This afternoon, nine members and five leaders of my church’s youth group went tubing on the Susquehanna River. We were scheduled to go tubing on Penns Creek, but we haven’t had too much rain lately, so the creek is quite low. So low, in fact, that if we had gone tubing, we would have walked our tubes along the river about 75% of the way.

Over half of our group drove to Shady Nook, a small park with a boat launch, while the rest of us (including myself) drove to the Isle of Que, our destination. After getting rides back to the starting point, the group of fourteen set out down the river for what I would guess to be about a mile and a half ride down stream.

The current wasn’t very strong (at least not as strong as I was expecting/hoping), so I ended up paddling a fair amount of the way just so I would feel like I was moving; I’m sure my arms will be feeling the brunt of that in the morning :)

As we were floating, the roll of thunder made its way into the valley, so we made our way closer to shore so that we’d be able to get out quickly if a storm came up. Fortunately, all it did was thunder off and on without any lightning or heavy rain.

After about ninety minutes, we made our way to land (through lots of seaweed, or as one of the youth called it, “river weed”) at the Isle of Que. At this point, the craziness of getting all of the cars to the destination began. It would have been very easy, but our church’s conference has a policy called Safe Sanctuaries where, no matter the size of the group, there always needs to be two unrelated adults present to keep an eye on the youth. Eventually, all of the cars were brought back and we headed back to church. Some kids decided to have a mini cookout at one of the leaders’ homes (with another adult, off course), but I couldn’t stay because I needed to get some rest before the start of a busy week.

What did I learn from this event? When tubing, allow way more time than you think it will take. We had allowed from 3:00-5:00, but we didn’t end up finishing until close to 6:00. Also, double-check the weather forecast, including the forecast for cities and towns to the west. That way, we’d have been able to come up with a plan for what to do if we had to get out of the river mid-journey–I’m not sure how we would have gotten to either set of cars.

The next summer youth ministry event is a trip to Dorney Park and Wildwater Kingdom on August 10.