Was up and headed over to my friends house by 10:00 this morning.  The group of us going to Montana on a canoe trip in a couple weeks were all meeting together to discuss food and gear as well as to have a nice paddle for a couple of hours. I arrived a little early because I wanted to see the progress that had been made to my friends house since the last time I had visited. They had completely remodeled their kitchen and stripped out all the carpet from the main floor. Instead they had installed new tile in the kitchen and new hardwood laminate flooring in the rest of the house. It looked wonderful to me, even though there was still a bit of work still to be done. I really like the kitchen layout they came up with, as well as the colors they had picked for counter tops, tile and trim. Can't wait to see it fully complete.

    Everyone who is going on the trip, six of us, were soon there, as well as a couple of other friends who stopped in just to say hello. I had a chance to finally paddle with my friend, and canoeing partner for the first time, Stephanie. Steph has been a friend of mine and all the other 'boat people' for several years now as she lives across the street from my friends Tom and Donna. But she has never been on a canoeing trip with any of us before, so it was perfect that she wanted to go and that I needed to have a canoe partner. Plus, she and Donna have been practicing for several weeks now, so she is certainly past that novice stage already. We had a good time paddling up and down the lake a bit, and even though the wind was blowing pretty good, we didn't have any problem going where we needed to go.

    We also took her dog, Lucy, along with us for the ride. Lucy is a wonderful golden retriever who is just starting to get use to the idea that once in the boat she should stay there no matter what interesting thing might be occurring elsewhere. In our case it was a young coyote that appeared on the shoreline and tantalized her into taking notice. Steph was able to keep her in the boat by bribing her with treats however, so I think we will be okay on the trip.

    Also saw all kinds of water birds along the shoreline today including several great blue herons, an egret a few cormorants and lots of ducks and geese. There was also a red tailed hawk (?) that flew over us at one point carrying a foot long snake in its talons. Pretty cool!

    We all had a nice picnic style lunch of sandwiches, chips and fruit with cold beer and ice tea to go along with it all. After satisfying our hunger, the six of us going on the trip settled down to discussing the up coming trip. For Tom, Donna and I it must of seemed pretty routine as we have all done this 150 mile section of river so many times over the past 40+ years. Tom alone has done it more than 40 times and I lost count somewhere in the mid 30's. Donna, being just a youngster is only in the high 20's we figure. But for the other three, John and Caroline and Steph this is all brand new for them. Lucky for us all Tom has become a master at organizing these kinds of trips, so he has printed lists and directions and all the required info for doing a trip solo or with a group of 40. Me, I just sit back and watch as he does all the work at this stage.

    Probably the most important part of the whole meeting was deciding who was bringing and cooking what for each of our dinners. Each canoe is going to be responsible for providing, cooking and cleaning up for two complete dinners for the whole group. So we all made sure we weren't bring the same thing for each night. A good selection of different meals that always taste great no matter what, while you are on the river.

    The rest of the meals, breakfast and lunch, are the responsibility of each individual, or group of two. So Steph and I still need to discuss what we want to do about those meals. I doubt she really wants to share in my ideal breakfast or lunch as I'm a bit of a minimalist when it comes to those things. A pop-tart and some canned fruit for breakfast and some tuna or smoked oysters in a tortilla for lunch. That and a lot of Kool-Aid and I'm a pretty happy camper. On the other hand I can also do meals that are a bit more involved so we will have to talk about what we want to do later on this trip.

    Had meant to go up to Fort Collins to my cousins place for a bar-b-q this afternoon. But by the time we were done with our meeting it was already late afternoon and I just didn't feel like driving all that way. Especially as it looked like the front range was going to get hit by some big thunderstorms again this afternoon and evening. So I returned to Marge and George's where I spent a very nice early evening reading my book, taking a nap and then watching a couple really old, 1950's, movies that they had.

    Had planned on working on photo's yet tonight as I am really falling behind on them right now. But it is already late and I need to be up reasonably early to go visit some friends I haven't seen yet. They want me to come look at a structural issue they are having on a remodel project of their own, and then we are going to head off to some lunch at a little Mexican restaurant near them. I really love my friends!