There has always been something about moving water that has drawn me to it. Whether a
tiny creek running behind my Grandparents old wooden frame house or the mighty Amazon
winding its way across South America, I just can’t help it. It draws me in. Since those
youthful days of spending hours upon hours beside that little unnamed creek, always
wondering where the trickle of water passing by would end up, I have been to, seen, floated,
and fished uncountable rivers, including those in the Amazon basin. I would not trade any of
those experiences for anything. They will always be cherished memories. But, that is exactly
what they are. Memories. I never really got to know any of those waters. When visiting a
river you never get to experience the comfortable familiarization that you have with your home waters.
For me, home is the West Fork of the Trinity River in north central Texas. Although
not as glamorous or romantic as many of the rivers I have been on, the once heavily polluted
and now very much improved, Trinity is where I spend most of my on water time. I am a
volunteer canoe guide at the Fort Worth Nature Center and Refuge in northwestern Fort
Worth. I have canoed, kayaked, and rafted all over the world, and though not nearly as
scenic, not anywhere near as wild, and certainly not as remote as the other rivers, my little
portion of the Trinity has given me as much pleasure as any of the others. Perhaps more. I
say this because as a guide at FWNCR I get to expose people to a riparian environment that
many of them have never seen. I’ll never forget the time a five year old boy that I had in my
canoe saw a flock of coots for the first time as they ran across the water to try to get airborne.
He laughed about it for the entire trip. Or the time that an osprey circled overhead, made a
sudden dive to catch a fish right in front of our boats, and then turned and flew right over us
as if to show us what he had caught. The looks on our guests faces were priceless. From a
fish jumping out of the water and into a canoe, to a huge flock of white pelicans taking off and
flying low over our heads, to wild hogs rapidly swimming away from us, to the occasional and
ever popular (though at times somewhat tense) alligator sightings, each moment is a special
event.
I have come to actually know this water. I am not merely a visitor but a partner with the
river. Our partnership allows us to share up-close and personal a very special ecosystem
with people who might otherwise simply drive over a bridge and never even look over the
side. I imagine that after these trips they think differently about the river. They will want to get to know it too. Many offer to come help clean up the banks. They want to know how to get
into canoeing. They want to learn. They gain respect for their surroundings. In that instant,
when that spark of caring for the river ignites, I am most happy to be on my special portion of
the Trinity. My home waters.