I met The Commander at age 87

The answer is in.  What will The Commander be like at age 87? Well old Kadizzle found out.  Bev was the leader of our raft trip down the Green River. This is the toughest spunkiest octogenarian you will encounter. First she organized a fifty mile trip down the Green River through the Flaming Gorge.  That was do da. The little lady worked harder than any of the escapees from the nursing home that went with her.  Bev had us all beat, but there were several competitors in their mid seventies,  most from 65 to 70, and a couple of stragglers in their mid fifties.  A lot of guilt rained down from the sky when Kadizzle crawled out of his tent at 6:30 and saw Bev already up getting breakfast for all the bums in the tents.  That will be The Commander some day, picking up coolers packed with food by herself, and keeping order on the river.  Keep in mind Bev did this after paddling all day.

It was a very nice trip with a nice mixture of cliffs, rapids, wildlife, and good company. Stoupini went along to fill out the group from Hazen. Stroupini said he wanted to meet new people. One demand Stroupini had was that he not be placed in a raft with Kadizzle who he had heard too many times.  Stroupini joined Cliff from our Arizona Trail crew and they had a great time.  Viewing trout of every size and description all day in the crystal clear water was entertaining.  Osprey, bald eagles, and other birds plied their trade on the river.  A moose was the highlight of the trip.

Even a historical site was included along the way.  John Jarvie's store was still intact and restored.  A large pie lumper who worked for the BLM gave a good tour of the premises and explained how John was murdered for $100 when the store was robbed.

A couple times the mosquitos were mean, but there was a lot of good sunny floating.  Old Kadizzle was hot and jumped in the river to cool down.  The water was wonderful, but the current was much stronger than expected.  Only by jumping in could you realize how much water was actually moving through that canyon.

Some of the  best adventures have  been floating through nature, but this one had a special delight. As the maker of the universe would have it a professional masseuse went on the trip. After a long day of paddling Kadizzle could sit on the ground and have his sore shoulders and neck corrected by a lady who did this for a living. She actually said she enjoyed it.  There is a god and he does love Kadizzle this is proof.

Older people can get off their ass and enjoy the outdoors in a tent.  No one proves it better than Bev who does four of these trips a year.  Kadizzle's oldest girlfriend is May, she is in her nineties, but May is afraid of snakes and bugs.  May has a lot of spark, but May could not make it ten feet down the rapids in a raft.

Bev does all of this as a charitable act for the Sierra Club.  People can bad mouth conservationist, tree huggers, or call them what you like, but we did not meet any group of old people with Trump stickers on their rafts. Someday everyone will be thankful that a few people like Bev went to such great lengths to save the best parts of our country. The theory is that if you see the wonderful parts of our country you will never let them be destroyed or sold by the Republicans. Bev made a believer out of Kadizzle.