Monday, April 20, 2015

Brazos River Expedition

On April 18th myself and 20 others from the Mariner Sails Kayak Fishing Club launched our kayaks for what turned out to be a very memorable adventure.



We left the launch around 10 in the morning and paddled up river to a gravel bar which would be a our campsite for the night.

Many paddled and fished en-route to the campsite.









Others paddled straight to the site and began setting up their tents.



That evening we all met back at the camp to prepare our dinners.
During dinner several folks were closely monitoring the weather radar as a huge storm was working it's way across Texas.



That storm found us at about 7:30 Saturday evening and brought some serious wind, rain, thunder, and lightening with it. We all hunkered down in our tents to ride it out. It lasted for about and hour and a half and then moved on.



Once it was gone we decided to get out of our tents and survey the area to make sure everything was okay. Fortunately, everything was still intact.

While we were out we observed something huge and black in the river that appeared to be floating our direction. It first was believed to be a kayak that had gotten loose, then someone said it was a huge cow, and as it got closer we realized it was a large herd of wild hogs and that they were headed right toward us. Fortunately, when someone yelled "it's hogs!" they turned and ran away.

It continued to rain late into the night so we all turned in.

The next morning everyone was up at the crack of dawn. Some jumped in their yaks and took off up river in search of more fish while others of us hung out and cooked up some breakfast.



During break fast we handed out three collectible water bottles to three folks.
Funniest fish story of the trip went to the Lopez Brothers.
Person who brought the most stuff went to Dan Nelson.
Youngest camper on the expedition went to Hannah Brimage.



After breakfast it was time to start packing up and heading back to the take out point.



We all converged on the take out point around 2 o'clock and began dragging all of our gear and yaks up the hill to our vehicles.



This was a really fun trip. Many of the folks who attended had never tent camped much less load all their gear into a kayak and paddle it 3 miles up river and setup camp on a gravel bar. Then you add in the severe thunderstorm and it wound up being quite an adventure.

Everyone on the trip reported that they caught fish. Several stated that they caught over 100 fish over the two days.

I want to say a big thank you to my buddy Rick Hall. Without his help this event would not have taken place.