Day 19 Blog post: Teresa Musick

Riding in the van back to Brevard

Can't believe we've come so far

From night time rain- waking up in puddles

To night time rain-waking up in puddles?

The circle is complete, but the journey will not cease.

The memories and lessons learned

The laughter and long river days

Will continue to fill our minds,

If only to calm our longing hearts

To return to the simplicity of nature,

To drown in its ever flowing, over coming current,

To live in those moments- not blinking, not missing a second.

 

We will all eventually long for those days to return;

When our passion for the river was first lit,

When all we had to do was "paddle damn-it."

 

The last line is a shout out to Monty, your saying got us through many long days on the river!

 

So our journey is over, we made it through that final long and hot van ride back to Brevard and up that familiar hill to Ross hall. We all worked hard and diligently to clean up the boats and cook-ware and other group gear that desperately needed attention. After setting up tents to dry out for possibly the first time in 20 days, we got hit with a rain storm that didn't decide to let up until the rest of clean-up was complete. Chelsea, Austin, Jenny and I worked on breaking-down and re-setting up the tents back inside. Chelsea and I decided that the true test of setting up a tent was doing it in a closed and small setting, aka in the classrooms of Ross Hall. That was a whole other challenge in itself. We were the last people to finish clean-up, which in total only took us a little over two hours! Our final de-brief was an emotional one, with lots of hugs and teary eyes, it was hard to say good bye to the people we have grown so close to in such a small window of time.

 

Reflecting back on our journey, I am so impressed with each and everyone on the trip. We all overcame some sort of challenge and did it with a smile; we stayed positive as a group and really supported one another. I am so thankful to have been a part of such an important trip. So this is it, the closing blog entry to our trip, I hope everyone enjoyed following our progress on the Yadkin- Pee Dee river!