I was planning to do some kayaking over the weekend, but the water level in the river was looking awfully low. Hurricane Ernesto came to the rescue and refilled all the creeks and rivers, even the mighty Tiadaghton Creek (aka. Pine Creek).

Yesterday, Klinutus, Klinutor (Younger brother of Klinutus), Mama-Klinutus (the matriarch of the Klinutus clan), and I decided to make a run on Pine creek before the water went back down.

I had to get up at the proverbial butt-crack of dawn to get up there on time. As butt-cracks go, this one was kind of nice looking.

_{The butt-crack of dawn}

No SUVs on this trip. Who needs an SUV when you have a roof rack and a bit of courage.

_{Fahrvergnügen}

The creek was a mixture of flatwater and some fairly snarly sections.

_{Klinutus and Mama-Klinutus manning the mothership / Snack barge.}

After we came out of a particularly snarly section, I saw a Bald Eagle sitting in a tree. By the time I got my camera out of waterproof storage, we were pretty far downstream, so the picture sucks.

_{A blurry eagle}

One of these days, I’ll get a camera with more than 2 megapixels of resolution…

During his attempt to photograph the eagle, Klinutor got too close to shore and was nearly devoured by renegade Ents reaching over the water. He narrowly escaped impending doom, or impending splinters in any event.

_{Klinutor flees from the Ents}

We covered about 11 miles of the creek all together. Not a bad way to spend a Monday morning.