...by Edmonton Journal photographer John Lucas. I had just finished a run on the river, had the kayak sitting on the ice and was gonna pick her up and haul her up to the car when this guy comes up to me and says he wants to take my photograph on the water. I see the nice sexy lens on his camera (Nikon D90) and right away I know who he is, John Lucas, award winning photographer for the Journal. He intro'ed himself and I said, "Yah, I know who you are. Your the guy who photographed me hand-feeding the birds in the park two years ago". John paused for a few seconds and remembered that day. So I got back into the kayak and he snapped a few shots. I really didn't wanna get back in the kayak because I was dead tired from the upstream paddle. The water levels are high and the river is pinched as a result of the shore ice so the current is much faster than normal. Paddling upstream for the last 400 meters took me an hour of solid hard paddling and any time I eased up on the power, I was swept back downstream. Yesterday's paddle was very interesting though. Billie Milholland, friend and worker for the North Saskatchewan Watershed Alliance was taking my pic in various locations that day to be used for the Spring edition of their online newsletter. She snapped photos of me when I started paddling, then five minutes later I photographed coyotes on the shoreline, then I discovered that the ice created a slalom-like course through which the water raged between massive blocks of ice so I had to make a few runs through that just for fun, then I spotted a new friend on the water, a beaver, then Billie met me further along to snap more pics, then I encountered a muskrat who seemed to not mind me sitting not more than 5-feet away, so I snapped pics while taking a rest break, then I slog it back to the put-in, John takes my pics, then I get home and get a phone call for a job interview (Yah, unemployed again), then, dead tired, I go to Linda's work site to help her move lots of very heavy furniture. Sigh! Today I am so tired from it all. It was quite a day yesterday. Today I am gonna screw the pooch big time. I will post the pics I took from yesterday. See the link, the pics are actually pretty ok.

PS: At least I can say that the pic John took wasn't of me being rescued off the water.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150682091937747.391279.609972746&type=1&l=7b00f3c21a

Robert N Pruden