The Mighty Altamaha

The Nature Conservancy calls Altamaha River one of the last great places. Two weeks ago, lured by its serene beauty, I put down my kayak at Jaycee Landing and paddled up the gushing water. I was fighting the current like a cockroach being flushed down the toilet. Any normal person with a sound mind would have turned around and gone home, but my hard head kept me fighting upstream for an hour. When I finally decided to turn around, it took only 15 minutes to get back. I call it the Mighty Altamaha.

Looking at the map, I realized I had only seen one out of 138 miles of its meandering charm. I wanted to see more of the Mighty Altamaha, but I didn't want to be the cockroach again. So I tried to recruit several kayakers in order to do an A-to-B run and shuttle between the launch site and the end point. It was a good plan until everyone bailed out. Going on a river by myself never bothers me. It is the lack of a ride back to my truck that had me deeply concerned. Luckily Mike volunteered to give me a ride. I wanted to do a 16-mile stretch down the river, starting at Upper Wayne County Landing. From my last cockroach down the toilet experience, I estimated about four hours and asked Mike to pick me up at 5 p.m. at Jaycee Landing.

For a Chinese blond like me, getting to the launch site was a little more challenging than fighting the current. By the time I got my paddle wet, it was already 1:56. The day was as gorgeous as could be, considering the record low cold snap earlier in the week and the incessant rain we had the two days prior. Blue sky, sunshine, calm air, fast water, that was all the Mighty Altamaha offered and that was all I wanted. In the dead of the winter, the bald cypress looked utterly naked. The woodland was flooded and grey shadows casted on the black water. The deserted sand bank seemed striped of life. Messes of dried twigs made the high bluff feel desolate. Scrawny gum balls dangled from the forsaken sweet gum trees, hanging onto life that was already drained. Even the calls of the osprey that occasionally broke the silence sounded exhausted. This is the kind of tranquility that only exists when everything is dead and when time stands still. Below the water surface, the Mighty Altamaha was roaring with all the forces it had drawn from the land.

After 3 hours and 5 minutes of paddling, I landed at 5:01. Without a watch, that time was close enough. Mike was already waiting at Jaycee. One thing came to my mind: When the whole world bails out on me, Mike is there for me.

For more photos of the Mighty Altamaha, please visit my Altamaha album.