A Day to Forget
It was September of 1988 when Meg, Stephen and I drove to Goodwater for the Labor Day weekend. Saturday came with some time to burn so Steve and I decided to take his Coleman down Socapatoy Creek. This was a spur-of-the moment decision, so we grabbed a cooler and some paddles, ferried Steve's Blazer to US-231 and got Steve Jr. to take us to the put in spot on US-280. It has been my experience that spur-of-the moment trips, for the most part, usually turn out surprisingly good. This was a half-day trip and since we had never gone down this creek before there would be new territory to explore. We put in at a place off of US-280 where Baker Creek, a tributary to Socapatoy Creek, was about 12 feet wide. Trees were lying across the water, stretching from one bank to the other, for as far as we could see. The sky was overcast but rain was not expected. We got wet right off the bat at the first tree crossing we came to. After what seemed like an hour of hauling the boat over blow dow...