At 39.55′, on the Natchez gauge yesterday, the Phatwater was just inches from being 13 feet higher than it was this same time last year. 13 feet.  Now that’s a lot of socks.

Of coincidental note, M and I paddled to Rifle Point yesterday evening and I clocked our time going upriver, by way of  Casio Illuminator G-Shock, at a designated 39.55 minutes, even.  What does this mean?  Well, we’ll leave that up to the soothsayers, from whose camp I’ve  long since been dismissed.

I have to wonder, however, given the numbers reported above, how we might have fared, had the Phatwater not been roiling in silt.  Right now, the Phatwater looks to be about  like that ugly dung colored curtain everyone who ever set foot on an elementary school stage to sing Dixie or the Battle Hymn of the Republic will recall.  Right now, we’ve got parts of Iowa, Minnesota, Tennessee and Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Montana and the Dakotas floating past us. Wisconsin, pronounced Wis-CAN-sin by Wisconsignees, is also contributing.  The water is still Large. We’ve got a million cubic feet a second flowing past us, and a million grains of silt per cubic foot.  We’re siphoning the entire continent.  There were even reports of  Canadian Maple Leafs drifting by, on July 1st, Le Jour de la Confédération, also known as ‘Canada Day’, although I don’t know why they don’t just call it Canaday.

On a technical note, all the stuff in the Phatwater that makes it so milky isn’t sand, but most of it is.  For this reason, each of you who paddle the Phatwater this year should consider the amount of friction this creates.  Sand, against your paddles, and against the hull of your boats, though floating through the water, is at the same time working against the surfaces of all things with which it comes in contact. And friction produces heat.  This is all part of that principal of physics known as “Charles’s Law”-heat resulting in expansion.  So, while you would think that the friction from the suspended sand in the river would slow you down, it actually has the potential to speed things up since the volume of the river is ever increasing with the heat being generated not only by freestyle Shovelnose Sturgeon and the ubiquitous Quillback Carpsucker, but by the cumulative draw and lunge from paddlestroking Athletes Sans Frontiers-

The down side?  Well, you’re probably going to have to purchase a new paddle, since, by now, you’ve worn away most of the gel-coat, or resin, or whatever else it is that paddle manufacturers bond to the blades to give them that highly buffed sheen.

But, before you do that, consider spending your cash on a Phatwater Bowie raffle ticket.  That’s right.  We’re set to go with the sixth annual Phatwater Bowie, by Master Smith Terry Vandeventer.  This year’s Bowie is another classic, and we hope to have some nice shots of it by this weekend.  Until then, here’s a sneak preview.

As with years past, the sale of Phatwater Bowie tickets is an absolute JOY, since all the proceeds go to the Natchez/Adams County Humane Society.  However, this JOY falls squarely on the shoulders of but a few die hard hawkers, and this year, we’ve not a sponsor for the construction of the knife, so, for the first time, we’re hoping to reduce the burden by making this a more exclusive piece.  This year we will be selling a total of only 120 Phatwater Bowie raffle tickets, at $50 per ticket.  Fifty bucks.  A tank of gas, these days.  For a One-In-A-Hundred-Twenty chance to win this year’s prize, valued at $3500.  Give us a shout.  We’ll send them your way.  We’ll even let you pick your own ticket number.  Act now.  And, remember, the legend of the Bowie Knife began on a SANDBAR, just upriver from the Phatwater Phinish.  It’s the story of a continent.  Perhaps even a Wis-CAN-tinent.

All For Now-KB