Word for today: VEXATIOUS.

I thought of a variety of titles for today: 1) Everything but the kitchen sink 2) Thank you sir, may I have another 3) Whatever doesn’t kill you 4) How do you spell brutal? W I N D… Today may have been the most physically demanding. It was certainly the most stressful. And it just kept building from a relatively calm beginning. It was like yesterday, or the day before, but worse. I mean, I already accepted that there would be no cake walk this week, but c’mon!

So, I wanted another early start today in order to ensure I can get 40+ miles to past Baton Rouge; up before sunrise again. I got out of the tent to the strong smell of… beaver. Was the smell there last night, but the wind whisked it away? But after a few minutes, it seemed to disappear. I had my coffee and started to pack up, then the smell came back, but again for only a few moments. As the sky started to brighten, I noticed footprints around the camp; I was glad they were made by small mammal feet rather than gator. I also went back to investigate the hole in the bank I noticed as it was getting dark yesterday. Sure enough, it looks like I plotted my camp in the middle of the beaver den on ramp. Then I noticed one of them was back in the water watching me. So, that earlier smell was likely him leaving his den and heading for the water; maybe they were both out there. Then I looked down the beach in the other direction – the gator was back. Neither one let me get too close before submerging, which was a good sign. Like usual, there were a few tracks around my stuff, but nothing was touched; and the gator was not an issue. I think these guys just wanted to know when the hobo was leaving.

With the animal distractions, it was 7:30 before I shoved out. I really should’ve been on the water an hour ago! That’s okay, even if I only make 4.5 mph I should be past Baton Rouge around 5. There was a little wind, but not enough to cause any problems.

Shortly after I started, I nearly lost the cap to my Gatorade bottle. I’m sure I could’ve figured out “life without bottle cap”, but at this point everything seems precious; I don’t really want to have to engineer any more solutions. I did have something in mind for that broken chain, but I would need to break 2 more chains before that would be necessary. 168 miles to go, at 4.5 mph, that’s about 37 hours. Multiply that by 100 steps per minute and I need to get about 225,000 more steps out of these drives. That seems like a lot, but nothing compared to the 3-3.5 million steps done to date.

About 30 minutes along I passed by a cruise ship, the American Melody. There appeared to be very few passengers. The boat was docked like it was about to disembark passengers for some kind of shore excursion; what they could see of interest around here I don’t know.

About 10 minutes later I came upon a big beautiful beach that would’ve made a great camp. I certainly would’ve been pushing into the last of the daylight to make this last night, but I probably would’ve done so had I known it was there. It had a nice view of the highway 10 bridge and the smokestacks that reminded me a bit of the Battersea power station in London. I could’ve slept with creatures and dreamt of pigs on the wing over the power plant. But, it wasn’t meant to be.

Then a small boat coming from downstream came up towards me. It has an enclosed cabin and I couldn’t see inside. He came to a near stop about 100’ away; I waved but go no response. He stayed that way for 2-3 minutes, I assume just watching me. Then I thought, maybe this is like a Hunger Games thing and he’s reporting to the game master: Looks like he survived the beavers and gators; we’re going to have to turn it up a notch; let’s put a nest of cottonmouths and buzz him with murder hornets at camp tonight, if he survives the day. He watched me for a moment more, then zoomed off without any contact.

As I rounded the bend I saw what I assume to be a coal barge unloading facility to feed the power plant. Or, maybe it was some sort of pirate defense mechanism? Call now to get our best offer on the Raider Ripper 3000! This device slices, it dices, it will turn your marauders to pirate purée faster than you can say’shiver me timbers’! I’ll have to ask Ron Preston about this thing; he claimed to have a lot of knowledge about power plants on our way to dinner in Greenville. I’m not sure why, but since the days of Carlo Gambino I think there’s been a link between business “protection” and “entertainment”. Or maybe I don’t really need to know anything more about Ron’s “work”.

Around 11 I had a visit from a father-son team from Waterloo Iowa. Ben and Liam started off on a kayak in the Twin Cities (or did he say Quad Cities?); they went as far as St. Louis and traded the kayak for a wave runner. They were headed to Baton Rouge where Ben’s wife was waiting, then they were headed home. We chatted for a bit while I peddled. Ben asked what the toughest thing has been; I told him wind (which has now been steadily increasing today). He asked how it’s been dealing with those big eddies that come up from the bottom of the river. We wished each other well and they zoomed off. They would likely be to Baton Rouge in an hour, I had a nearly full day ahead still.

At lunch, the wind had gotten very strong. The trees were bending and creating a whooshing noise on the near bank. Waves occasionally picked up and a few times washed over the back of the boat (no more dry cheeks). This was certainly the worst wind since Wisconsin, and it made it difficult again to keep traveling in a straight line. At lunch I check my pace: 4 mph. I was working harder than usual and going slower, which disappointingly seemed right. This meant my Baton Rouge arrival by 5 was in jeopardy, but I’m not sure I can push much harder for 5+ more hours.

The wind never abated, but around 1:45 I came to a long straightaway of tugboat business that I knew precedes the final turn to Baton Rouge; this was encouraging as I should be making my approach to the city before 3. That tugboat stretch was one of my least favorite parts of this journey. The wind had to be a steady 15-20 mph with stronger gusts. I was traveling more up and down in the chop than I was going forward. The channel was wide, which equates to slow, though flow was impossible to tell in the chop. And, tugboats, barges and Exxon refinery loading facilities lined both sides of the river nearly solid. It took me over an hour to get through that stretch and I felt physically and mentally drained at the end.

Turning the corner, the 5 mile stretch through Baton Rouge was comparatively nice. There were still tons of tugboats, barges and other ships, but not a lot of movement. Some guys on a gasoline loading barge called out to me as I passed; they were excited about my 65 day journey and wished me luck on the final days. That picked me up heading towards the city. Like nearly every other riverside establishment south of St Louis, there was no access to it by water. I had secretly hoped for a Mike’s Fish Shack experience, but there were only commercial marine loading and unloading facilities, and a high levee wall with a railroad atop it. So, passing Baton Rouge as quickly as possible is the only goal.

I was past the city just before 5. What I wasn’t expecting was another 5 mile gauntlet of tugboats and barges. This was worse than coming into the city as they were more densely populated and more active. Most of these were here “lodging” for the night, either awaiting orders or waiting for their turn to load or unload. I would estimate there weee 200-300 tugboats and 500-700 barges in this 5 mile stretch. I didn’t have any close calls, they all seemed to notice me and were courteous, but this was much closer quarters with active tugs than I’ve ever had; a few times I was within 30 feet of tugs that were speeding off to assist some “lodgers” with their parking.

I looked at the map beforehand and knew there was an island 6 miles ahead. So, past all of these barges and around the corner is my safe harbor for the night, and I would be racing the sunset to get there. About halfway through I counted 67 tugboats on the left and 75 on the right bank where I was traveling, and I needed to be on the left to access the island. So I decided to cross now to have less parked barges to deal with. I looked both ways, several times, and crossed without any problems, but as I’ve said before, this is stressful even without barge traffic in sight.

I had been traveling at my top pace for this last stretch, and the wind seemed to get stronger as I went. This was the test that the game master had in mind! When I finally passed the last parked tugboat and barge, I shouted an expletive back at these foes. Then I looked ahead for sand in the remaining sunlight. Dead ahead I saw an island, but this wasn’t the one on the map; this was more a precursor island caused by the low water. I thought about heading there, but it was populated at one end by pelicans (stinky) and the island was probably only a foot above the water level at its highest point (would this wind bring rising water?) To the left bank I saw more sand and a level surface up a small rise, that looked better.

Elated at having made it as the sun was setting, I nosed the kayak onto the shore. As I think shown in the Cape Girardeau video, I’ve gotten adept at crawling over my gear to exit the nose end to keep my feet dry; I did that tonight and stepped onto the shore. Splunge. Slurg. My first two steps were into some sort of quicksand. I was in about 9” up to my shins. I suppose it would’ve consumed my whole body if I stayed there all night, but this insult was not really needed right now. I stepped only to have my right shoe sucked off by the muck. Ugh. Now I was wet from the waist down in muddy shoes and socks. Yay.

Rule number one is put on dry pants and shoes, but when you’re racing daylight, that gets delayed. But, with the wind whipping, walking around wet from the waist down gets chilly, especially when you’re missing much of your body’s natural insulating layer (man, I would kill for a zip up cardigan right now). But, I got things set up, probably quicker than normal, and changed as the light faded. I then rewarded myself with a cold can of beef stew and cold Chef Boyardee raviolis. This is the life!

I know there’s plenty of “everybody hurts” type music about surviving or overcoming challenges. But at the end of today, I declare that I’ve broken the back of this thing. I need to average under 32 miles a day for the next 4 days. So I won’t start at dawn tomorrow, though I would still like to shave some miles off that final day. Tired, but in good spirits tonight. With that in mind, I am adding to the playlist The Five Stairsteps O-o-h Child, because I fully expect things are gonna get easier.