been-on-the-road-for-seven-weeks smiles, shoulders toned from waves and rapids. So first the carnival found us- abandoned, in the light of day, the concession stands empty, the lights turned off- and begged us to explore, and what do you know but we fit right in to that crazy place. 

What I’m trying to say in far too many words is that we did a photo shoot or two:

David Hughes, Melina Coogan, Emery-Kate Tillman and David Gorski ride in true New River Academy style. Photo by Tracy d’Arbeloff

David Hughes takes Emery-Kate Tillman, David Gorski and Tracy d’Arbeloff for a spin. Photo by Melina Coogan.

Tracy d’Arbeloff shows perfect form on a photo shoot designed and shot by David Gorski.

But were we finished, or was the carnival finished with us? Miraculously no, because on Friday night the whole place got plugged in, ride by ride. The flash bulbs of the roller coaster popped on and the Ferris wheel began its slow rotation. We took a visit just for the fun of it, the feel of it, just ‘cultural experience’ (certainly, we as adults and young adults couldn’t really enjoy a kiddie carnival ride….right?) What we ended up with was not only the ride of our lives, but also the candid photo opportunity like nothing else we have ever (as world travelers, as photographers, as explorers, as adventurers, as poets….) had EVER come close to experiencing. I hope you enjoy these fantastic photos, and that they relate at least a portion of the wild experience we enjoyed together that night.

All smiles: Melina Coogan, Tino Specht, Emery-Kate Tillman, Palmer Miller and Alexandra Shallhorn loving life. Photo by David Hughes.

From above: Emery-Kate Tillman, Tino Specht and Isaac Holden watch the brave Ferris wheel goers. Photo by Melina Coogan. 

Tino Specht and Melina Coogan show off no-hands on the Himalaya Roller coaster while David Hughes and Isaac Holden hold on tight. Photo by Palmer Miller.

Emery-Kate Tillman and Alexandra Shallhorn lead the charge. Photo by Palmer Miller.

Alexandra Shallhorn and Palmer Miller wonder just what they are getting themselves into! Photo by Melina Coogan.

Now hold on! Ask your child about this crazy tilt-a-whirl, because the entire group came back to ride in the next night. Photo by Alexandra Shallhorn.

Goodbye Pichilemu, and thank you for all the colors and light…

        Enjoying sunny skies in Chile and beautiful waves on the ocean. I’m in Pichilemu, Chile with New River Academy. I’ve been surfing my kayak every day in the ocean and just today I tryed boardsurfing. It was tons of fun and I got trashed quite a bit.

I was setting up a lesson plan for Palmer Miller’s AP American Literature Class when my eyes fell upon this poem. Beware, it is long and if you’re not a poetry fan, well….I’m sure there will be plenty other blog posts coming your way so worry not! Feel free to scan through for the photos!

But this marvelous, marvelous poem caught my eye, heart, mind, brain, soul. It reminds me so much of New River Academy.  The students here are brave, bold, vivid and they attack each challenge head on. It is extrordinare to watch and be a part of.

Curiosity

may have killed the cat; more likely
the cat was just unlucky, or else curious
to see what death was like, having no cause
to go on licking paws, or fathering
litter on litter of kittens, predictably.

Nevertheless, to be curious
is dangerous enough. To distrust
what is always said, what seems,
to ask odd questions, interfere in dreams,
leave home, smell rats, have hunches
do not endear cats to those doggy circles
where well-smelt baskets, suitable wives, good lunches
are the order of things, and where prevails
much wagging of incurious heads and tails

Face it. Curiosity
will not cause us to die–
only lack of it will.
Never to want to see
the other side of the hill
or that improbable country
where living is an idyll
(although a probable hell)
would kull us all.
Only curious
have, if they live, a tale
worth telling at all.

Dogs say catys love too much, are irresponsivble,
are changeable, marry too many wives,
desert thier children, chill all dinner tables
with tales of their nine lives.
Well,t they are lucky. Let them be
nine-lived and contradictory,
curious enough to change, preapred to pay
the cat price, which is to die
and die again and again
each time with n oless pain.
A cat minority of one
is all that can be counted on
to tell the truth. And what cats have to tell
on each return from hell
is this: that dying is what the living do,
that dying is what the loving do,
and that dead dogs are those who do not know
that dyois is what, to live,each has to do.

(Alastair Reid)

Why did I name my blog technicolor Ducklings? There are so many titles out there! And trust me, I’m in love with words and I thought of them all! But the ducklings stuck….because of this picture:

Yeah, the boaters are not in sunlight and that drives me crazy, but hey at least one of them is in some rays! When I’m cruising down a river or surfing in a hole or waiting in an eddy (and let’s be honest, this is what I do the most of) I love to look up and see all the bright boats bobbing around, going bottoms up, whipping around, an aquatic modern dance, the world’s brightest ducklings. Everyone laughing, shaking water off their feathers.

The ironic thing of course is that of everyone in the group, I am the least experienced. I started paddling this summer and my river mentor, JP, always refereed to me as his baby duck. I followed him so closely that I’d bang into his stern all the time, which is of course the wrong thing to do but I was a terrified beginner. One day I got bold, and another intermediate paddler and I  decided to paddle the Skykomish river without him, while he was at work. I left a message on his phone to tell him such and he called me back immediately. "Tell me you’ve got a mama duck with you!!! who is your mama duck?!"

So yeah, I’m still a duckling and most of these paddlers who I teach in the classroom every day are my mama ducks, monster giant rodeo-winning huge wave surfing world class paddling ducks.

But Technicolor Ducks just doesn’t have the same ring, does it!

(Thanks for reading technoduckies!)