The lowpoint of the trip came when we should have been happiest. At 9:00pm we reached Rogers Landing, which I mistook for Yamhill Landing (which we had passed 6 miles and 2 hours back). While looking for the promised campsites, we met Ken and his grandson Joshua. Josh was about 5 years old, bubbling with enthusiasm, and probably a little touched in the head. Ken said we were right across the river from Champoeg Park and Josh pointed to some boat docks about 1/2 mile down river and said we could camp there. The guys were wiped out by this time, so I put Cody in the front of my canoe, Ryan on the breasthook behind me, and stacked their canoes sideways across mine. I paddled downriver until, to my horror, I saw the supposed camp sites were actually privately owned docks with "Keep Out" and "No Trespassing" signs plastered all over them.

Standing in muck up to my knees, I unloaded the canoes, put the boys in them and shoved them as hard as I could back upriver. The only good thing about the situation was that the flow of the river had slowed to nearly nothing, so we had almost no current to paddle against. When I caught up with the boys and "urged" them to keep paddling ("urge", in this instance, is a euphemism for "yell") Cody summed up his experience in one sentence: "If this is what it was like for Lewis and Clark, I'd have put a bullet through my head by the second day."