Nothing goes as planned when you’re training for the Texas Water Safari

Nothing goes as planned when you’re training for the Texas Water Safari

training for the Texas Water Safari

Part of Pam LeBlanc’s race team pushes their boat around a log while training for the Texas Water Safari. Pam LeBlanc photo

When you’re training for the Texas Water Safari, stuff goes wrong. And it did this week.

I’m racing on a five-human boat, and two of our five humans live in Colorado, not Texas.

That’s OK. Both Steve Daniel and John Murphy have finished the 260-mile paddling race between San Marcos and the Texas coast before. They know what they’re getting into – extreme exhaustion, sleep deprivation, log jams covered in spiders, the occasional dead and bloated cow, mud, snakes, mosquitos, horrible rashes, sore shoulders, and more.

In their absence, a rotating cast of paddlers has been filling seats in our boat, so Debbie Richardson, James Green and I could train.

But starting position in the Safari is based on how teams do at the Texas River Marathon, a 35-mile race from Cuero to Victoria on May 7. Top finishers at that race get starting slots at the front of the line at the big dance on June 11. But if your entire team doesn’t race in the Marathon, you must start at the back of the pack at the Safari.

No problem, we figured. The way we planned it, our Colorado teammates would fly down for the Marathon and a few training runs. We’d paddle together for the first time and work out kinks before the Safari.

A change in plans

But earlier this week, things turned south. Our Colorado teammates both got sick. They had to cancel their trip to Texas to race the Marathon.

The boat calculus that Richardson had worked out suddenly collapsed and a flurry of rescheduling ensued. Our brains collectively melted down. Hotel reservations, flights – it all had to be cancelled and rescheduled. And with only four more training weekends remaining before the Safari, we have to figure out how to get get in at least one training run with our Colorado contingent.

Tomorrow, Richardson, Green and I are racing in a three-man boat. Come race day, we’ll have to start at the back of the pack, trying to maneuver around slow-moving aluminum tandems and other slower racers. Imagine a 37-foot torpedo picking its way through a minefield of hand grenades.

debbie richardson

Debbie Richardson pushes a canoe under a branch while training for the Texas Water Safari in March 2022. Pam LeBlanc photo

I figured we were doomed. But Richardson, who has finished 12 of the 12 Safaris she started, assures me we’ll be fine. She’s started at the back of the pack three times. And of those three races, she’s finished third, fifth and eighth overall, out of roughly 150 boats.

“We might need a helmet and life jacket (at the start),” she jokes. “But I’m not scared to start at the back wall.”

It’ll be tricky at the start, but we’ll have about two days of non-stop paddling to make up any disadvantage.

Bring it on.

About Pam

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Food as art (and in a terrarium) at the exclusive Green o in Montana

Food as art (and in a terrarium) at the exclusive Green o in Montana

social haus at the Green O

Guests of the Green O at Paws Up in Montana eat meals at the Social Haus. Pam LeBlanc photo

If food were art, I just worked my way through the Louvre, nine paintings at a time.

Over three nights tucked in the woodsy chic world of Paws Up in Montana, a place where well-heeled families and couples looking for a romantic escape fill their days fly fishing, aiming shotguns at neon-orange sporting clays, and trying their hand at moving a herd of cattle from one pasture to another, I ate some of the most beautiful food of my life.

The Green o: A romantic, adults-only retreat

the Green o

I sizzled a thin strip of pork belly on a hot rock during one evening’s nine-course meal. Pam LeBlanc photo

The green o is the newest corner of the 37,000-acre resort that opened in 2005 on a former sheep ranch in western Montana. Unlike other sections of the resort, the Green o (named for the green circle that the rancher, whose last name was Greenough, painted on his livestock) is adults only. Guests stay in modern treehouses or sleek glass and metal homes nestled among swaying pines.

I’m no foodie, but the food was other worldly, from the rhubarb and chamomile ice cream sandwich waiting in my cabin’s mini-fridge when I arrived, to the homemade potato chips and dip with caviar I nibbled at lunch to the nine-course meals I tossed back each night at the property’s Social Haus.

the green o

One course of a nine-course dinner at the Green O is called the terrarium. Pam LeBlanc photo

terrarium

Lift off the glass dome of the terrarium to find a tiny garden of fresh baby vegetables. Pam LeBlanc photo

Beets weren’t just boiled pink orbs, they were chopped, mixed with local flathead cherries, infused with something that tasted vaguely like a campfire (in a good way) and formed into diamond-shaped filets. I ate gorgeous mushrooms and venison and pheasant brined for 48 hours and served with sunchokes. I tasted fennel and a frozen palate cleanser made with gin, tarragon, and green tapioca. I grilled a thin strip of pork belly on a sizzling hot river rock. One memorable dish, called a terrarium, arrived in a mist-filled glass dome that, when lifted, revealed a cluster of tiny carrots and radishes and purple onions buried in a layer of bright green basil puree the color of fresh moss, over a layer of pureed kohlrabi.

The mysterious menu at the Green o

the green o crudite

The Green O at Paws Up in Montana serves food that is as creative and beautiful as it is tasty. Everything in this terra cotta pot was edible. Pam LeBlanc photo

The menu, delivered on a sheet of stiff, bone-colored stock, always oozed mystery. One course of last night’s meal read, simply, “crudité.” That didn’t prepare me for what the server slid in front onto the table. It looked more like something you’d pick out at the neighborhood nursery than what you’d eat at an exclusive restaurant.

A miniature farm’s worth of leafy greens billowed from a terra cotta pot. But everything – save the clay vessel – the chef assured me, was edible. I zeroed in on a tender shoot and plucked it gently forth, like a farmer harvesting the evening crop. A tiny carrot emerged from the soil, along with a bit of soil – a crumbly brown mixture of toasted hazel nuts (a thing here, I’m told), chicory and roasted onion ash.

I popped it in my mouth. Like almost everything else here, it blew me away.

Food, as art. I’m a fan.

About Pam

I’m Pam LeBlanc. Follow my blog to keep up with the best in outdoor travel and adventure. Thanks for visiting my site.

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