Sometimes what makes these trips so special are the little things.

Critters big and small are everywhere on the Chickasawhay River:




An abundance of minnows offer the mullet and other species of fish plenty to feed on in the Chickasawhay:



A school of mullet swimming upriver in the Chickasawhay at around Mile 12. The mullet are extremely aggressive in the East Mississippi river:

First paddle in East Mississippi Region will be longest yet.

I've just completed marking out my topo maps for the Trip On the Chick. This is going to be a heck of a trip. The weather apparently will be good, and the temps will be incredible. Sharon and I will need it, because the mileage I have measured is 86.51 miles.

The trip appears to have plenty of landmarks on the upper end. But, on the lower end, when our bodies are worn down and some landmarks would help our mental state, there will be none. The last 22 mile section has one landmark utility line to let us know we are two miles from the takeout. The other 20 miles is nothing but wilderness and sandbars. This one will be a test of our mental strength. I'll likely save a little battery for my GPS so I can have a fallback in case Sharon and I get ready to kill one another.

I took a moment last night to shoot a video in our garage after getting a few pictures of the signatures on the kayak. It's hard for me to believe that some of them will make it through a trip this daunting without scrubbing off. So, I wanted some shots to remember them all. You can see the pictures of the signatures on our Facebook Page.

Here's the video I shot. The lighting isn't great in the garage at night.