Picnic on the Colorado River

We knew we would have to get out early if we were going to the Hot Springs Pool again today. Imagine our disappointment when we were there at the crack of 11:00 (giggle!) only to see from the streets around it that it was packed! Seriously packed! Hundreds of people! Even the expansive lawn was filled with families on blankets because all of the hundreds of lounges were taken. Then, when we saw the pool from the overpass it seemed to be a solid mass of bodies...definitely not our idea of a good time.

So we went to WalMart to pick up the photos from the disposable camera I took on the whitewater rafting trip, came back home to pack a lunch, and drove to a spot on the Colorado River for lunch and water sports watching.

This is the spot where we took the rafts out of the water yesterday to go back up above the rapids so we could come through them a second time. It's just a couple or three miles up from our RV Park. Since there are no rapids from here on down for miles, there was a variety of individual vessels today from the snub-nosed kayaks in this first photo

to stand up paddle boards like these.

We also saw rafts and sit-on-top kayaks and inflatable canoes. People were enjoying the river with all kinds of really cool watercrafts. We took our new chairs that we had not even used yet, our little folding table, a cooler, and of course, The Girls.

We were enjoying watching the people and the water and the girls; we had just unpacked our lunch and started eating when it rained. Having been baptized by the river yesterday, we were just going to sit it out because it seems to rain just a bit most summer afternoons in Colorado. But then, it REALLY rained so we packed up all our stuff and climbed the bank to share a meager overhang with other folks outside the building housing the restrooms.

When it quit, we carried everything back down and set up again in our spot on the riverbank. Oh, but just look at our poor wet dogs.

Rich got our lunch out again and we were set for the afternoon.

Although, after lunch, I think Bella was asking if we could just go home...giggle!

But the sun was out; the valley and the river were gorgeous; the personal watercraft continued to parade in front of us; two men were fly-fishing just down river from us; and other folks were having lunch. It was perfect, just exactly what we had hoped the afternoon would be like.

And Bella seemed to have accepted that things weren't so bad there. teehee

And then...it rained. Again, we thought we could wait it out and joked with others as they packed up to leave.

Rich was thinking we could laugh it off and it would quickly quit...after all we could see blue sky and white clouds around us.

But I am here to tell you that it REALLY RAINED HARD so we gathered our things and our girls and went to the car in surrender to the rain.

As we approached the RV Park a few miles down the river, it had quit raining so we drove to the dead end road that runs along the river. When we turned around at the end, we noticed this inflatable canoe coming down the river. It had passed our picnic spot earlier, just before the final downpour! At least their timing was great today.

I mentioned that we picked up photos this morning. Rich scanned this one and asked me to post it. This was taken with a waterproof disposable camera just before we boarded our raft. You can tell it's before the first run of the day because we are DRY!

In other rafting news...after we finished the second run and hauled the raft out of the river yesterday, I was standing at the edge of the water, stepped backward into some rocks, could not get my balance and fell to my knees, scraping my shin on a rock...cool move, huh? Made it through the rapids, then just fell over on the bank. Today I noticed a blister on my left ring finger and that the back of the band on my engagement ring had broken in two; I wear it on my right hand. Proof that I did some gnarly paddling anyway...so there. haha

Lovin' Life ~~ And Funfilled Days