Miscellaneous

Texas Water Safari 2008: Staples to Luling

By Chris Stevenson

The stretch of the San Marcos river between Staples and Luling is dreaded by most Safari racers.  Reason being, the river is narrow with lots of sharp twists and turns.  Worst of all, it is choked with downed trees and barely-submerged stumps, gravel bars and boulders.  In a low water year like this year, the number of exposed obstacles increases dramatically.  This leg, more than any other, claims more boats and ends more races than any other section.  We would have to be cautious.

We had run this section a few times before the Safari, but we never felt like we'd mastered it.  We always managed to have at least one mishap.  Robo lost his wedding ring in a sweeper a couple of miles down from Staples.  The first time we ever ran the section we flipped out of the boat and let it get crossways in the current and got as close as we'd ever been to wrapping the boat.

The action starts immediately when you leave the Staples Dam area.  There was one sweeper in particular, not 200 yards downstream, that gave us fits every time.  Before, we would thread through some large diameter stumps only to get taken by the current and pushed into a tangle of sharp dry branches.  This time, though, we managed to thread the stumps at a sharper angle and get the nose into the eddy pool to avoid being swept by the current.  We made it by with several feet to spare between us and the gnarl.  This was the second or third time that we had easily managed an obstacle that had given us trouble each time before.  Because of that I knew we were having a good run.  Plus, it built confidence that we were now experienced rivermen and could handle just about anything the river threw at us.  In fact, we developed a saying after every time we come through a difficulty - "That was no problem; for a Man of the River."

And so it went along the entire 24 miles.  We would come around a bend and see current pushing into a corner and a waiting sweeper.  Sometimes there'd be a gravel bar at the head of the tight turn, making it even more difficult.  We passed "Wedding Band Sweeper" and I called it out as we went through.  I don't think Robb thought any of it was amusing.  We came upon familiar obstacles where we knew it was best to simply jump out of the boat and portage around, instead of through, the junk.  All of our training and practice was paying off bigtime.  Things that only a few months before would have dumped us out of the boat easily, we whipped around and through like we'd been doing it for years.  Before, I'd be apprehensive at every obstacle, wondering if we were going to spill out and wreck the boat this time.  I dreaded turning over and chasing all of our gear floating downriver.  But now, I looked forward to obstacles - each one different and requiring different approaches and skills.  It had become fun.

We saw our TC at Fentress and told her we were doing fine.  A couple of hours later, we rolled into the checkpoint at Hwy 90 outside of Luling.  We had survived the worst leg of the Safari and our split was 4:29 - 15 minutes faster than my pre-race projection.  We had a bit of a hairy water exchange with our TC because she had no one to help her at this point and some of our jugs and bottles got away from us and were floating downriver.  Fortunately, some local kids who were swimming there scooped them up and gave them to her.  Still, it was a pretty quick exchange and we were off again toward Luling proper and Zedler's Mill.

It was the shortest leg of the Safari at a little over an hour, or about 6 river miles.  The obstacles were fewer and further between and we made it within 5 minutes of my projected split.  Our portage over Luling Dam was a bit awkward, but we made it through without any major mishap.  We climbed back in and we were off to face the most difficult portage at Ottine Dam and then the checkpoint at Palmetto State Park.  We had planned to arrive at Ottine before dark, but we were going to be cutting it close.

Full post as published by Cursed With Ambition on June 30, 2008 (boomark / email).