Book One: “Adventure is at Hand: June 29-July 1, 2012”
Chapter 3
Attack
I’m jolted. My nervous system is in shock and I don’t knowif it is pain or paralysis. I feel the fangs set into my skull and the warmblood that was once inside run into my mouth. The grunts of a bear are the lastsounds I am going to hear, John’s asleep and I can’t scream. Forgive me…
Scared, I let out a cry of distress and awake to sunshineand crow calls. My nightmare disrupts John’s sleep too. We get up semi-restedand emerge from the woods using our rope to keep from falling down the mudslide.Surveying the area with a clear sky brings our spirits up to know that we madeit through what we later learned was one of the biggest storms to hit Virginia.Killed seven and millions were without power.
You can tell it stormed. Leaves and limbs everywhere, thesmell. My KSOs and John’s tent peg are on the island. Can’t believe they didn’tget washed away, but I am thankful that my shoes are back with me. He provides.
Tearing down the camp doesn’t take too long. We layeverything out on the small island and take an inventory of what we have.Everything seems to be in order, some things are wet but our dry bags keepeverything else bone dry. We lay the tent out to dry as we clean the mud off ofus and our gear and get breakfast going. John, the chef, cooks up a protein filledmeal of scrambled eggs, bacon and cheese. I heat up some of my Samurai Chaitea, so good.
The tent is dry enough to pack up and we start fresh with aneatly organized convoy of kayaks. We shove off leaving our worries behind andstart our second and final day out here. The water is still low even after allthe rain. Not too far down, we begin to see massive trees that have fallen intothe river. I imagine if I had continued farther like I had suggested in oursearch for our campsite, God led us directly where he wanted us to be. Anyfarther up or down the river we could have been crushed. In awe we look on the surrealnature of the fallen timber as we paddle.
11 miles of grueling heat, shallow tides, rocks, draggingboats, pumping water, and exhaustion behind us now and we approach the RappahannockRiver Campground. Here we dock our kayaks and unload a 2 serving meal pack toeat. Chicken and Potatoes. There are a few campers here and John goes to thecamp store to get information as I cook our meal. Much needed after munching ona granola the whole day. I eat my portion and John returns and eats his.
Power is off here at the campground and John’s dad is on theway to pick us up. We are tired and over estimated how far the trip was becausewe still are 14-16 miles away from where we wanted to end up. Time passes by asI relax in the water watching the little campers play. John is on the phonewith his father directing him to the campground until we get the news that hecan’t come and get us. All the roads are blocked off due to downed power linesand the only other way would be a 3 hour drive around it all. We are trappedhere.