More than two months into a canoe trip along the Mississippi River, retired ABC7 reporter Paul Meincke and his friends have hit a few snags on their journey.

With only eight days remaining in their trip, Meincke and his friends will finish the journey a little differently than initially planned.

“We have one more day on the main channel of the Mississippi and then we go to the Atchafalaya,” Meincke said.

One of their paddlers returned home and the original foursome is now a trio. With one less paddler, the group switched from traveling in two smaller canoes to one larger canoe.

“There are three of us in one boat and that changes our ability to battle big wakes from big ships. We’re not comfortable with that and we don’t want to come this far and then get swamped by a freighter,” Meincke said of why they’ll continue the journey along the Atchafalaya rather than the Mississippi River.

“The Atchafalaya is a distributary from the Mississippi, so when there’s overflow the Mississippi diverts its water into the Atchafalaya,” he added. “It’s a huge wetlands/swamp, but a defined river with interesting wildlife and cypress trees. It’s a calmer route, and it will still take us to the Gulf.”

Though not part of the original plan switching to the Atchafalaya brings the trip full circle.

“There’s kind of a nice symmetry to the whole thing because we started up north in a wilderness area – a lot of wildlife – and we want it to kind of end that way too although the wildlife is much different,” Meincke said. “It’s alligators and copperheads and other things that can wreak havoc.”

With 63 days of paddling behind him, Meincke admits he’s felt better.

“I’d be lying if I said we felt great. We all feel like burnt toast. We’re in Natchez now, and we had four or five days where the heat index had to be way up there. One day we were told it was 105,” he said. “So you’re on a big channel for 6-8 hours a day. I think we’re handling it intelligently but there’s really no cover.”

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