June Ends in Pictures

June ends on the Lower Fork of the Salmon River in Idaho.

 I need to re-pack my duffel bag.

 Mike's boat has a spot that wore almost all the way through, having rubbed on a rock during the night.

 Time for a patch-job.  The paddles prop the boat up in "dry dock".  As soon as the solvent meant to clean the area hit the scuffed part, the remaining membrane of rubber dissolved, deflating that part of the boat with a pop and a squeal reminiscent of letting go of the world's biggest balloon.  Still, the patch was successful.

 Laundry.

 Youth, displaying various levels of enthusiasm for morning.

 The dish washing system is four tubs:  Slop (scrape off your scraps); mop (wash in detergent); rinse, bleach.  The used-up Roman candles are not part of the system.  They are the remnants of an ill-advised, dangerous, but super funny Harry Potter-esque recreation of wizard dueling the night before.

Packing up and getting ready to move

Spencer and Russell

Kaitie and Trevor

Me, with Chuck and the kids

 Nathan got some time on the oars as well. This turned into a problem.  We let him row for a few minutes on the first day; and he spent the remainder of the trip begging, pleading, cajoling, threatening, manipulating, you name it, to get more time on the oars.  On the last day when the water was pretty much flat, I finally sent him and his attitude to ride with Russell and Spencer, where he was permitted to row until his hands blistered.  He was very pleased with his blisters.

 Cooling off?  Or peeing?  That's how it works.  There's a can with a seat on it to use as a toilet when you have a big job to do; but pee goes in the river.

There are no pictures of us running rapids.  That's because I put my camera away for that part.  Along with my hat, my sunglasses and the map.  The rapids did end up claiming two pairs of sunglasses, a hat and a shoe from our group.  In Slide, the biggest rapid, we had two of the five boats flip over, but no one got hurt.  I lost my own hat rowing a rapid after Slide.  I was concentrating on the rapid when a gust of wind carried my hat away.
"Aigh!  My fucking hat!"
"Row the boat!"
It is kind of precious to me:  a gift from Chuck that he bought me at the Rugby Sevens World Cup in Las Vegas last year.  After the rapid, Chuck got on the oars and rowed downstream as hard as he could.  After about a mile, we found it and rescued it.  Happy day!

Bighorn sheep

 That chair is waiting for me and my paperback.

Spencer, panning for gold