Big Slush River
Spring fever must have hit because a high of 33 degrees is not an ideal temperature for the first canoe trip of the year but that did not deter Tyler and I from our first trip of 2014. We set out late morning after meeting up at Tyler's apartment. The plan was our classic route; Klondike Dam to the Highway 18 Bridge a total distance of 8 river miles. It was a beautiful morning and it felt great to be back outdoors again but it was COLD. Chunks of slush littered the river that had formed from the freeze the previous night. It felt like we were paddling through a slushy. With only one pair of gloves Tyler and I took turns with either a right or left handed glove to keep some feeling in our hands. This was the earliest that I had ever been out on the Big Sioux River and it was really cool see the river in such an early stage of spring. Tell tale signs of springs approach littered the river but the amount of birds that we saw was a dead give away....