Part 3
I don't know how many people have actually stripped naked and shit in an overly populated river before, but it can't have been too many times. We all thought it was epic and laughed hysterically for the remainder of the trip.
We somehow managed to get B-Ride back in one of the canoes, (we continued to stick Poor Bastard with him.) We even managed to get the kid's pants on. We probably should have made an attempt to get him to cool it on the vodka at this point, but any attempts would have been futile, and potentially dangerous. Like I said before, the line between funny angry B-Ride and violent angry B-Ride was a slippery slope, and none of us wanted to risk losing any teeth on this day. This thin line would soon be tested.
The hilarity of the river poop temporarily subsided and we continued our drinking until we were good and sauced. No matter how many beers we consumed; however, we would not be able to compare to the inebriation that B-Ride experienced. There was more to our perception of him than we had originally observed. He had always acted on the verge of crazy while drinking vodka, but he dropped a bomb on us shortly after the poop incident. During the time when he met up with the random campers and shotgunned a beer, he quietly and secretly also drank some mushroom tea. Bad combination. Hilarious, of course, but bad. Our cautious laughter barely hid our terror.
We soon drifted past a group of campers on the bank of the river. They consisted of some pretty hot girls and a group of about 5 "tough guys." If these clowns weren't as drunk as us, they were pretty close. All of us attempted to persuade the girls to ditch the losers and come with us. The logistics of this request were ridiculous, of course, due to the lack of room in our canoes, not to mention that these stuck up bitches wanted nothing to do with us, despite the fact that we were 10 times more awesome than the douchebags they were currently hanging out with. Undaunted, we continued our obnoxious yelling at the group. As our persistence was continually ignored, our compliments of the girls and ignoring of the guys soon turned to being plain mean to all of them. The guys eventually took exception and the yelling back and forth continued. One of them then grabbed a hatchet...yup, a hatchet, and began running after our canoes. I'm sure you've all tried running in waist deep water and I'm sure you can all figure out the results. This numbnuts waded after us, carrying on and swinging his ridiculous weapon like a moron. We admired his courage....wait, no we didn't, we made fun of his stupidity. One idiot with a rusty, dull hatchet would be no match for us. We even had the advantage of the high ground, being in the canoes. B-Ride was up for the challenge, you know, cause he was a bottle and a half deep in vodka and tripping balls on mushroom tea. Before he could jump in and most likely use his vodka super powers to annihilate their entire crew and possibly leave bodies scattered all over the beach, Slatz, ever the pacifist, managed to stop him by distracting him with a rock that was sticking out of the river.
"Hahahaha....that rock looks awesome!"
Mission accomplished and disaster averted...barely. To their credit, the other 4 guys from the campsite got the "B-Ride" of their group to settle down and we drifted past without confrontation. We felt lucky since if it was up to B-Ride, Joey, and Merph, (by far the most aggressive of our group), we would have beat up the guys, (and possibly the girls, who knows at this point), and burnt their entire campsite to the ground after stealing their supplies. It would have been just like medieval times or some shit.
The drinking continued as we began barrelling down the river, and we began to see fewer and fewer campers. It was now getting time to set up camp, but there were no more beaches, only swampy, muddy river banks with nests of millions of mosquitoes guarding the areas. The alcohol had muddied also any chance we had at a coherent thought...but after much deliberation, we elected to try to pull the canoes up onto the mud and set up our tents. As we tried this, B-Ride tipped over one of the canoes. Naturally, the canoe that tipped was the one holding the bag of my brother Joey. So now not only was his sleeping bag ruined from day 1, but virtually everything else he brought with him was soaked. He pretended to brush it off and tell B-Ride not to worry about it after he apologized about 39 times. Knowing my brother his entire life; however, I could tell he was steaming beneath his facade of calmness.
As 5 of us set up tents, literally being consumed alive by mosquitoes, B-Ride elected to punish himself for his indiscretions by fighting an oak tree. Though he packs a powerful punch, he was no match for the 200 year old behemoth tree. Literally shattering his knuckles, he continued to punch the tree until his little brother got in his way. B-Ride took exception to this, and the line from funny to angry had officially been breached. He went on a tirade from which there was no escape. Things were getting ugly. We couldn't stay at this spot. It was too muddy to even stand, let alone set up tents, and the bugs were just too much. We were doomed. We needed to hit the river again, but it was getting dark and we had no idea if the camping areas would just get worse the further we went.
Our salvation came in the form of two locals who drove past us slowly in a small boat. They reminded me of a couple of the gator hunters from the show "Swamp People." B-Ride's brother, clearly tired of having to deal with him, flagged the hillbillies down. We knew we needed help, but was this the answer? We asked them if there were any camping sites further down river. They said no, and even though we knew that they probably traversed this same river a thousand times...we had no choice but to believe them. One of us would have to board their vessel and travel with them down the river to look for a decent spot to camp. We knew this was a bad idea, but we were out of options. B-Ride's brother bravely volunteered, jumped onto the yokels boat, and they drove out of site.
"You guys know that we might never see him again, right?" Nails stated the obvious.
"He had a good run." Slatz figured.
Morale was at an all time low. Millions of mosquitoes, bloated on the feast of our alcohol infused blood, began dropping dead of alcohol poisoning. After a while, we began to seriously ponder the fate of B-Ride's brother. Time had lost all meaning, B-Ride's hand had swollen up to the size of a cantaloupe, and hope was nearly completely lost, when we heard the hum of the small boat's motor returning to our hell. B-Ride's brother hopped out, hugging the clowns as though they had been friends their entire lives.
"Saddle up boys, me Jed and Amos found a decent spot about a half hour away." Catching our second wind, we broke down the tents, loaded up the canoes, and got 3 of them in the river. Joey's canoe, which we had tipped upside-down on up on the bank to attempt to dry it out, was the last one in. Some how, some way, B-Ride managed to tip the gatdamn thing over again....with Joey's shit inside, once again.
"Fuck it." He said, beaten but not broken. "Let's get the hell out of here."
The drinking and eating continued throughout the short trip to the new campsite and beyond. We setup camp, made a fire, and enjoyed our final night in the wilderness. As it turns out, we long overshot our second day on the river, and by the third day, we made it to the end in about an hour. Whoops.
We waited in the hot sun for our shuttle to arrive while we sweated out the ridiculous amounts of booze we had pickled ourselves with.
"Maybe next year we'll just camp on dry ground somewhere."
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