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If you are lucky enough to live down by the riverside then you are lucky enough, so we are lucky enough. We do live by the riverside but not down by the river, that’d be foolish since it is in the flood plain; we live high up on a bluff overlooking the river.

We have just had work done by some very hard working young men who did a lot of cleaning up around here of dead trees and debris left by the storm last year. (If you need some good workers call for details). While they were here, Pat had them do some repair work on the road down to the river. Those big rains last year washed out the best part of the road and it was virtually impassable, at least as far as I was concerned.

With their equipment they brought in dirt and a couple of whistles and lots of caliche and had that road ready for a sports car to traverse in no time. We don’t have a sports car but the road is that good. Pat took me down in our ‘Mule’ yesterday to view the work. They also drug their loader bucket and scratched out a jeep or Mule road all the way down beside the river to where the last flood had left us a really nice sandbar. I was thrilled because for the first time in years the grass was cut enough that I could see where I was walking and where the snakes were hiding.

Sandbars come and go with each flood and although the last one we had wasn’t the largest we have seen in 30 years it was big enough to leave the largest sandbar we’ve ever had. Well of course it isn’t really a ‘sandbar’, it’s mostly river rock but small ones and it will suffice until real sand comes. I always like to look for the odd shaped rocks and have found heart shaped rocks to be abundant. I even found a piece of river washed green glass there among the rocks; a piece of a 7-Up bottle I suppose but it is unusual. One thing that really caught my eye as we went alongside the river; a poppy! There in all its reddish orange glory was a POPPY! Just one probably blown there by the wind or maybe the seed came floating down the river or maybe a bird dropped it there. Some folks like me can’t grow a weed and some things grow in spite of me.

Things we have found down by the riverside have included a .22 rifle with the hammer cocked. Of course it was a bit worse for wear but it was a river treasure, however friends found it not us. It appeared after the horrible dry summer we had when the river nearly evaporated. It was found lying just under one of the rock ledges in the river bed. We find arrowheads real often and during a flood we see all kinds of things come rushing by, telephone poles, lawn chairs, trees and pieces of trees, old toys but those thing usually end up down at the Honeycutt’s and they have to deal with it. Their property is in a bend in the river and lucky them, it piles up there for them to deal with.

Another thing which had been deposited on a high spot, which except for the occasion of the ‘deposit’ has been dry ground, was a wooden fishing boat. We bought this property in 1975 and by the look of the boat it had been grounded there for maybe 20 years at that time. That flood, the granddaddy of all floods on the Pedernales, took out all the pecan trees that had been on what is now our property except one hardy big tree. However on our jaunt down to the river yesterday we counted about 20 new pecan trees that are between 3 and 6 feet tall so one day unless they get flooded out may be a pecan grove again.

You gain another perspective when you are down in the river bottom. From up here on our back porch you can see how wide the river is in a flood and that is awesome in itself but down there looking up into the few big trees and seeing the debris still hanging there from last years flood, you can see how deep that river gets when on a rise. We guessed it must be at least 12ft. up and I guess 250ft. across.

I have no way to guess how fast the river is rolling but it is mighty and loud. We have had the same two kayakers come knocking on our door for help during two of the big rises. Once one was hurt because his hand got caught on a rock as he went crashing down the river and then next time he and the kayak parted company.

One huge flood in the early 90’s, and I don’t remember exactly which year, we lost three big items, a flat bottom aluminum fishing boat, a deer stand and a deer feeder. We heard that flood of the 90’s took a good number of boats from up this way and deposited them down at Lake Travis; in fact they were overrun with boats piled up down that way. The deer stand and feeder no telling where they went but someone has them I can assure you of that. We no longer keep a boat or feeder in the river pasture.

The river brings us way more pleasure than not, I cannot imagine going out on my back porch almost any day of the year and not seeing and best of all hearing the Pedernales River, we are just that lucky!