Escaping Santa

With the increasing frenzy surrounding baby Santa's birthday, Andy and I decided to head out for the territories.

With the so-called government shut down, we found Willow Beach pretty much vacant, plopped our boats into the Colorado, and headed upstream toward Hoover Dam.

This is Andy's first outing with his new wee motor. Big fun.

There were a few trillion ducks, coots, and other things flying and swimming everywhere.

Yo0u can't actually go all the way up to the dam without getting bazookaed by security, but you can get to almost to the gigantic new bridge.

There are a lot of nooks and crannies to explore, many with thermal springs oozing and dripping out of them.

We had a Christmas dinner that couldn't be beat. Macaroni and Cheese with Burnt Wienies.

While we sat around the fire the river flow went from 1500 cfs to 21,000 cfs. We were all of a sudden moving camp upslope with urgency. By the time we settled down for the night it was back down to 6,000. Pretty psycho flows.

Selfie with fan palms.

RJ came up to join us for Andy's birthday.  Another selfie required.

Hot springs on a cool day. Very nice.

Our great discovery this trip was that once you are up to speed, you can set the motor handle down and walk up to the front deck. Relatively modest shifting of weight from side to side steers the boat quite effectively. It's really fun and gets you away from the puttering of the motor. Dory surfing. Love it.