Saying Good-bye to this 1Woman3Great Rivers Blog Site.

The Great Missouri River-2013

The Great Mississippi River-2016

The Yukon River-I’ll be traveling from the right side to the left, ending up at the Bering Sea…exciting!

Join me at LoveYourBigMuddy.com going forward. I’ve exported all of my posts from this site to LoveYourBigMuddy. The last post I added on this blog site was two years ago yesterday when I left Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, for Atlin Lake and the Lewellyn Glacier, British Columbia, the Yukon River’s source. It was nearly impossible to post anything on the Yukon because of its remoteness. (Satellite posts were accomplished on my Expedition Facebook page, but I could not post photos unless I had WiFi, but that was a struggle to get access to as well. You can visit that FB page and go to 2017, June through July, to follow that trip.) SO NOW, I am consolidating and going full-scale LoveYourBigMuddy blog again. It is hard enough maintaining one blog, but TWO? Impossible for me.

A lot of chapters have opened up in my life since completing the three Great Rivers Expeditions. I’ve been teaching 7th grade Science, changing school districts, guiding on the Mississippi, participating in river cleanups, visiting friends and family in California, and suffering through four years of chronic back pain.

This summer I am going to start writing my book about the LoveYourBigMuddy Expedition. I’ll be recovering from back surgery beginning in two weeks, so the time is right. My brother, Jim Sullens, will help me with editing, and I’ve received a lot of good advice from author friends of mine. Also, sharing stories from the journey recently have made me realize that I have A LOT of stories to tell. Then, there is the Mississippi AND the Yukon Rivers!

I’ll be in the river town of New Haven, MO, this weekend (May 4, 2019) for Miller Landing Days, a celebration of their historic culture and river history. I am listed as ‘story telling’ so that will be another avenue of review and preparation for writing. I’ll have t-shirts available to give away, or for a small donation.

I hope to share my progress on my LoveYourBigMuddy blog, hopefully getting it revved up again. I hope to post stories and photos to document further the adventure of it all. It may very well be that I have several chapters just on the first few days of the trip. I mean, a broken radiator, sleeping in our car at a truck stop in Wyoming after taking a wrong turn in a blizzard, a 6-hour ski into the source at the Continental Divide turned into 30 hours with no means for fire, food, or sleeping gear, day one on the water I nearly swamped my boat in a strainer and sprained my hand getting out of that mess, and the next day I ran into a shoreline snag on two different occasions, and popped TWO holes in my boat! SO MANY STORIES!

Join and follow at LoveYourBigMuddy Expedition blog site, and/or FB page. Please feel free to provide comments and ask questions. This will be my last post on this site.

The Yukon River-I’ll be traveling from the right side to the left, ending up at the Bering Sea…exciting!

Sunset at Red’s Landing, north of St. Louis

Mississippi’s grand exit into the Gulf of Mexico

Thank you Lisa, and everyone at Eddyline, for your continued support of my loveyourbigmuddy expedition, and now 1woman3greatrivers project. You have always been there to help me out, and for that I am hugely grateful.

Arriving at Sunset ramp in Rock Island, Monday, June 20. Nearly a month has gone by since starting on May 25, 2016. Wow, how time flies!

My good friend and paddling partner to the Twin Cities, Bill Nedderman, was a happy man when the DNR camp was situated next to the Grand Rapids library. He loves libraries!

Sunrise camped on an island. So lovely to wake up to.

December Chill

 

1Woman3GreatRivers-The Great River Yukon

You can follow my progress using my SPOT tracker, just like my other expeditions. Click on this link to access tracking. You will find my messages posted on my loveyourbigmuddy expedition page. My concern is power as i do not have my solar panel this time. SPOT takes batteries so i can keep it going. I will post messages using my satellite communicator. I should be back in Whitehorse in a couple weeks. I hope to work out kinks by then. Cheers all! Heading to Atlin in an hour so it may be a Monday splash. Going with the flow!!!

You may have to copy and paste in your browser…

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspotsf.jsp?glId=0OTk9yFHNQST7X80jJqUupDAcer3Aja7D

Let the adventure begin! I have arrived in Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada.

I arrived in Whitehorse yesterday, but nothing boring about the trip.

I will post here some of my Facebook “LoveYourBigMuddy Expedition” page posts because that is my main media for sharing.

Here we go…

I practiced packing in the kayak Tuesday morning. The foldable kayak is only 14′, three feet shorter than my other boat, Blue Moon. And, the owner who loaned it to me is a minimalist, of which i am NOT. I think i did pretty good for my practice run.

I made it in time to the airport for a burger before departure, but international search was cumbersome:

Air Canada would not let me on the plane b/c two minutes late because i was redirected through security for 3 ounces of water in my water bottle. I ‘missed’ my flight!! Let the adventure begin!! (I was actually quite ticked off!)

There’s my plane, six minutes past departure time, still sitting there, without me on it.

BUT THEN, as soon as i sat back down after photo-journaling the incident, they came and got me, something about couldn’t find my bags (4 of them, mind you!), and the plane had to be delayed. So, off i went, now quite polite, and slept all the way to Toronto. 

Whew! Close call. Must’ve been angels on the wings…

The whole flight scheduled took 19 hours, three flights: St. Louis to Toronto to Vancouver (eight-hour layover) to Whitehorse. The flights were all wonderful, but best of all was the last segment to Whitehorse:

The magic is beginning to swirl around the expedition. I was blessed with another perfect flight on Canada Air AND a port-side seat looking west. We flew RIGHT OVER Atlin Lake, Llewelyn Glacier, and the Atlin River which is my exit stream off Atlin Lake. Oh, the thrill was incredible!!! Kid in a candy shop! WOW!

Teresa Island and the wind-protected route (right side) up to the glacier (top and center). The town of Atlin is left of Teresa Island out of the photo.

The source i am headed to is Llewelyn Glacier in the upper center of the photo. SO AWESOME!

On Saturday i will get dropped off at Warren Bay, which is just out of the photo on the left side. I will paddle up the shoreline, through those little islands, then over to Llewelyn Inlet, there in the center. I’d like to camp there, and hike up the mile or two to the glacier if i can. Back down (i’ll actually be headed north) behind Teresa Island to the Atlin River where i will exit Atlin Lake.

Next Lake is Tagish, which was showing some signs of glacial waters.

Well, there’s a bit of ice, but it won’t last long with the gorgeous weather forecasted. Tagish Lake

I am camped now with a rental car and gathering the very lasy of my gear, trying not to accumulate too much. I picked up a new canister of Bear Spray, and a wool blend shirt for cold nights. I bought a burger and fries last night, YUM, and a Starbuck’s coffee this morning, YUM, after trying to get a shower in, but no darn hot water.

Feeling good now, at the library watching the river go by, Yukon River, that is, and squeezing in one last blog post. Earlier i sat by the river by camp and wrote this post:

The Great River Yukon making a couple twists and turns before presenting itself to the city of Whitehorse. Of course, there IS a paved path in a sweeping multi-mile loop up and down both sides of the river, with vista benches strategically placed, bicycles content to carry their happy riders, strollers with tiny passengers who are comforted by the babbling of their river sibling, dogs with swinging tails walking their obedient owners, joggers jogging, and walkers chatting.

Whitehorse is a hard-core river town in the middle of the Yukon wilderness. Life is ‘in’ the ‘outdoors’ (at least in the summer), as it should be. Strive to love what YOU do, inside and out, and do what you love.

Peace Out. Fasten your seat belts. We’re going on an adventure!!!

A Quick Review of the First Couple of Weeks on the Mighty Mississippi

The source of the Mississippi River at Lake Itasca, MN. A Great River’s humble beginnings.

 

 

The Mighty Mississippi starts as a small stream little more than half the width of my 17′ boat. May 25, 2016

First camp of many provided by Minnesota DNR (Dept. of Natural Resources). These camps usually came with picnic table, mowed grass, and a potty (some much more unique than others). This one even had a little half-cabin shelter! We didn’t see any more of those after the first couple of camps.

My good friend and paddling partner to the Twin Cities, Bill Nedderman, was a happy man when the DNR camp was situated next to the Grand Rapids library. He loves libraries!

The Mighty Mississippi, still small enough to throw a ball across.

 

Love Your River, For it is Truly Great.

They don’t call it the “Big Muddy” for nothing, that’s for sure. Haha!

The Great Missouri River is referred to as the Big Muddy. But, hey, so is the Great Mississippi River. As numerous paddlers of both rivers know quite well, these two rivers can be, indeed, quite muddy. While paddling down the Missouri River on my LoveYourBigMuddy Expedition in 2013, I have to admit the mud was abundant on the upper stretches, but silky soft and rather clean. I know, right?! “That’s impossible,” you say. I actually found that going barefoot in this mire of mud was the best way to go. Once in the boat my feet washed off easily, and off I went. That’s not to say that I wasn’t glad when the earth hardened up. Joy filled my soul with the simple pleasure of dirt, rocks and sand replacing the squishy brown muck.

In the Upper Missouri Breaks National Monument following a multi-day rain deluge

Ahhh, yes, the glorious sandy beaches of the lower Mississippi. Well, in 2013 they were glorious. 2015 was quite a different story with the river running flood stage all summer, and paddlers scrambling for dry land on which to sleep.

A Mississippi Blue Hole is great for a refreshing swim and/or careful bath. Blue Holes are created when the main river drops below the level of the sand bar, losing its connection with the pool. What a sand bar!!

I will be heading north to Lake Itasca, MN, the source of the Mississippi “Big Muddy” River, this May to begin a source-to-sea paddle of this other great river as part of my 1Woman3GreatRivers Project. My goal is to solo paddle the three longest rivers in North America. The Missouri River is the longest river on the continent at 2,540 miles, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), with the Mississippi coming in a close second at 2,320 miles (per Environmental Protection Agency-EPA). The third longest river is the Yukon River at 1,980 miles (per USGS), which I will attempt to paddle in 2017 from its source at Atlin Lake’s Llewellyn Glacier, to the Bering Sea. Yukon River means “Great River” in the Gwich’in language. “The Gwich’in are the northernmost Indian Nation living in fifteen small villages scattered across a vast area extending from northeast Alaska in the U.S. to the northern Yukon and Northwest Territories in Canada .” (http://ourarcticrefuge.org/about-the-gwichin/)  More about the Gwich’in Nation, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and my 2017 Yukon Pursuit later.

Yukon River

I look forward to paddling the entire Mississippi River this trip so I can understand more about our nation’s historic and cultural monument, and to build upon that very magical and personal relationship we started in 2013. Here is a video snippet from LoveYourBigMuddy Expedition taken in early November on the Lower Mississippi.  Love Your Big Mississippi  🙂

Now that I am teaching full time, my challenge is to complete my adventure in 60 days (70 days, perhaps, if we have no snow days), during my summer break. I am confident that my outcome will be successful and full of celebration, but my tempo will be vastly different from my Missouri River expedition, being challenged in strength, both physical and mental, and in endurance and stamina. Dictionary.com defines endurance as: “the ability or strength to continue or last, especially despite fatigue, stress, or other adverse conditions.” 

I say, “Bring it on”!!!

I hope you will join me on this journey down our continent’s Great River to the Gulf.

Live slow ~ Paddle fast

Peace and Love, Janet

Know your river. Touch your river. Love your river.