Saturday, July 11, 2020
We've been trying our best to find new things to do during the Coronavirus outbreak. Outside things are safer than indoor or crowded things. Well, it turns out that kayaking on the Elk River meets all the appropriate criteria: 1.) outside 2.) social distance and 3.) super fun with friends (Molly, Abby and Josie)!
We went to a place Molly knew about up on the Elk River near Clendenin. It took about 40 minutes to get there so it wasn't too far away. When we arrived, we got all checked in and chose our boats. Emily got a small whitewater kayak, Daniel got the green boat that I think belonged to the owner of the company and I took an orange boat that had space for our little cooler and dry box. And with that, we were off!
From time to time, we pulled the boats off of the river and let the kids swim and have "duckie wars." This is when Molly would flip her inflatable kayak over and the girls would climb on top and try to knock each other off. I think they liked that more than kayaking. They also liked swimming in the river. We had a gorgeous day and the current wasn't super strong (which was both good and bad, really).
We paddled about 4 miles from Queen Shoals down to Beulah and by the time we reached our destination, the kids were pretty tired. Turns out that the whitewater kayak that Emily got was really hard to control.
Once we were back on land, we were all really hungry so after we took off our gear and returned our boats, we headed to a local shop for lunch - Frostbite Dairy Bar! It was kind of cute and old fashioned. They had burgers, sandwiches, fries, really good onion rings and lots of ice cream and shakes!
We had so much fun that on our way home we had already started talking about when we might get to go again. I definitely think there will be more kayaking for us this summer. We had a blast!
