I don't know where to begin on this post. There are two topics intertwined in to one fun story. Or should I say one story with two lessons. My brother and I were very excited, okay, well, I was very excited and slightly obsessed given my renewal of interest in the field of cryptozoology, so I persisted that we venture out again after the river dragon last Friday. I wanted to see her again. She was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen in the wild. When I saw her, I was startled at first but then was mesmerized by the beauty of seeing a real dragon flying over my head and then away into the horizon. So we geared up for a night expedition.
We geared up with head lamps, flashlights, boots and BDUs. We were going to head from the “Island” to the beach where we saw her before and post there for a few hours. The water is very deep there because it is coming up to a dam. I think that this is why she was there before, this is where the bigger fish are. After reading more on the topic (reading the encounters and sighting reports from the past here in Texas) I realized that we are lucky she didn't attack us. She just became angry with us and flew up river to perch some where else. Seriously loud squawking at us right before she flew, like nothing I have heard before.
So we set off in Serenity, our inflatable kayak. Just to give a visual, Serenity is a yellow and red inflatable “sit-on-top” tandem (two person) kayak we got at a garage sale for $50. We have taken her on the river a few times now with lats of success and fun. San Marcos is where they train for the kayaking in the Olympics. However, the San Marcos river is an entirely different river at night. Having lights this time it was starting out to be a great experience. We saw all kinds of wildlife from raccoons to owls. It was very foggy and hotter than we expected. Unlike the last few night trips we have made, this time we had lights and could see the spiders that were hitting us in the face..lol. Sevé is a spider magnet. He will be sitting there and all of a sudden one will pop up on his leg to say hi... I picture the spider from Madagascar looking at him and saying “Well howdy-doo?” every time..lol...
So we are getting in to deep slow water when we hear some air coming from Serenity! We have had a leak before and patched it with some engine liquid gasket witch was something that we forgot to bring this time. The part of the river that we were in was particularly deep and had no banks to make port with. I found the leak, it was coming from the seam that attaches the seat back rest to the main part of the kayak. It was ripping and getting bigger letting out more air. We were already a good hour in to the trip and knew that there were no houses or civilization any where close so I held the hole with my finger while Sevé paddled. We were determined to make it to the beach but that was another half an hour or more away!. The rip got bigger! I was now using my thumb stuck in to the hole to plug it!. Sevé kept paddling as fast as he could, then it ripped again! This time there was no plugging it! I told Sevé to head to the bank so we would have a place to grab on to and not drown (I was wearing steel toed swat boots) We found a place to make port right when the rip let all of the air out of the main section of Serenity. She went down like a leaf in the wind. (a little “Browncoat” humor there)
So here we were regaining composure on the bank of the river in a remote spot. At that moment we were just happy to be out of the water. After a while we knew that we had to do something other than sit there, we needed to see what was over the large hill we ported on. When we got to the top we realized that this was a cow field. We saw lights way off in to the distance. We started walking, because lets face it, there wasn't much else we could do. We walked a little over a mile (maybe further) before we came to a fence. It was a small barbed wire fence beside a tree and it stood in the way of us that the lights in the distance that were looking more and more like street lights. This was not an easy trek. We were carrying Serenity deflated and rolled up, along with the ores, pump and our equipment. We were considering posting up here and sleeping till morning but there were countless piles of cow crap thus far, and where there are cows... there are bulls. So we kept trekking toward the streetlights. We figured we were going to have to walk back to San Marcos cause who would actually pick up two guys in camouflage BDUs covered in mud... at night? It just seems kind of shady.
We finally make it to the lights after a couple of miles of walking across this field. We met a new fence and a dreadful realization. This fence was 10 feet tall with barbed wire on top... and those were no street lights. We had come to a strange facility in the middle of nowhere. We couldn't tell what it was, a factory, or some kind of business for sure... only... no night crew or security guards.. no, it was Friday night.. and every one was starting there weekend. And here we were on the wrong side of the fence. We decided to try and go under the fence.. it had a couple of inches from it to the ground and a good few inches leeway when you pull up on it.. I figured I would try to go first since I am the biggest. Well I got about halfway when the Sevé's grip let up.. The bottom of the fence was sharp and ripped my shirt to shreds scraping my back a little.. He pulled again allowing me to get back from under the fence.
We figured we would keep following the fence even though it was so long that it literally vanished in to the distance. (well, plus it was dark) We walked a ways when we were elevated enough to see that on the other side of the parking lot that was on the other side of this huge fence was another fence then water! Like a lake or something.. Thank God we didn't make it through the fence cause then we would have been trapped in there...
We kept walking along the fence before we realized that these were backs of houses we were coming up on... where there are houses there are people and where there are people, there are phones to contact other people to get us. However we didn't want to trespass on to peoples yards and get chased by dogs again (...yes ... again..) About then we saw a car pass quite a ways down in front of us! So we continued toward the road.. We came across a back yard full of people having a party! We got their attention not caring how we were going to explain why we were dressed like like military refugees or why we were kayaking at night. I mean you can't tell people in this world and culture that we were looking for pterodactyls cause then they would call the cops thinking we are insane..lol
The gentleman who gave us a ride was the owner of the house and the manager of the “facility” we had come across. It was the San Marcos fish hatchery! We were not far from our car at all!
Okay, so What was the morals of this story?
1. Never go out at night on a 3 hour paddle in an inflatable kayak wearing steel toed boots, (Have accurate and reliable equipment)
2. Make sure you know your area very well before a night adventure (hello “google-earth”)
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