Still Celebrating

Yesterday afternoon we kyaked and canoed to Emerald Cave. If you start at Willow Beach (just 30 minutes south of the Hoover Dam off US 93) and go upstream two miles there is a tiny cave called Emerald Cave that is almost worth the work of paddling that hard to get to. I think on a non-windy day it would have been easily worth it.

It was memorable for our family. We switched every mile who was in the canoe and who got the kayak, so everyone got to experience both at least once. The hard part was on the way back. We had to fight the wind the whole way back. Faith and I made it back right at 4pm when our gear was due back and were confused because we didn't think that everyone else was that far behind us. It turns out that Bill, Ivy and Will got caught in a circular current near the fish hatchery and did four big circles before being able to avoid that current by paddling near the rocks on the other side of the river. It was a teaching moment (read *painful*) when Bill had to explain to Will and Ivy (mostly Ivy) that freaking out wasn't going to help - everyone had to work together.

Will and Faith are in the kayak behind Ivy

Inside Emerald Cave

The cave was small enough that we wondered if we had found the right place. Bill and Ivy went upstream just a little bit to make sure and yes, this was it.

It was an interesting experience. Maybe some of the horror of it will fade for Ivy. She wanted to extract a promise that we'd never do that again...not her favorite adventure!