SCENIC FLOAT TRIP OUTSIDE MISSOULA, MONTANA
The trip was offered as an optional activity on a national conference of the American Academy of Attorney-CPAs on June 25. There were two different trips offered by Montana River Guides: a Scenic Float trip on the Clark Fork River and a Whitewater Raft Trip on the Alberton Gorge. There are more details on their website. I called ahead to be sure they could handle someone with limited mobility and I was assured that they could. I picked the float trip because it had an easier put-in and take-out walk. I have been using a walker since I had leukemia and a broken hip four years ago.
Their van picked us up at our hotel and took us to the put-in on a tributary, the Blackfoot River. I received help walking the short distance to the oar raft. There were 4 rafts on the trip and I was assigned to the one rowed by Jane, the senior guide on the trip. There were 2 other clients on Jane’s raft, a couple from California that were also in the conference. We went downstream and we saw a bald eagle along the way.
We were in a valley with mountains all around which was created by glacier action in the past. We were in moving water. We stopped for lunch along the bank but I decided to take my lunch in the raft to avoid having to go across potato sized rocks.
I was brought lunch by Grace, a newer guide, who sat and talked to me for several minutes. Jane took over from Grace by visiting with me and she pointed out that Grace was a Yale graduate.
The Blackfoot merged into the Clark Ford River which went through the center of Missoula.
In Missoula, we passed by the University of Montana football stadium and we took out in downtown. The take-out was walking distance from the hotel but I was given a van ride to the front door of the hotel. I was very happy to have the chance to be back on the river after four years of not being able to. The guides made every effort to help me and I recommend Montana River Guides highly. Missoula was very pleasant with cool air, the University of Montana, a good independent bookstore close by, and an independent outdoor store across the parking lot from the hotel.
I was happy to get to the conference because I had been delayed overnight in Denver two days before. I got a quick hot dog in the hour plane change in Denver. I got to the gate for the plane to Missoula and I felt faint and had to sit on my walker’s seat. A paramedic came and said I better go to the emergency room. I was sent by ambulance to the Anschulz medical center where I was observed overnight. I received a CAT scan and a MRI and was visited by a neurologist to be sure I was not having a stroke. They could find nothing wrong with me. United had already printed me a new boarding pass for the next morning before I had left the gate and I was able to catch that flight.
