The Daddy and Doggie Memorial Weekend picnic

So those of you who are FB friends know that Friday night was a catastrophe of music and liquor.  Other than my ability to type at the end, the only casualties were my last 4 inches of a bottle of Admiral Nelson, though KC's smaller bottle of Captain Morgan and my "God-knows-why-I-bought-it" bottle of peach schnapps took major damage.  So somewhere in the night I amended plan A for Saturday to Plan B- the early picnic at the river trip plan.

Scrappy raring to go

ZOOM!

While Dad is lucky to maintain foreward motion, Scrappy still insists on sniffing every little thing...

more ZOOM!

Canal is loaded with flowers- and the pics don't really do them justice.

Wouldn't be a trip to California Road without morons unclear on the concept.  Apparently, this person needs to have "NO MOTOR VEHICLES" posted in a language other than English.  Or in cartoons, maybe.

And there's our next contestant, who evidently has a similar problem with the "NO OUTLET" sign posted before you pass the Plex.

At last, the bridge to our goal is sighted.  The backpack feels about 100 lbs by now, and it sure seems more like it's been 5 miles getting this far rather than the just-under-a-mile it actually was.

Crap!  Here they come!

"Table for two?"

A nice seat to watch the river go by...

Scrappy and a curious squirrel...

...with a big mouthful of something.

"Today's courses:  For monsieur, cheese sandwiches, chips, and cottage cheese.  For Doggie, BabyBels.  And water for both."

MMM-MM-Good!

Dude fishing on the homeward bank

Here are the next two idiots that think they were going somewhere.  Bike belongs to fisher dude, who was concerned enough about the pickup's over-wide turn that he soon moved down the way.

Scrappy was amazingly content to just chill for a change.

Me, content with the view, watching the swallows dive the water.

Our next contestant in the "WTH am I" contest was a bit unusual.  After turning around, he parked, sat there for a minute or two.  Then got out, went to the back of his car, smoked a cigarette, and watched the river.  Finishing the smoke, he circled the car the rest of the way, got in and drove off.  So me and fisher dude would think he ALWAYS just drives down here to randomly smoke one and leave, I guess.

Light dinner music by Robin and the Redbreasts, coming to you from high atop the St. Joe au fresco restaurant.

There's a Sargasso Sea-like dead spot in the current were the creek and the river join up that rather looks like the floor of an unswept sawmill.

The Umbrella Magnolia on the tree walk has apparently been naughty, and is in time out.

These are shots from upriver- I decided to trust my somewhat rolling innards for a brief walk a little farther.  Almost not a good decision, but I digress.

Tiny island near the inlet at IPFW.

Apparently this tree, a criminal associate of the Umbrella Magnolia, is in witness protection and may not be identified.

No turtles at the swamp today, but plenty of frogs.  Like this big boy.  Took this picture as we were being passed by the second of our last two contestants, who couldn't find the clearly-marked entrance to the soccer fields if IPFW put up a big freaking neon sign.

Final totals: 2 hours, 2.5 total miles, all food consumed and trash removed, 8 dipshit lost drivers, and one pair reasonably clean underwear.