Working on the Schedule

We are working on a tentative list of waterways for the 20 excursions. Ernest Herndon's book Canoeing Mississippi is coming in very handy.

See Rivers and Regions for more on the scheduling effort.

How you can help

Thanks for taking a look at this page. As the success of the project goes, this is probably the most important one of them all . . . you!

See the How You Can Help page

Early-Onset Alzheimer's and Mixed Dementia added to Social Security Administration's "Compassionate Allowances"

Social Security has an obligation to provide benefits quickly to applicants whose medical conditions are so serious that their conditions obviously meet disability standards.

Compassionate allowances are a way of quickly identifying diseases and other medical conditions that invariably qualify under the Listing of Impairments based on minimal objective medical information. Compassionate allowances allow Social Security to quickly target the most obviously disabled individuals for allowances based on objective medical information that we can obtain quickly.

Commissioner Astrue has held five Compassionate Allowance public outreach hearings. The hearings were on rare diseases, cancers, traumatic brain injury (TBI) and stroke, and early-onset Alzheimer's disease and related dementias. Most recently, a fifth hearing was held in San Francisco on schizophrenia.

Read More at the Social Security Administration Website

Orange Beach Canoe Trail Map

Orange Beach Canoe Trail Map

If you decide to go, here is a great map with put in/take out spots for paddlers.

Have fun!

Trip Log-Orange Beach: I was never a Boy Scout, but now I get it.

Looking out at Ono Island from the balcony of the condo where I am residing on Perdido Key it is easy to assume the island has been tamed. The 8-mile long barrier has one house after another competing for a gawker’s attention like rows of contestants standing on a pageant stage. Ono has its own municipal government, its own infrastructure, water, and a Fire Department. It also has several interior canals for water traffic, further allowing for the use of every square inch of space to be used by boat owning homeowners. But the order ends at the water’s edge, especially on a slightly windy day, and especially on the northeastern end of the island.

Ono Island is bordered by Bayou St. John to the north and Old River to the south. The Perdido River pushes into Bayou St. John from further north via Perdido Bay. The river has only two small areas to escape to the Gulf of Mexico, Perdido Pass to the west or Dolphin Pass to the east. At Dolphin Pass the waters of Perdido must squeeze through to Big Lagoon that lies south of Pensacola at the Naval Air Station. Shifting tides and big boats that use the water ways means that someone in a kayak with a nonworking rudder has to pay attention.

Old River is somewhat protected from these confluence of currents by the island itself, which may be why the island was originally named Orinoco by the Spanish in the 15^th century, meaning “a place to paddle.” As I write this morning from the balcony with coffee in hand overlooking Old River at least 6 paddlers have already passed; five in one group were being directed by a coach from a small motor boat, and one gentleman paddled by several minutes later in a beautiful shiny wooden kayak. 

A paddler enjoys the calm waters and confines of Old River on a Sunday morning excursion. 

The dolphins like Old River, too. Thanks to the generosity of friends, my family stays at this same spot every trip to Coastal Alabama and the dolphins never fail to show up to entertain the kids while feeding in the shallow waters. From this vantage point Old River is tranquil and welcoming. So, it is with a lackadaisical attitude that my wife and I hopped in our Wilderness Tsunami Kayaks around 1:00 pm for a short two hour trip. We made no particular plans except to take a quick look at a map online. We’d be back in plenty of time to shower, and prep the redfish we purchased for grilling that evening.


That was our first mistake.


Big open water is a lot like big open spaces on land. Distance is tough to estimate. I can recall as a young man walking the row crops of my father’s farm and thinking how close the trees looked on the far end of the field. You could sometimes walk blisters on your feet and still be barely half-way across.

We paddled west out of Old River around the end of Ono and north towards a peninsula that juts out to help form Terry Cove to west. After stopping to enjoy a flock of around 50 pelicans on one of the uninhabited islands that dots the water north of Perdido Pass, we hugged the north shore of Terry Cove, paddling past the Orange Beach Marina.

A few of the 50 or more pelicans can no longer resist the urge to take flight when my kayak closes in.

Nice little tour. And it should have ended there. At that point we could have easily back paddled, or maybe went south to Cottons Bayou and around a couple of other small islands. Then we could have headed home to a cold beer and the smell of a preheating grill.

But, we didn’t do that.

My wife and I have always enjoyed hopping in the car with no specific plan to drive and sightsee. But, that attitude can get you in trouble on the water with the sun dropping, and the temperature with it. We were thinking—that is thinking and not knowing— that we could easily make it all the way around the north side of Ono. The thought was that we would circle the eastern tip and head west on Old River, but we were paddling into waters we did not know.


That was the second mistake.

A few hours earlier, prior to launching our boats we took a short look at an online map and paid no attention to mileage. It simply looked doable. But, looks can be deceiving. If real life were as easy as a map I wouldn’t spend time sitting in traffic most mornings. It’s all about the unforeseen.

After paddling the north shore of Bayou St. John, we crossed from the peninsula that bordered Perdido Bay south to the Peninsula that protects Goat Bayou on Ono Island. Here is where the water began to get choppy, where the cold brackish water and the big power boats had little concern for a boat without a controllable rudder.   But I didn’t stop to notice the signs. We soldiered on.


A closer look at the map (post trip) shows that the north side of Ono squeezes the waters of Perdido River via Perdido Bay into less than a quarter mile. Then it further narrows at Dolphin Pass. We were caught in some heavy churn here that caused us to seek refuge and possibly another passage to Old River through a series of man-made canals for the islands homeowners. But, with no outlet found and at least another hour lost, we had to leave those safe confines and again hit the churn of Perdido. I made a not-very-popular-decision with my travelling companion; we would continue east around the tip of Ono and then get to Old River as quickly as possible.  I figured with the wind and current behind us we would make good time, much better than if we attempted to back paddle facing the wind and the current, and my wife was complaining that she was wearing down.

Sharon is pleasantly distracted with a playful dolphin off the northeastern shoreline of Ono Island. Notice the increasingly choppy waters.

Her dissatisfaction with the decision was momentarily forgotten when a dolphin came within a few feet to get a closer look, and I pushed ahead to negate any attempts at lobbying on her part. By the time I slowed and she caught up, we were too far along to go back. As we reached the eastern tip of Ono, she began to relax, but with the sun setting the temperature was dropping fast. I had to make another quick decision. We weren’t going to make it the full 7 mile length of Old River back to the condo. So, I headed south toward Perdido Key State Park, and as close to Highway 292 as quickly as possible. Again, she began lobbying, but again as my fingers went numb from the plunging temperatures, I pushed ahead.

I quickly unpacked my phone from the dry pack upon hitting the sands of the Park, called my oldest son Isaac to instruct him to drive east, helped my now arriving wife from her boat, and trudged the quarter mile of dunes, sea oats and briars having learned a valuable lesson.

From now on, no matter how easy it looks, I’ll print and take a map with me to be sure I have easy access to the lay of the land. Things look different on the water. I’ll stop and consider the signs around me. I’ll take the time to fix a problem with my gear, like a loose rudder, before I launch. And, I’ll always know that a quick and easy 5-mile trip can unexpectedly turn into a difficult 15-miler with one bad decision.

A couple of good books from a couple of my new friends.

Leather Britches: Kayaking couple plan Alzheimer’s fundraiser

Keith Plunkett of Flora was kayaking Chunky River with his wife Sharon last fall when he had an idea: What if he could find a way to pursue his hobby while raising funds for a worthy cause ?

The result is a project he calls Lucy’s Revenge, in memory of his late grandmother Lucy Plunkett, who died in 1993 after suffering 10 years with Alzheimer’s.

“I thought, this was a great way to give back to my grandmother, because she was a very big part of my life,” said Plunkett, 39. On Thursday, Plunkett met for a brainstorming session with several people he thought could help with the project. They included Patty Dunn, state operations director for the Alzheimer’s Association; Laura Mann, producer and director for Mississippi Public Broadcasting; Mike Jones, program manager for the Mississippi Division of Tourism; Paul Collins, director of park operations for the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks; and David Hales, Plunkett’s longtime friend who will serve as technological consultant.

Read More--McComb Enterprise-Journal

First I Had To Convince Myself

When I first made the call to Ernest Herndon asking his advice on the project. I halfway expected some answer that would convince me to forget this.

I didn't get it.

What I got was an enthusiastic supporter with plenty of ideas of his own. I received the same response from Patty Dunn and Ian McDonald at the Mississippi Chapter of the Alzheimer's Association. I have received the same response from everyone I have spoken with. So, it looks like this is happening. And for that, I am grateful.

In the first post to this blog, I want to go back and take a look at my initial hashing. I find it helpful to write "stream of concsciousness" and then go back and edit. My apologies if I missed something.


January 24, 2010

I love to think and ponder far more than I love to write. From time to time, when my mind is quiet enough to conclude it, I come to the realization that it is of no use to anyone—especially myself—that I won’t bring myself to write down my thoughts. I mean, it’s an undeniable fact that I have no real mental capacity to retain much information. It stands to reason the only way really to hang on to my thoughts is to commit them to paper, or database. Whatever the medium, I need to get it down.

I tried this journaling thing before. It worked well to help me commit things to memory. Amazing how simply writing something down will do that. Writing has a tendency to make me think on a deeper level, too. Maybe, subconsciously, that scares me. Because thinking it is one thing, writing it another. But, sharing it?

Sometimes ignorance is bliss. However, to me that is not the case when it comes to this. I want to commit to this, and when my mind is quiet enough to bring me back to finally deciding to do it, I know it is a good idea.

It may especially be a good idea now as I seem to have finally wrapped my brain around the idea of the Alzheimer’s Paddling Project. I’ll need to loosen the grip my own shortcomings have on me to make that project work. The idea is to work with the Alzheimer’s Association to raise money through all of my kayaking over the next year. It works on so many levels. It gives me so many positive things to promote; first of all Alzheimer’s awareness and the need to fight the disease. Secondly, the life lessons I learned from Mamaw. Her suffering with Alzheimer’s began for me the realization that it was a genetic condition that I would likely one day face. I want—I need to face it now, in this way, on my terms. Many of my Aunts, Uncles and Cousins have dealt with it or are currently dealing with it. Thirdly, as I have paddled more over the course of the past 6 months I now know the wealth of paddling opportunities that abound in Mississippi and the surrounding states. This could be good to promote the health and continued vitality of those waterways, and the incredible towns and historic sites that are found along the way. In just a short time, Sharon and I have seen so much. It boggles my mind to think what else could come of it.

What has helped me to finally make the leap has been that Sha is now on board as an adviser and more importantly paddling companion. She worried that somehow I would ruin our new found hobby by turning into a venture, as opposed to an adventure. I couldn’t and wouldn’t have done it without her support.

So, tomorrow I will again make the calls that I initially planned to make four weeks ago. Ernest Herndon, canoe enthusiast and author of a great many books on paddling in Mississippi (I’m still not sure I’ve seen them all). The Alzheimer’s Association, of course, whose Director and Project Development Director thought this was a great idea from the start. They think we can get corporate sponsors to help in the effort. Ian McDonald, development director, mentioned Bass Pro and Academy Sports. I think maybe I can get Primos involved and who knows who else we can add to the list. We’ll see how that comes together after the first meeting. Scott Williams, outdoor writer, kayak builder, and experimental survivalist who has paddled the Gulf Coast and— the idea of it still amazes me—from the Florid Keys to the Virgin Islands . . . amazing! Mississippi Public Broadcasting, who I hope I can sell the idea to as a way to promote the fundraising for Alzheimer’s, but also to highlight the special places it will take me. Malcolm White, the director of the Mississippi Arts Commission, who paddled the Pearl River from Edinburgh to I-don’t-know-where to raise money for I-don’t-remember-what 10 years ago.

Of course, there will need to be a website and a blog which brings me back to my original thinking when I began writing this. I’ve got to keep writing. I can’t get intellectually lazy. This will be fun to be sure. But, it also requires commitment to make it happen the way it needs to happen in order to get the job done. I can’t keep the experience bottled up in my head where it will likely disappear. One day at a time.

So, Onward and Upward!

January 26, 2010

I’m at home with Rickey this morning. The stomach virus made a comeback and got him again last night. The poor boy is never going to make up his school work at this rate. But, he acts a little more bright-eyed than he was earlier this morning and that’s a good sign. Sharon has to speak at a luncheon today, so the duty to be home with Rickey falls to me today. Maybe it’s all for the best as I have been fighting dizziness for the past two days anyway. I’m still not back to a hundred percent. I don’t think I realized that until yesterday at work when I had a few bouts with vertigo.

I’ve been thinking a lot more about the spiritual aspects of my decision to dedicate the next year to the Alzheimer’s Paddling Project. Oswald Chambers, my favorite devotion writer, simply says it is up to us to “work out what God works in”. This has been a basic tenant of my personal Faith for many years now. In short, what it means to me is that we all are given a piece to a greater puzzle that we know nothing about, in fact, can’t even fathom its depths and complexity.

If God allows us to all have only a piece of the puzzle, then life, His Life, can only open up to us over time. Answers can only be provided to us when we keep our hearts open to hear and except them for the truth that they are. You can’t spin Reality. It simply is. And what appears to be is that God is working the circumstances into my life to do this project. I am attempting to work out the details. It could all change tomorrow, and if my Faith is what I hope it is, I will be prepared to make that change. If led, I should follow. I want this project to be not only an exercise in fundraising and awareness, but an exercise in Faith.

I was thinking yesterday on the drive home from the office about the similarities between art and nature, and why when I am paddling out to Deer Island or down the Chunky River or simply sitting on a deer stand watching the sun rise it feels as if I am surrounded by something so much greater and more important than me. My question to myself was: Why do I draw inspiration and strength from it?

This is what I came up with.

All of us are built to draw inspiration from something aren’t we? Something that is simple in its complexity? In a story, a writer must bring together the complexities of the characters, their likes and dislikes, their circumstances in life. Those complexities are pitted against, run in contrast to, and parallel those in the other characters, and all with the backdrop of some potential problem to solve or conundrum to understand. Then there is the setting, or place in which the story takes place and how it affects the characters, the problems they face and the give and take of how it is concluded, or whether it ever concludes. Also, the addition of metaphor is an important addition—it’s no wonder people get caught up in and inspired by a good book or movie.

The same can be said of visual art in its many complexities, and of course, my favorite: music. To me there is nothing more spiritual or more inspirational than music. The different instruments, notes, and sounds, topped off with thought provoking lyrics is the ultimate in manmade expression. But, add to that the thing that can’t be seen or understood through intellectual interpretation of facts; the melody that draws out of us an emotion that is unexplainable. To me music is faith. You can’t explain. You just have to believe in what it is saying to you.

But all of these manmade expressions are but pieces of a puzzle, pieces that contribute but can’t stand alone as the final solution to understanding. None can come close to the level of complexity found in nature. None can come close to the level of symbiosis that makes the final work, with untold numbers of parts, come together and work to such a fine degree that it seems simple. Nature does this. Nature has the ingredients of all of mans best expressions and more. The rock strewn babbling turn in the river ahead, the wind blowing the fragile leaves of a birch tree holding on for dear life, the cypress tree gnarled from some untold high-drama battle with a thunderstorm, the deer swimming across downstream on some never to be explained journey, the colors of the sun setting and the reflections of everything the light touches, and even the shadows from where the light has already passed. The seasons, of course, affect the colors, the sounds and the story. There are the scents, the breath of the heat, and the bite of the cold.

Then, there’s us.

The history of man to tame and use nature is of course part of the story, part of the painting, part of the song. But, it is less because of man’s ability to make changes and more because of the persistence of nature to change us. Even when dramatic manmade changes have occurred, nature has not given in. She has forced us to compromise, and as a result has had a profound effect on our culture and our history. Nature has elements of faith, too. We have to pray for understanding, because no matter what we think we really have no control.

How we fit into the awesome complexity of the natural world is yet another ingredient that makes the finished product worth our while, that is if we quiet our mind and truly experience it. Only then can we be molded by the greatest of Artists to be notes in the most beautiful symphony, characters in the most beautiful story, and get a front row seat to view the most beautiful painting ever produced.

Individually we only hold a small piece of the puzzle. So, interpreting nature requires God, and it requires Faith, because the power can never be fully understood.

How I pass this one of my simple truths along to others through this project is of great importance to me. And first I must figure a way to explain it to the others during our upcoming meeting. In the end, I may just have to read this to them.