River and Bayou

First, these mosquitoes are hungry. And they’re everywhere. By the gazzilions. Thank God there are no mosquitoes on the river itself. That would be excruciating.

Second, I haven’t seen any alligators yet. But I think there close. A couple Cajuns just went by in a boat scanning the shoreline with a huge searchlight. They said that’s what they’re looking for. Lot’s of ‘rich people’ want to shoot one.

Okay. About my day paddling the Atchafalaya. It was pretty boring.

The river is straight, low, and running a lot slower than it did even yesterday. Maybe that’s because I’m deep in the swamp basin now and the waters of the river are being diverted into bayous and other watery places. I don’t know for sure. But it sort of makes sense so that’s my story and I’m sticking with it.

Only thing of real note today was me paddling under the Interstate 10 bridge. Everything else was just me trying to find the fastest water flowing in the main channel. Only one barge all day, too. A small one. He snuck up on me from behind. I didn’t hear him. And when I did see him, he was pretty close. And startled the crap out of me. Needless to say, I got out of his way in a hurry.

Camping now on a small sandy area at the mouth of Bayou Chene. Bayou Chene is one of the main bayou’s in the Atchafalaya Basin. I suppose if I had more time, I’d paddle up it a ways just to see what bayou habitat is like. But I suspect it’s even more mosquitoes. And snakes. And critters that might be interesting to see, but not encounter. But I’m only forty-six miles from the end of this adventure. That’s two days paddling and I don’t want to miss my ride home. So no time for side trips. I’ll just stick to the main river channel – the fastest, most direct way home. I’ve been camping for four weeks straight, now. And I’m looking forward to taking a hot shower, putting on my clean set of clothes, and going out for pizza and anything to drink with ice in it.