Friday Afternoon at the River

We left work an hour early on Friday, a little perk we usually get

before a holiday, which gave me time to stop at the store and 

pick up a picnic dinner before jumping into the boat on the 

only dry day of the long weekend.  

I tucked my hair up in a cap and packed my towel

and some necessities that I might need.  You never

know how wet you might get or how cool the breeze

may be, even if your own backyard is pretty hot.

My husband is the boat driver.

I hate the ride, just hate it, because we travel through

water that is only inches deep and we're going pretty fast to do it.

When the river's deep, I love it.  I can face forward, 

uncover my eyes and enjoy the view!

We traveled light this time, knowing we would be there only

a few hours in the late afternoon when the sun would start

to go behind the hills and shade the beaches.  The water was cold,

too cold to take a swim that day, so we sat on the beach,

opened the cooler and dined on hard salami, crackers,

cheese, fruit and a selection of olives from Dierberg's olive bar.

(a very nice grocery store in St Louis)

There were green ones, giant green ones stuffed with blue cheese,

kalamata olives, feta cheese crumbles, marinated peppers and 

small chunks of hard parmesean, all in wonderful olive oil.

Even though it was a holiday weekend, we had the place to ourselves.

Hardly any boaters were on the river that early.  There were a few

jet skis and a boat here and there but for the most part it was quiet.

After a bit we knew we had to head back so we could

wait our turn to put out.  We could take a slower ride home

and look at all the vines and wildlife, in fact an eagle flew over

with another bird chasing it!  We talked to a guy setting

out jugs for fishing and watched people setting up 

their camping spots on the gravel bars with car access.

It's almost always pretty there, really pretty in the snow

but I have been on the river in snow maybe once or twice before.

We caught the sun at just perfectly to capture the reflection

of the bank on the glassy water.  

The next few days were almost completely rainy, a continuous,

steady rain that we needed.  It must have soaked in well since

we didn't see any flooding but our culvert filled up and that is a 

sure sign that we have had a lot of rain!

I hope your holiday weekend was very nice if you celebrate the 4th of July 

from wherever you are reading.  Sometimes I forget that I work for an 

international company and would return to e-mails from other countries

where they were not off work Monday but take a holiday that corresponds

to their country.  I'm thinking we need to be diverse and celebrate everyone's 

holidays (with a day off work!).  I'll even write a paper on their holiday.

So far the company hasn't taken me up on it!