Well, it seems I never got around to writing up this trip. Here in November 2004, I'll try and recreate events from the pictures. Forgive me my creaky memory. Damn, and that was the trip we saw bigfoot, elvis, and those nice little doctors from the UFO.

Magnus accompanied the intrepid duo of Chris and Tony that year. Oh, and of course, Otis the Finest Dog Ever™. We put in at Milford Beach that year. It was beautiful May weather as we did the car shuttle dance, and after interminable delays we finally got everything and everyone into the boats. A cute lesbian couple had been watching us pack, and petting The Fur as we struggled to get everything in and secure. He was always a guy for the ladies, that Furry, no matter their predilection.

Our adorable newfound friends helped see us off, and I couldn't help but think the attention boded well for the trip. Heck, would this finally be the trip when the Swedish Bikini Team parachuted in to our camp? Well, time would tell, but in the meantime, the late afternoon sun glinting off the gracefully ascending pillars of the Milford Bridge added a halcyon glow.

As always, our late start necessitated heading for camp toute de suite, so we dug in the paddles and made time downriver. Our original and still fab campsite on the Delaware, on Minisink Island, was empty, and we pulled off on the New Jersey shore. There's a flat little area a couple feet above the river, then a steep bank of about fifteen feet, and then the flat height of land. We emptied the boats down on the bottom plateau, hauled everything up the steep bank in a relay, then tied boats down within an inch of their lives.

Finally alighting the berm, we chose sleeping spots and set to setting up the tents. I was totally psyched to try out my brand new, high end, ass kicking, mountain blizzard defying Moss Outland. Thus you can imagine my surprise, dismay, and general malaise when I ripped the thing right in half while inserting the first pole. Seriously. Damn. What a way to start a trip!

After staring in abject horror at the mess of fabric in my hands for nearly fifteen minutes, I managed to pull myself together. Tony had brought his Mountain Hardware tarp along for use as an "office". I'd been reading a lot about the ultralight camping movement, and one of the first things its devotees suggest is ditching your tent. Even a high performance mountaineering tent like the Outland weighs nearly 6 pounds. Sleeping under a tarp can save you five pounds of pack weight. I didn't really care about weight on this canoe trip, but since I couldn't enjoy the Outland on this trip, I made the best of the situation and requisitioned the tarp. I could have bunked with Magnus in the palatial Little Dipper, but the opportunity to try tarping presented itself and I decided to give it a shot.

And what a nice bit of serendipity it was. Though I love the idea of a totally sealed from all elements mountaineering tent, the reality of most camping I do is that it's total overkill. I felt cozy, warm, protected, and comfy in/under tarp. In fact, I liked it so much, that even though Moss immediately replaced the busted Outland, I ended up never really using it, because I switched to tarping instead. It's easier to get up to pee, roomy, protected, and best of all one feels much more connected and immersed in the surrounding environment. And isn't that why you're camping in the first place?

All four of us, Tony, Magnus, Otis and myself, enjoyed a roaring campfire and exciting tales of bonhomie and derring-do as we passed the evening sipping cognac. Well, alright, we imitated Beavis and Butthead episodes and swilled cheap wine. And lovely though the fire was, it wasn't long after dark that The Fur and I were curled under our tarp, sawing logs to beat the band.

The weather was pretty damn gorgeous throughout the trip. Pretty much every day had that hazy, sunny, but not too hot sort of feeling to it. And we had fairly short distances to travel every day, so most of the paddling was gentle and conducive to sightseeing. First week of May the air is warm, but the foliage hasn't caught up yet. There are buds on the trees, but not many leaves. So the sightlines are good, there's lots of light. One is also aware of all the detritus left from winter's storms caught in the tines of trees. The third day we had some wind and I had to struggle to keep the Freedom 17 straight in the rapids leading up to the Bend, but other than that it was easy paddling.

Second night we camped at that awesome multilevel site we'd snagged before. Just at the bottom end of the Walpack Bends, the one originally recommended by the hippies. Though it's hard to get ashore and hump all the gear up the first steep face, once you get there you get a whole campsite with fire ring to enjoy for the "office", and then two more entirely separate sites up another hill into the woods. Really a swell site. I snagged a sweet setup using two trees to support the tarp, and had a little berm to protect me from all but the fiercest storms. Which we did not face, though it did pour for a while during the night. Otis and I were snug as bugs in a rug, and I woke only enough to enjoy the fact that it was pouring cats and dogs and the dog and I were cozy and warm.

It was nice having Magnus along, as he broke up the predicable two way squabbling of the principles. And his hilarious tales of compulsory service in the Swedish Navy were priceless. He paddled the two man Pocomoke kayak. It doesn't get much use, so I was happy to see it cut some wake.

Wo we put in and paddled on another brilliantly blue day. We passed the usual panoply of sights along the river, including some R/C aircraft buzzing like angry hornets. We took out at Smithfield Beach, thus skipping the last few miles above the Gap, which Tony seems to dislike quite intensely. I seem to recall we'd left my car up top, so Tony and I drove back up to the put-in to retrieve it, while Magnus guarded the stuff. It's weird driving the route you just spent three days paddling in forty minutes. But weird or not, it's tedious, so I was happy to finally get everything unloaded, reloaded, tied on, strapped down, and ready for the highway. Another nice thing about the Delaware trip, it's only a little more than an hour from take-out back to Claryville. Of course, Tony has to drive like six hours back down to DC. Better him than me.

Oh, here's a map of the route, though I haven't had a chance to append this year's (or 2003's) camping spots yet.

PS: the title of this page refers to a book Chris had read just before the trip, where the nature writer John Burroughs writes a whole paen to foxes. But instead of calling them foxes, he calls them Reynard, as in, "Reynard is crafty. He is stealthy...". So Tony, Magnus and Chris spent the whole weekend speaking in heavy french Canadian accents talking about Reynard.