5/17/13 Niobrara River, Nebraska

Woke to a bright sunny day with temps promised to be in the high 80’s. Sounded like a good day to go for a float on the Niobrara River. This is a National Scenic River, located outside of Valentine. We found a canoe rental place that was open, seems we are a little ahead of the season around here. Anyway, they dropped us off with our canoes at the Fort Niobrara launch site, which is at mile 4 of the river. We launched at 12:40pm for what was supposed to be a 3 hour float.  The "float" was really more like playing dodge ball with the rocks and the current pushing us from side to side in the river.  It wasn't long before we knew we were in for a long day.

We stopped at a spot called Berry Falls for a stretch break, this is at mile 12.4 on the river, so we have paddled 8.4 miles at this point (as the river flows and not counting all the back and forth treks). This break lasted about 30 minutes.  It was a pleasant stop except for the biting flies that were enjoying their lunch (us!) too!
At mile 16 on the river we stopped at Smith Falls, this is a state park and we were told that this is a must see. The falls are about a quarter mile from the river, and well worth the stop. The Smith Falls drops 63 feet over the sandstone cliff and you can walk right up to the bottom of the falls and stand under it if you want, we didn’t want to so we just enjoyed its beauty from a ‘dryer’ distance.
A few miles downriver from Smith Falls we started to notice that to the west of us the clouds were building and the wind was picking up, which only caused us to zig zag back and forth even more! There are also more rapid areas and sandbar islands, which require decisions to be made…right or left around the islands; usually we went whichever way the wind thought we should, much easier than fighting it. By mile 17 we are hearing thunder and the sky to the west of us (the river runs east) is getting darker by the minute.

So, now we are paddling harder, we need to get out of the water before this storm hits. At last we see the last bridge and the landing where we are suppose to be picked up. So, we head for the landing and immediately notice that this is not going to be like the landings we have made previously, all of the gravel has been washed away from the spot where we are suppose to go.
Phil and Nita got to the landing first.  Here is her account of what happened:
" We hit and bounce off, trying desperately to dig our paddles into the bottom so we can stop the canoe and not over shoot the landing. What happened next is a blur, neither of us could make the paddles hold, the canoe was rocking wildly, I remember falling backwards and then the canoe tipped and started to roll. The current was strong; I was trying to dig my feet into the bottom and save our stuff at the same time. Phil managed somehow to grab the canoe and stop it from taking off downstream, yelling at me to grab the side of the canoe as I was in danger of being pulled downstream myself. John and Fran had landed at this point, safe and dry, John had jumped out of their canoe to help and Fran was yelling for help from the driver in the parking lot who was waiting for us. By this time my legs didn’t want to work, I couldn’t get up, finally had to roll onto my knees and was able to get my feet under me and stand up, John helped me out of the water. Luckily I had a bathing suit under my shorts, so I was able to take them off and sort of air dry a little while the guys helped the driver load the canoes. Everything that wasn’t in a sealed baggie was soaked; fortunately things like my cell phone and the camera were in baggies and were still dry."
John and Phil then walked down river to retrieve a couple items that floated away.  During the walk John, walking a little behind Phil, spotted a 6 foot snake that looked suspiciously like a rattler.  He stood quietly until the snake decided he didn't like the look of John either and slithered away.

Our day wasn’t done, within 30 minutes of arriving back at the rigs; the storm that had been threatening all afternoon hit us with a vengeance! We have had storm after storm all night, with extremely strong winds and lots of lightning and thunder. It’s still going and the radar shows more on the way. We are so tired and worn out though that I don’t think we will have any trouble sleeping tonight.