Day 43: Identify Richard’s “mystery toy” and the origin of his can of Coca-Cola

After spending the coldest night yet on his trip camping on a sandbar along the riverbank, Richard woke up at 6:00 AM on Saturday morning. He built the fire back up to keep warm - it was still “damn cold” that morning.

That morning, he found an unusual scenario on the river - it was hard for him to describe. There was the usual fog, but it was much taller - he couldn’t even see the water. Richard estimates that the fog was 30-40 feet tall. He took some pictures as he watched the fog dissipate and ate a tootsie roll, a can of peaches and drank his usual cup of coffee for breakfast.

He began breaking camp, he was sure to make sure his campfire was completely out before leaving and he did his best to leave the site better than he found it. There was plenty of trash left behind by the previous campers - there were used baby diapers, plastic Kool-Aid cooler drink bottles and aluminum cans. He also found a toy left by those who came before him. He decided to take the toy along with him during the rest of his journey.

I asked him to describe the toy so that we could guess which character it may be - Richard has no idea if the toy is a well know children’s character or if he’s just some random toy left by a child along the river. Here’s Richard’s description of the toy – if you think you know what character the toy may be, please leave a comment on the blog.

The toy is wearing a space suit. It looks as though he has a helmet, but the helmet is missing on the one Richard found. The shoes on this character are green and silver with black soles. He is wearing some sort of headphone contraption on either side of his head and has a “britney spears” microphone near his mouth. He is wearing boxing gloves on his hands and there is an “R” on the front of his space suit. The character’s space suit is green and black. He also has a big grin on his face and some type of pack on his back - maybe an oxygen tank? I think it will be fun to see if we can figure out which toy he found in his campsite.

Richard finally began paddling around 9:30 that morning, the sun was up, there were no clouds in the sky and there was a slight breeze. Early during his day on the river, he spotted a deer drinking along the river along another sandbar near the riverbank. The deer ran off when he spotted Richard paddling down stream. Later in the day, he stopped at an old grain silo along the river. There were these monster silos on the property where the grain would be stored and then there was an opening at the bottom of the silo where the grain would be transported from the silo to a barge via a conveyor belt.

There was no one around and the structures looked old and dilapidated. Richard took some pictures from the property near the old grainery and before he left, he found an old coke machine on the property with a bunch of old Coca-Cola cans still in the machine. None of the cans were open, but most of them were empty. There was one can left that was still full and Richard opened it and drank the Coke. He also brought one of the empty cans as a souvenir. There were numbers on the bottom of the Coke can and Richard is challenging anyone to decode the numbers to see if we can figure out how old when and where this can of Coke was originated from. He numbers are JUN 1697 ETB 1054. The can says “Get into NFL Coca-Cola - Win Super Bowl trips” - the ring on the top of the can is colored red. If you know how to decode the numbers on the can to figure out the date and location where it originated, please post a comment to the blog.

He left the site of the old grainery, climbed back down the riverbank (about 40 feet down to the river) and continued his paddle downstream. He passed several places along the river where there was a dyke built along the riverbank where barges would stop and wait their turn to go to a plant or to be transported down river.

That evening, Richard set up camp on another sandbar along the riverbank. He dug a fire pit in the sand using the blades of his paddle. He lay in his tent looking at the fire and the sky streaked with clouds. On one side of the sky, he could see stars, the other side of the sky was cloudy - he could see the moon, but it was behind some clouds. The river was as calm as glass and there was no wind. He can see the reflection of the trees from the other side of the river in the water - it looks as though they are reflecting off of a mirror only it’s the river’s surface. The weather was cool, but not cold - a welcome change from the previous evening. Richard is beginning to realize that his trip is coming to an end. This was his last Saturday night on the river. As usual, it’s a bittersweet time for him. He misses his friends and family, but he will also miss the river when he’s home. He will be sure to cherish his last few days of the trip.