Hands Across the Water

What an amazing day we all had!

I’d been super excited about this event for some time now and it was finally here!

I decided to camp overnight at Earle Rowe Provincial Park where the event was being held. I don’t have many pics of that because I came super late and it was so buggy I really wanted to hurry up and set up camp and make dinner so I could just get settled in the tent without the bugs.

A quick dinner… gosh it was awful. I burnt the cheap frying pan and the whole thing tasted like burnt pan.

I was pretty happy to have my thermacell bug device with me so I didn’t have to load up on deet before bed.

Being in the radio free zone didn’t help much as lots of people arrived very late. Lots of car doors slamming and tents setting up until 2am! But that’s ok…

The paddling and all the smiles of the day made up for being super tired. I absolutely loved paddling in this event. Not only does Abilities in Motion provide a safe atmosphere for people with disabilities to paddle, but they have the best attitudes. Everyone was so welcoming! Being a smidge shy, I always appreciate that!

These were my favorite pictures from the event. We had two other photographers show up, but they weren’t paddling so I tried to get my shots from my kayak. In this case I was fortunate to have a wide flat bottomed kayak because it was quite stable and allowed me to use my camera in the water. But I learned very quickly that it’s difficult to take pictures from my kayak because every time I put my paddle down my boat seemed to spin in the wrong direction. Still lots of fun though!

Some folks getting ready to paddle. I didn’t hear the joke but they looked like they were having a blast!

Andy, one of the instructors, always has a smile on his face in every picture! You can tell he loves what he does!

While we were paddling a goose decided to walk in front of one of the boats on the water! That was really cool to see!

I just love how excited she was to get in the water!

Pauline being the Director of Abilities in Motion also seemed thrilled with the turnout and with being on the water.

We had great weather. Even though it was calling for more rain, we only had a light sprinkle.

Because the water isn’t the best quality, Andy has planted a garden with hopes it’ll take root to help clean things up.

Preston from portageur.ca came out to help and wound up doing a very informative live video on Facebook! You can check that out here.

Thanks so very much from the bottom of my heart to everyone who sponsored me to paddle in this event. Abilities in Motion relies on donations to fund all their equipment and to keep costs low for the folks who use the services.

I think you can tell from all the smiles that it was a GREAT day!