18MAY2012 @ Chamois, MO - I guess my naps yesterday were effective because I was up with the 0430 birds and out the door quickly.  Chamois was so pleasant that I was a bit sad crossing the railroad tracks, walking over the bridge, walking past the Lion's club building and over to the boat ramp.  Pushing off into a beautiful morning, though, I got into the trip spirit again and paddled on in solitude, finishing 3 miles before the sun broke over the horizon.  I went ashore at Portland and concluded that pushing on to here would have been fine as a bar/restaurant opens at 1100 and stays open well past my bedtime.  Portland's ambience is pleasing, but at sunrise it is a good place to paddle past.
The confluence with the Gasconade looks strikingly similar to the confluence with the Osage and I mused that Daniel Boone choosing Missouri over Kentucky made sense.  I am equally certain that members of the Corps of Discovery would have preferred to abandon the expedition once they saw this country's beauty.  Indeed John  Colter lived his final years near here - more on that tomorrow. 
Flood damage continues to be seen., but it is almost totally riverbank washouts, not destroyed houses.  Missourians do not have their homes on the riverbanks ... they are on bluffs or on naturally high banks.  Some - like the Riverview Boat Club where I end today - are set on posts as described later.   
At 1000 I was beached at Hermann, reportedly the richest town in Missouri.  Despite that reputation, I decided to get a blood test done here.  My cholesterol pills are about out ... so I want to know how much good they are doing.  A blood test here followed by another test in (and after) several weeks of no pills should let me know how efficacious this whole pill thing really is.  By 1300 I had my blood drawn and I had had lunch ... pretty fast says me.  Dennis Miller helped me get to the hospital and then we went to lunch together and he deposited me back at the waterfront.  Dennis is a Quapaw tribe member who is renovating a house about halfway between downtown and the hospital.  We met when the chain of my borrowed bicycle broke close to his work spot and he took pity on the "tired old man".  Of course I payed for lunch - happily.
At 1400 I left Hermann into a facewind that occasionally turned the bow.  Being tired, I drifted a while, paddled a while, dozed a while and enjoyed the scenery awhile until 3 hours later I was at the Riverview Boat Club 13 miles from Hermann.  Before me was a clubhouse on posts about 8 feet above ground, a gravel parking lot and a large grassy lawn, well mown, as well as the boat ramp.  Almost immediately Bob Liermann drove up and assured me that setting up my tent on the lawn was fine and OK with him and all the members.  Within a half hour I was set up and the boat ramp was abuzz with other members and their boats.  They moved very efficiently and for an hour or so I was alone again.  Then they slowly began returning - and staying.  By dark they were all back, leaning over the gunwhales, swapping stories and popping beer tops.  One gets the feeling that these folks are all true friends who thoroughly enjoy hanging around together.  I was asleep before the last of them had left.
Today I paddled from river mile 118 to river mile 85, a distance of 33 miles.  It was fun to see the signs go from three digits to 2 this morning.