Senkiw Bridge – Soggy and smiling

When I joked about racing across the river with two teams, a bridge team and a swimming team, it really was just a joke…

Our family joined a few friends in exploring this little gem of a trail with an interesting history. In 1947 the Senkiw Bridge replaced the hand-powered cable basket system in getting kids across the Roseau River to school. The trail is part of the historic Crow Wing Trail, near the town of Roseau River, just upstream from Roseau River First Nation.

After setting out from the north trailhead near the Senkiw School site, we sliced between farm fields and descended into the river valley.

Finally we arrived at THE bridge, and wobbled across it as it swayed under the footsteps of our group.

I imagined crossing this river daily to get to and from school. How many hours would a group of kids lingered at the riverbank after school on a warm spring day? How many times would parents have shook their heads when their kids arrived home, late for chores and dripping wet?

We did the same, stopping to dip our feet in the cool waters of the Roseau River.

That’s when things got real. One of the older kids called our bluff about swimming across the river, and jumped in, clothes and all.

You could feel the realization sink in among the group – we were going to have to try swimming across.

As we walked back to the trailhead, soggy clothes (I’d only brought a foot-drying towel, not full changes of clothes!) but smiling and refreshed, I was reminded how the best adventures usually happen when we embrace a little discomfort, drift ever so slightly off the beaten path, and jump into the current.