A Canon Blast and Canoe Blessing and We're Off
by Denise Janus

Today is the official start date of the trip with a send-off ceremony on the Rouge River at Telegraph Rd. and Civic Center Drive in Southfield. Before the ceremony started, the 24-foot North Canoe Mike Means engineered and built with the help of a dedicated few students delicately fed into the river to hopefully float. When that last bit of canoe touched the water and it was fully in, we all cheered and Mike was elated.  We were overwhelmed at how many supporters showed up-families, faculty, sponsors, and the media!  After planning this trip for more than two years it seems surreal that it’s all finally starting. The ceremony included speakers, a minister blessing the canoe, French re-enactors firing a gun salute and blasting a canon twice, and refreshments and questions from those attending.

As guests trickled away from the ceremony, the student paddlers and advisors huddled by the bank to decide if the Rouge was too high to canoe. The few inches of rain we had just gotten last night that made the volumetric flow rate of the river grow sixfold adding to the difficulty of canoeing the river. We reached a consensus to at least do a little bit of the Rouge.  Mike, Chris, Will, Dr. Vogt and I hopped into the two smaller canoes and set off.  We did a few miles and I can honestly say that was so much fun-I loved having to stop and get out to go over log jams and portage!  This is the kind of traffic jam I wish I was in every morning in Oakland County at 8:30am!  Log jams can’t really phase a person who's been canoeing in the peaceful quiet watching ducks preening themselves on the bank and listening to the birds in the trees.  Who knew all of this was in the heart of Southfield, or Oakland County?  What a treasure! Then it started sprinkling, and the sprinkling intensified to moderate raining, which turned into a full-blown pelting torrential downpour, which came so fast that raingear was just a thought and nothing more.  I’ve always loved water growing up on Lake St. Clair, and so being rained on that hard was fun to me. During the downpour we came upon a log jam and on the other side were two canoeists; a father and son who had a house close by. When we told them about our story they said they wished they had known because they would have taken part in it, but even still they invited us in for coffee!  We had to decline because we needed dry clothes and a warm shower!  Nonetheless they canoed with us a ways and when we reached our halfway point under the 9 Mile bridge we parted and they went on their way.  At that halfway point, soaking wet, we again discussed whether to go on or not.  Much to our disappointment we had to stop canoeing for the day.