We left our site above New Orleans on a Sunday. There was a cruise ship docked right on the river walk. The ship was massive and I'm pretty sure all the passengers got a kick out of our ragged, tiny boat cruising by. We crossed the river after looking at the city for awhile, then easily navigated the infamous right hand turn in the river. A lot of people warned us of the turn upstream.
The days after New Orleans were uneventful and full of paddling. We finally started seeing alligators after the city, though. The first one we spotted while we were banked due to heavy rain and winds. He was around seven feet long and we sat and watched him for awhile. We saw three more that day and a few more the following days.
We reached Venice and decided to stop in and see if we could find someone to pick us up at the end with a boat so we didn't have to paddle all the way back, seeing as Venice is the southern most point where roads end. We talked to a bar pilot taxi who told us we should be able to wave any boater down at the end. Those guys taxi the pilots of the ships back and forth. When ships come in from sea they have to get a designated river pilot to take the ship up the river. We left there confident we'd have a ride back from the mouth. We finally hit the head of passes where the river miles reach 0. As we continued down the southwest pass we saw the first BHP (below head of passes) river marker, which read 27. It was disappointing because we were hoping we would reach the end that day. We started pacing ourselves then camped on our official last camp spot.
We found what looked like a great spot with a nice beach to drag the canoe up. The sandy shore should have been a dead giveaway that wakes break high in that area. After we cooked dinner the ship in the picture below went by and made for a good picture. Then, we got its wake which put knee high waves through our entire camp wiping out and drenching everything. We laughed it off, knowing it was our last camp.
The next morning we did a short 10 miles or so and realized we had reached the end. The Bar pilots have a huge station right at the end of the east bank. We went up to the station to see if they'd radio a ride and they were extremely cool to us. They fed us a huge breakfast and called one of their boats to pick us up on its way up river. We had like an hour to spare so we got our stuff up on the dock and walked the beach a bit.
109 days and we'd made it 2,141 miles. Our gear and our boats had taken a serious toll. We hitched a ride back and got to gaze at the river as we traveled at more than 12 times our average speed up river. It was a bluebird day, hardly a cloud in the sky, a great day to end a trip like ours. We were on the oldest boat those guys had, but it had speakers on the deck and Blake, our pilot boat driver, played a playlist of great classic rock songs which became, in my head, the soundtrack to our journey. "The Judge" hit the dock in Venice as Blake steered it into its designated parking spot. We thanked him for the ride and jumped off to meet our moms who were there to meet us. Shawn's dad Bill made a nice rack for our canoes and we packed everything in and hit the road. We stayed a couple nights in New Orleans and had some fun celebrating, then hit the road, northbound. It's been less than a week now and everyone seems to ask me the same question of what I'm going to do now. I'm enjoying my normal life now until I find a way to do something like this again. It's safe to say I'm hooked on traveling and don't see myself stopping now.
Thanks to everyone who donated and helped us out on this trip. I'd try to thank everyone individually, but again, I would hate to leave anyone out. Special thanks to our wonderful mothers who drove all the way down to get us. I'll leave you guys with a great quote from the river man himself! Till the next time!
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
-Mark Twain
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