It was a busy week getting things ready for the CCC Easter meeting in Gatlinburg. All week long the weather forecast degraded and day by day, I'd start packing more and more clothes. I longingly looked forward to the arrival of my new drytop from REI since my drysuit is in England being repaired. I wasn't looking forward to facing a 20 degree weekend with an old leaky drytop and splash pants. The new drytop arrived and of course it was the wrong size. REI wouldn't and then couldn't get me an exchange of size and I was left without.
We had a fun mid-week kickoff to regular poker nights with 'the boys' on Wednesday night including Mike, Bill and Steve. We pigged out on wings and pizza and let the first night go by with freebee chips so we could get a feel for cash flow. It took about 3 hours for us to exhaust our $20 of play-money, with Bill the big winner. Nancy wisely made alternative arrangements for the evening.
Nan and I head to Gatlinburg on Thurs. by ourselves after several folks bailed on the weekend and riding up with us. There were about a dozen folks there Thurs. night and about 20 by Fri. night. Friday dawned without any appreciable natural flow except eastward on the FB and Noli and westward far out on the plateau. We paddled the lower Pigeon in cold but sunny weather on Fri. with newcomers Clint and Greg while the rest of the group paddled the Pigeon Gorge. Fri. night and all the way through Sat., the snow never ceased. We were greeted with a half inch of white and heavy winds Saturday morning. It took all the intestinal fortitude possible for me to join the group of 10 for the French Broad on Sat. It was cold but fun and rewarding.
We decided to head home Sunday after a short hike with Mark and Dana in the Cosby section of GSM NP. I took it easy for the next two days, catching up on paperwork and cleaning/warming up from the trip. Finally found a Kokatat drytop at NOC after striking out at ERA and GOPC. It's on its way and should be here in plenty of time for the instructor course at the end of the month. Once less item to fret about.
No comments:
Post a Comment