The Early Years……
Well really it starts with you and a desire to share our “Happy Place” in the hopes it will bring you as much peace as it has brought to us.
I suppose as for any startup we were pretty unofficial to say the least. Saline River Canoe started in 2008 with a few used canoes, no office, no vans and no trailer we were up and running. I will never forget I was sitting on a picnic table behind Riverside Grocery, I got a call about a rental, I was so excited that when the fella asked where he needed to go I said “ where do you live I will come and get ya.” Luckily he lived close! As I sat at the take out waiting for them to arrive, dreams of running a canoe rental business on the Saline filled my thoughts; however, I really needed to figure out how to do better than one rental @ $40 a day.
Over the next few years we acquired a small office behind Riverside, a few shuttle vans, a few trailers and around 30 canoes, but more importantly a love for the Saline River. In 2015 our prayers were answered and we were able to purchase a house with river frontage adjacent to Lyle Park. We quickly moved our operation and began to enjoy living, working and playing on the Saline…living the dream.
#CleanSaline
Given our daily interaction we became more aware of potential threats that endangered the health of the river and became determined to do our part. To date we have introduced the Saline River to literally thousands of folks. We organize frequent cleanup efforts via Friends of The Saline, I sit on the Board of Directors for The Saline River Watershed Alliance, and we have adopted Lyle Park through Benton’s Adopt-A-Park program and adopted our local section of the Saline River through the AGFC’s Stream Team program. After 13 years of renting canoes and kayaks I can honestly say we love doing what we do so much we often forget the difference between work and play.
It’s our hope that we can help you find peace in this sometimes overwhelming world by helping you slow down to reconnect with friends, family and the natural world around us.