This weekend, the Guadalupe River, shallow as she was, swallowed me up and spit me out like she never had before.

We finally made the trek to San Marcos to partake of our much beloved activity; tubing. In years past, we've hopped onto scortching-hot, black inner-tubes and clung for dear life as the river swirled us about until it deposited us upon calm, soothing waters. It's as much fun as you're going to have while clinging desperately to the rope attached to your beer-cooler tube. If the beer goes in the drink, ain't nobody gonna luv you, sugah.

Tubing is an activity tailor made for rambunctious teenagers, drunken frat-boys and, let's face it, sundry rednecks. It's not uncommon to find kids wearing t-shirts that list their Senior Class graduates by name on the back floating past whole university greek chapters tethered together as one enormous pan-hellenic flotilla. All this, and grandma will pull the cigarette outta her mouth long enough to adjust her Texas flag string bikini and yell at some yung'un named Ida Jean to toss her a Shiner Bock.

This time around was so different. Yes, there was beer, but, there wasn't much more. Our little group showed up early and were floating, sprawled out on tubes by 10:30AM.
The water was extremely low. The boisterous rapids were reduced to babbling brooks and the entertaining crowds seemed to have become extinct.
The six of us, took turns passing beers, champagne (in cans -- no glass on the river, kids) and water bottles back and forth. While hoisting our butts up to avoid mine-fields of exposed rocks, we'd joke about being the last humans on Earth cause we were completely alone. There was no one else on the river. So, we lingered over the deeper, calmer areas of the river, choosing to take in the calm and relax a bit.
We thought we'd be bored because the party was missing. And while we did miss out on a floating hootenanny, we were exposed to things that we would never have seen and may never experience again on the Guadalupe.
Kaleidoscopes of light on water. Mossy trees shading turtles with red streaks on their necks. Sediment layered bluffs with goats that bleated and skipped along precariously. The dragonflies were out en masse, shamelessly resting on our heads and arms and tubes and toes.

Sure, I came home looking like someone sprayed the front half of me with neon pink and the back half of me with stark white paint. Hubster twisted his ankle while negotiating the slippery rocks on a shallow end of the river too.
But, as I sprayed myself down with Lidocaine and wrapped Hubster's melon-sized ankle in ice, we agreed that it had been a unique and fantastic day.

And it wasn't the canned champagne talking.