The Canoe Trip

Kathy Gea, 14
Arkansas

Sonja Thalheimer 17, North Carolina

“But, Mom! My friends were going to come over on Saturday! I don’t want to go canoeing with the stupid Boy Scouts! I’m not even a boy! I’ll be the only girl there, I’ll get soaked, and we’ll probably flip over and drown or get struck by lightning or something!” Anne flung herself down on the sofa, knowing the argument had been lost before it even started.

“Anne, you know that Dad will be out of town and there’s no way I’m letting you stay home alone that long,” Anne’s mom said. “We’ll survive, I promise you. And your friends can come over on Sunday. As for being the only girl there, Sam’s twin sister will be coming along too.”

“And the leader’s daughter is coming!” Anne’s little brother, Jackson, chimed in.

“How old is she?” Anne asked doubtfully.

“I think she’s sixteen,” said Jackson.

“Too old. If she was fourteen, then we might have been friends. Probably not, though.”
“Cheer up, Anne,” said her mom. “You’ll have a great time. Just wait and see.”

* * *

“Ugh. Six thirty in the morning. We must be crazy. No one in her right mind would wake up early on a Saturday,” Anne mumbled to herself as she dragged herself out of bed and turned off the alarm. She got dressed, brushed her hair (which she had straightened the night before out of stubbornness), and ate a quick breakfast. Then she went to the car with her brother.

As Anne’s mom got in, Anne could tell that she was worried. “What’s wrong, Mom?” Anne asked nervously.

“Well, it’s just that the chance of severe thunderstorms for this afternoon went up to 70 percent. I’m not sure we should be going on this trip today.”

“Come on, Mom! Where’s your sense of adventure?” Jackson asked, practically jumping up and down with excitement.

“Maybe they won’t let us go since we’ve never been canoeing before and it’s going to be dangerous and stuff,” Anne suggested hopefully.

“Well, we’ll find out now. We’re here,” said their mom as they pulled into the parking lot of the church where the Boy Scouts met. All the leaders were standing around in a circle, obviously talking about whether or not they should postpone the trip.

“I’m not getting out of the car, I’m too sleepy,” said Anne, and she turned her back on the window as her mother and brother joined the others. Eventually, though, she looked at the group of people. There’s the teenage daughter, Anne thought. She’s even wearing make-up. On a canoe trip? With a 70 percent chance of severe weather? I thought I was bad straightening my hair. I wonder what she’ll look like after the rain.

After a few minutes, everyone started heading to the cars. “We’re going,” said Anne’s mother as she slammed the car door shut. “I wish we weren’t, but we can’t back out now. They’re bringing a canoe for us and everything.”

The drive to the river didn’t take very long; it took longer to unload all the canoes, drive the trucks carrying them to the finishing spot eleven miles down the river, and bring the drivers back.

After about an hour, the canoe trip finally started. Anne was in the front of the canoe, her mom was in the back, and Jackson was sitting on a couple of extra Personal Flotation Devices (PFDs) in the middle. Everybody had a paddle, but none of them really knew how to use one. The boat ran straight into the bank on the other side of the river, and when they tried to push off, they just spun around in a circle before moving slowly forward.

“Well this is off to a great start,” said Anne sarcastically.

“Actually, it is, compared to the people behind us. Don’t tip the canoe when you look back at them! They just flipped over,” said Anne’s mom.

“I wonder what they did wrong. Did they stand up in the canoe or something? That’s always the first advice people give you: ‘Don’t stand up in the canoe!’ I wasn’t planning on doing that, myself,” Anne replied.

“Maybe some poor clueless person did that once, and everyone remembered it. And paddle on the right!” her mom shouted.

“Fine, fine,” Anne muttered as she dipped her paddle in the water again.

An hour later they were still at it. The canoe managed to go in an almost straight line most of the time, and Anne wasn’t feeling quite so grumpy anymore. The sunlight looked pretty on the water and the trees, and the tall cliffs were impressive. The only problem was that they were separated from the lead canoe, which was purple. They had to navigate some faster-flowing water (not rapid, just quick) all by themselves.

“Paddle to the left, Anne! Jackson, keep paddling on the right!” The person in the back was supposed to steer, and Anne’s mom was trying to do her best.

“Okay, Mom, I’m paddling. Did you see that storm cloud? It keeps getting closer,” said Anne.

“Yeah, I’m keeping an eye on it,” Anne’s mom replied. “It doesn’t look good.”

“Hey, look, the purple canoe!” Jackson yelled.

“Really? Where?” Anne asked.

“Over there! I can see it too! Let’s go!” shouted Anne’s mom. Everybody picked up the pace, arriving at the bank where the purple canoe and a couple of others sat, just in time to see them head back out.

“We’re going to see if we can make it to the cabin where we’re going to eat lunch before the rain hits!” yelled the woman in the purple canoe.

Even as she spoke, the sky darkened and the first drops of rain began to fall. Anne’s family struggled into their rain jackets and took off, just barely managing to keep up with the canoes in front of them.

“Left! Right! Left! Right!” Anne’s mom called out as thunder boomed overhead. The rain increased until the surface of the water was covered in little splashes and Anne’s jeans were drenched. Lightning flashed, lighting up the ever-darkening sky. The accompanying thunder rolled out less than a second after the lightning struck. The intensity of the rain increased until the drops almost hurt. Then they really did hurt, and when Anne looked in the puddle of water in the bottom of the boat she saw why.

“Hail! This stupid storm is hailing on us!” she cried out over the pounding of the rain and hail on the surface of the river, which was now moving faster than ever.

“I know! Just keep paddling!” her mom shouted above the roll of the thunder.

“It must be pea-sized and it’s getting bigger!” Jackson yelled just as the brightest flash of lightning yet lit up the sky and the thunder cracked like a gunshot.

“That was just over that hill! Doesn’t it seem like a bad idea to be on the river during a thunderstorm? Lightning likes water, right? And what if we tip over now? We’ll drown!” shouted Anne.

“Of course it does, I don’t know, and no, we won’t, that’s what the PFDs are for! Now just be quiet and paddle left, I think I see some canoes over there under that cliff!”

As the last few canoes pulled under the cliff, Anne breathed a sigh of relief. She started helping her family bail the inch or so of water and melting hail out of the bottom of the canoe. Her rain jacket hadn’t worked and every inch of her body was soaked. She felt (and was sure she looked) miserable, but as she glanced at the people around her, she noticed that most of them didn’t. In fact, they were laughing and joking as they bailed out their own canoes. Why? she asked herself. How can they be happy when they’ve just been on a canoe floating down a river in the middle of a hailstorm? I guess they can be happy that they’ve survived, but they look really happy. It’s weird.

Anne’s mom smiled at her and said, “Well, now you can tell your friends what you were doing during the hailstorm – canoeing on the river! Won’t that be an exciting story?”

“Yeah, I guess so, Mom, if we actually make it home again,” said Anne.

“We’ll be fine. The storm looks like it’s stopping and we’re really close to the cabin now. We’ll just be a little wet for the rest of the day. We can make the rest of the trip a good one, you’ll see.”
“Hopefully,” said Anne, as she scooped the last bit of water out of the canoe and dumped it into the river.

As soon as she had spoken, the sun broke through the clouds, illuminating the beautiful landscape that surrounded them. As the canoers left their overhanging cliff to finish the trip, Anne realized that it wasn’t so bad after all to be floating down a river surrounded by Boy Scouts. Even the hailstorm was something to be proud of – they hadn’t tipped their canoe over or spun around in circles at all! And, as she glanced over at the leader’s daughter whose make-up was dripping, she realized that she would always remember this day. It would make such a great story to tell her dad when he got home, and her friends at lunch on Monday; they would almost wish they’d been there.