Kayak Packing
Kayak Packing the Cascade Lakes
I've done a lot of planning over the years for backpacking, hiking, and cycling, but I had never planned a kayak trip. I was really excited about the change in format and was looking forward to exploring all of my options and different skill sets. I researched the typical weather, fire hazards, camping locations, drive time, etc. I had a perfectly planned out weekend and had invited my girlfriend Leslie.
The weather was quickly changing over and over with no predictability on what we would get. We prepared for the rain, the sun and knew if we got thunderstorms that we may have to cancel. Last-minute the weather took a turn for the worst with almost constant thunderstorms, since the weather kept changing so frequently we decided after much deliberation to give it a try anyway knowing that we may end up moving locations midway through. So away we went.
Original Plan:
Friday night drive to Sparks Lake, paddle across the lake and set up camp before dark.
Saturday am: Paddle around the lake looking for our next night's camping and set up after exploring the entire lake.
Saturday evening: enjoy a relaxing night camping and enjoying each other's company.
Sunday am: Paddle back to the car, load up and head out by noon.
Last-minute the weather showed thunderstorms coming in at 3pm on Saturday, and ending about 9am. We decided that we would set up camp Friday night, monitor the weather and go out and paddle as much of the lake as possible. Get off the water as soon as we say clouds coming in or no later than 2pm. If the weather was going to give us a break we would stay. But if no break insight we would pack up and go to Detroit Lake or Clear Lake for some dryer weather.
What actually happened:
We got to Sparks lake later than anticipated because we got distracted by other options. We drove to the lake and set up on the shore around 10pm. It actually worked out pretty good. We were in bed fairly early and I woke up around 645am. I got up make coffee and watched the weather reports. It turns out our weather changed again. The storm was coming in around 5pm, Thunderstorms were about 40% likely, and the rain would carry on all night and all Sunday morning.
We decided that we didn't want to pack up in the rain, so we packed up all of our stuff, and we would paddle all of sparks lake and then get off the lake and possibly get a hotel and enjoy Bend for the night. Again, nothing was finalized and we didnt want to make any permanent plans so we would let the weather decide what we would officially do.
We hit the lake with our kayaks about 1030am and were surprised at how low the water was. It was significantly lower than July when I was there last. I saw rocks in the water that were not there before. The shoreline was much bigger than July. We put in at the boat launch and tried to check out a channel that I had paddled before and we couldn't get through because there was not enough water. We were instantly surprised at how shallow the water was just after the boat launch, where it was less than a foot deep. It continued that shallow for most of the center and east side of the lake. We could've easily walked across the entire lake in capris and never got our clothes wet. WOW. I sure wasn't expecting that.
Just past the location, I had been to last the water started to deepen enough to where we didn't have to worry about bottoming out any longer and we could actually find a full paddle stroke without kicking up debris off the bottom of the lake. It remained deep through the remainder of our paddle. I was surprised how the Southernly tail of the lake was cut off rather quickly by a log jam, leaving us done with the whole lake by 1130am. We peaked through every nook and cranny. Needless to say, I was highly disappointed with how quickly we finished sparks lake.
We paddled back to the boat ramp and were out of the water and packed up with Kayaks and gear by 12noon. We still had hours left of paddling in us, so we drove over to Hosmer and paddled that. We made it all the way out to the main part of the lake and enjoyed lunch which consisted of an Omeal ready to eat, self-heating Lentils and Vegetable beef meal that Leslie was curious about. It was quite fun to start it up at the boat launch and watch it steam all the way to our lunch location in the center of the lake. The meal wasn't really enough for the both of us so we had crackers and meat sticks along with other snacks. We sat out on the lake enjoying the warm weather and each other's company for well over an hour. About 230pm the wind started to kick up. By 3pm some dark clouds were headed our way, so we decided to start heading back. It would appear that everyone else had the same thoughts because the boat launch was slammed pack with a lot of people, and the parking lot was emptying quickly.
As we drove down to bend Leslie found us an Airbnb and we went and showered up and enjoyed a night of hanging with some friends. That night it never rained. There was a thunder show, but nothing to that would've concerned us. The next morning we awoke to beautiful blue skies and wonderful weather. It just goes to show you have no idea what will happen with the weather in those parts. The good news is that we were safe, we were flexible on our excursion, we had lots of options, and the best part of all is that we had no plan and winged it the entire weekend.
Sunday morning we got up around 9am and were checked out by 10am. We went and got some coffee and decided to do some shopping in Downtown Bend. Many of the shops didn't open until 11am so we went to breakfast at a beautiful place called Drakes. They had good food and good service. I would go there again. We found some shops we loved including The Bend Store where we found outdoor copper necklaces and got introduced to some amazing artists. Clementines was another store we really liked. They had great clothing and wonderful jewelry. They even had a lot of great gift ideas that all appealed for the outdoors person, and of course the bend lovers. Overall they had a little bit of something for everyone. I really fell in love with the Adventure Girl line and the Mountain Mamas. I will admit their pricing was a bit outside of my current budget so I didn't purchase anything there, though if money were not the concern I would've gone nuts in that store.
The weekend was not what I expected it would be, and turned out to be a little bit of everything. It turned out to be the perfect thing I needed because I had been fighting an illness that had me feeling pretty tired most of the week. I was not 100% by the weekend and was not feeling the love for anything challenging. So this turned out to be exactly what I needed. Time with a good friend who was willing to challenge herself in something she was not familiar with. She camped in a hammock for the first time. We both learned a lot, and we had a great time.
In scouting we have a practice of Start, Stop and Continue. It's an opportunity to discuss with our leadership what we learned about our trip and what we would like to improve on, stop doing and continue doing. Here's my start, stop and continue for this trip:
Start - looking into reports of the area from locals who frequent that area. We would've found out about the low water levels at Sparks and maybe explored it differently. Though this was definitely a learning opportunity that unlike a dirt trail a water trail can change a lot of the course of the summer.
Stop - being so rigid and being more open-minded to our options. What turned out to be a complete change in weather conditions turned out to be a blessing of more opportunities. I used to be a complete fly by the seat of my pants kind of girl, until having kids and joining scouts. Though I know that I am open to change, Leslie definitely reminded me we can do all kinds of things in our area, and it didn't have to be a weekend of just camping. Instead, we got a variety. Don't get me wrong, I would've enjoyed a solid weekend of kayak camping as well. But the weather gave us more options for our weekend.
Continue - to investigate current conditions for travel such as weather, fire dangers, drive time, options for change and learn about new areas and conditions. My skills served me well, but thankfully I have a lot still to learn.
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