Thursday, June 26, 2008
Now we're camping!
Today was a great day. Patty went grocery shopping in the morning while I made breakfast, cleaned up and packed up. Then we headed south out of Bozeman on Hwy 191. We stopped at the first national forest campground we came to, Greek Creek to see if they had any campsites. The second loop had only three sites and they were all available. They’re all along the Gallatin river which is raging very high. We took a site and at 10:00 at night are still the only ones in this area. It’s a picture book setting in the Montana wilderness along a raging river in a deep valley.
And the campsite isn’t the best of it. We had arranged for a white water rafting trip along the Gallatin river. As of yesterday we were planning on a “full-day” trip with rafting before lunch and after lunch. The top half of the run is supposed to be very mellow and good for sightseeing, and the bottom half is class III rapids. Yesterday we called the company (Montana Whitewater) to change to a 1/2 day trip because we felt we had been pushing too hard to get from place to place, and the extra 4 hours seemed like it would really help. They were fine with changing to an afternoon only, but they told us we could only do the top, sightseeing section because of our young kids. They said the lower section with the really high water was just too dangerous to run with young kids. We very reluctantly agreed to go anyway.
Today when we arrived at 1:00, they said they had talked about it and decided that they’d let us do the more challenging section and put us in a boat with their best guide. I’ve done a fair bit of rafting over the years and know that a good guide can make all the difference, so Patty and I talked it over and decided to go for it. We were both pretty worried that it would be too much for the kids and that one of them would fall in and have a miserable time.
Before we started Jessica was pretty nervous. We put her right in the middle of the boat with a rope to hold on to. Kate and Kelly were in the rear on either side just in front of the guide. Another man and myself were in the two front positions, and Patty and another woman were behind us. After we hit the first significant rapid, I turned back and checked on Jessie, worried that she would want to bail out. Instead she had a huge grin on her now drenched face. :) In summary, the ride was a huge success. It was an impressive stretch of river. We went 14 miles down in less than 2 hours. There were numerous class III rapids with big waves and one class IV. Compared to other rivers I’ve been on with class III-V rapids, this had less variety - no rocks to dodge, not many trees to avoid, almost no holes to swallow you up, but it had huge waves and our guide hit most of them head on. I was drenched, Jessie was drenched and we all had a blast.
Along the way we floated past our campsite where we returned after the ride was over. We had a beautiful evening with a bbq dinner and a nice fire. This is my idea of camping. Beautiful location, not many people, fun activity. I’m a happy camper. :) You can check out a couple of shots here.
Sadly, tomorrow morning we leave for Glacier National Park where we’ll meet up with my parents again.
I don’t know when I’ll be able to upload this...
And the campsite isn’t the best of it. We had arranged for a white water rafting trip along the Gallatin river. As of yesterday we were planning on a “full-day” trip with rafting before lunch and after lunch. The top half of the run is supposed to be very mellow and good for sightseeing, and the bottom half is class III rapids. Yesterday we called the company (Montana Whitewater) to change to a 1/2 day trip because we felt we had been pushing too hard to get from place to place, and the extra 4 hours seemed like it would really help. They were fine with changing to an afternoon only, but they told us we could only do the top, sightseeing section because of our young kids. They said the lower section with the really high water was just too dangerous to run with young kids. We very reluctantly agreed to go anyway.
Today when we arrived at 1:00, they said they had talked about it and decided that they’d let us do the more challenging section and put us in a boat with their best guide. I’ve done a fair bit of rafting over the years and know that a good guide can make all the difference, so Patty and I talked it over and decided to go for it. We were both pretty worried that it would be too much for the kids and that one of them would fall in and have a miserable time.
Before we started Jessica was pretty nervous. We put her right in the middle of the boat with a rope to hold on to. Kate and Kelly were in the rear on either side just in front of the guide. Another man and myself were in the two front positions, and Patty and another woman were behind us. After we hit the first significant rapid, I turned back and checked on Jessie, worried that she would want to bail out. Instead she had a huge grin on her now drenched face. :) In summary, the ride was a huge success. It was an impressive stretch of river. We went 14 miles down in less than 2 hours. There were numerous class III rapids with big waves and one class IV. Compared to other rivers I’ve been on with class III-V rapids, this had less variety - no rocks to dodge, not many trees to avoid, almost no holes to swallow you up, but it had huge waves and our guide hit most of them head on. I was drenched, Jessie was drenched and we all had a blast.
Along the way we floated past our campsite where we returned after the ride was over. We had a beautiful evening with a bbq dinner and a nice fire. This is my idea of camping. Beautiful location, not many people, fun activity. I’m a happy camper. :) You can check out a couple of shots here.
Sadly, tomorrow morning we leave for Glacier National Park where we’ll meet up with my parents again.
I don’t know when I’ll be able to upload this...
# posted by Craig @ 10:00 PM 
