My buddy the Undertaker accused me of doing a bait-and-switch in last Sunday's feature about smallmouth bass fishing on Crooked Creek.
The "real" story, he insisted, was stashed behind the corn flakes on Aisle 5. It referenced Miss Laura and son Matthew's three-day dash down the Buffalo River from Ponca to Shipps Ferry on the White River.
He included these lines from the Crooked Creek feature: "That trip usually takes about nine days. They did it in three. The flow was normal and they covered 51 miles their last day."
"Who the hell wants to read a dadgummed fishing story after being gobsmacked by a paragraph of such gigantically tantalizing proportions as THAT!" he asked. "Man, that's a column you need to write! And soon, all we mundane mugs are on tenter hooks out here in the provinces suffering from Readis Interruptus!"
Frankly, I don't know what got into them. Matthew has wanted to do this ultimate version of a "lightning strike" for a couple of years with his brother Daniel. He's the only person I know whose intensity matches Matt's, but Dan's schedule wouldn't allow it. He lobbied me, but if I can't fish, I'm not interested.
So he pestered Miss Laura. They spent a week hiking the Athens Big Fork Trail last summer, and he convinced her that this would top that.
The plan was simple. They would paddle in overdrive and stop only for lunch, to cool off in the water and to camp.
They took the barest essentials, including a tent for Laura, a hammock for Matthew and a change of clothes. They took a minimum amount of nonperishable food and a water purifier to filter drinking water from the river.
They arranged for a shuttle with an outfitter near Yellville, which involved picking up a driver and driving to Ponca. The driver deposited their truck at the Shipps Ferry public access on the White River. The shuttle cost $125.
There are three ways to get off the water at the mouth of the Buffalo. You can paddle upstream to the public access at Buffalo City. I did this in moderate flow at age 31 when I was in peak physical condition, and it was very difficult. The Corps of Engineers has been blasting water out of Bull Shoals Lake all summer, and I cautioned them that this route would be unsafe.
You can also cross the White River to Riley's Station, but that's unsafe in high water, too. Shipps Ferry is about 6-7 miles downstream from the mouth of the Buffalo. That's a quick and gentle float, even in high water.
At least, it should have been.
Their time on the Buffalo was uneventful. They covered about 130 miles in three days, including a 51-mile marathon on the last day.
That's where it got interesting.
They neared the mouth of the Buffalo almost at dark. Some campers on a gravel bar told them they could reach Shipps Ferry in about an hour.
They reached the White River at nightfall where a wall of fog reduced visibility to about three feet. They couldn't distinguish landmarks, so they couldn't mark distance. They dodged trees and rootwads that materialized in front of the them, and they almost hit several docks that appeared suddenly in the mist.
They stopped at a house to ask directions. The owner told them he didn't know "anything about no Shipps Ferry," and ordered them off his property.
Somehow, Miss Laura had it in her mind that Shipps Ferry was a marina, with a convenience store and lighted docks. The failure of this vision to materialize caused her great anxiety, Matthew said.
Actually, it's just a boat ramp with a green cantilevered sign that you probably won't see on a foggy night.
Believing they passed it, they camped on a near-vertical bank. Laura pitched her tent at about a 45-degree angle, but said she didn't sleep because she kept rolling downhill and balling up against the tent wall. Matthew said it was one of the deepest, most satisfying sleeps of his life.
In the morning they planned to stop at the first house they found and see if a kind soul might drive them back up to Shipps Ferry.
Fortunately, Shipps Ferry was the first place they reached. It was only about 10 minutes away.
We have a dry-erase board in our living room where Miss Laura posts the children's chore list each day. They hate the dry-erase board and plot its destruction daily, but I digress. Miss Laura strode into the house triumphantly and scrawled in red marker: "Ponca to White River in 3 days."
Ordinarily prone to understatement, she punctuated it with 10 exclamation points.
Sports on 08/02/2015