Lining up the shot For the last few years, we've rafted a short stretch of the Susitna River with Talkeetna friends on Memorial Day weekend. For some of us, the weekend has been the start of the summer, which doesn't change life that much for most of us working people. But many of our Talkeetna friends are school teachers. A change in school schedules in Alaska meant that this weekend is now the end of the school year, and the start of 8 weeks off, for several of our friends. And this year Paul's birthday occurred during the trip. So despite some soggy, cool weather, spirits were high on a Susitna River gravel bar this past Friday and Saturday.
Primary activities on this raft trip include sitting around the campfire talking, eating, sleeping, and playing bocce. Bocce is an old Italian game of bowling colored balls as close to the small white palino as possible. I'm not sure how challenging this is on a grass court, but as you can see, it can be very challenging on an island in the middle of an Alaska river.
Whoever has won the previous round gets to throw the palino. In this round of bocce, the palino landed against a log (center of photo one-third from bottom) above a puddle under a massive log jam. The players throwing bocce balls from above couldn't see the palino so needed some direction. Paul is giving his partner Doug a line to throw on to try to reach the palino. The large red ball next to the palino is Doug's from his previous throw. I think Paul and Doug won this round, but because Paul was the only one wearing rubber boots, he had to wade into the puddle to retrieve several bocce balls.
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