West Bend

As we continued to camp we went down to West Bend for the weekend. When we arrived on Friday night the wind was really blowing and kicking up some big waves. The river is 2 miles wide at this area and the waves can really build, much like it can up on Lake Oahe. Saturday was part of the free fishing weekend and it looked like everyone with a boat showed up at West Bend. One time we went around and counted over 100 empty boat trailers. And they kept coming. Good thing there is a lot of water for them to spread out on. Fortunately, Saturday was a calmer day than what it had been like Friday night and it warmed up - the low was around 32 the night before. I was able to park near the campground and only had to carry my boat 50 yards to a good put in. Careful to not get run over by any outgoing or incoming boats I snuck past the opening to the marina and headed north (downstream). Since I have a geocache about 2 miles from my starting point I decided to go check on it. Before getting to it I spotted something slip into the water, maybe a beaver, but he was too elusive to tell for sure. A few turtles were sitting on some large logs and also slipped away under the water before I could get their pictures.

After checking on the cache I continued another mile downstream. After paddling about 3.2 miles I decided to head back. But, by making it a straight line back I was able to cut that distance down to 2.9 miles and with pushing it a little I made the return trip in just over 40 minutes. Because of the route taken it looks like I crossed a line between Hughes and Lyman County.