Army vet to paddle the Mississippi to search soul, raise money

Bennie Giles, a retired Army veteran from Clarksville, is taking on a journey that many would find intimidating.

“A while back we were just talking about all the things we wanted to do some day,” he said. “I wanted to walk the Appalachian Trail, and she mentioned canoeing the Mississippi — I didn't even know you could do that.”

The first week of June he’ll set a canoe into Minnesota's Lake Itasca and travel the entire length of the Mississippi.

It’s an adventure, he says, that was prompted by the kind of dreamy chatting with a friend that many are familiar with.

Once that seed had been planted, Giles began to get more intrigued at the prospect.

‘Like boot camp again’

For some time, Giles had been considering some form of trip to do a little soul-searching, and this seemed to fit the bill.

“Ever since I got back from the military I've lost that brotherhood; we've scattered. I've been doing everything on my own, which has been hard for me,” Giles said.

“This is one of those things where you go out alone and it'll be like boot camp again where you break yourself down to build yourself back up. In those sorts of situations, you come back a better person for whatever else you do in life.”

In addition to his personal growth, Giles has committed to utilizing the adventure to raise money and awareness for Homes for Troops, a charity that builds homes for wounded veterans.

“I have a friend who has done a lot with charities — the good and the bad — and he told me that this was the most deserving,” he said, adding that he was hoping to raise about $5,000.

“This was just going to be a soul-searching thing, but I figured if you're going to do something this big you should help a good cause.”

Homes for Troops is not foreign to Clarksville. In 2010, the organization built a barrier-free home for retired Staff Sgt. Heath Calhoun, who lost both legs while deployed to Iraq with the 101st Airborne Division in November 2003.

2,500 miles of solitude

Paddling the Mississippi is no casual jaunt.

It's some 2,552 miles, a journey that Giles estimates will take him about three months. It would be a daunting task for even a seasoned paddler, but as Giles freely admits, he's anything but.

“I don't canoe as much as some people — I'm not really a cold-weather person,” he said. “I usually wait ‘til the weather's warmed up, and I canoe four to five times a year.”

However, Giles' experiences and training in the military, coupled with a tendency toward strict planning, seem to be standing him in good stead.

“I've already got maps, already researched everything, every stop. I know where the rapids are, food sources, drinking water, locks and dams,” he said. “I feel pretty confident about that. It's going to be willpower mostly, not giving in.”

Indeed, among obstacles such as inclement weather, injuries and the possibility of having to get out and pull his canoe through low water, Giles notes that the major challenge will be loneliness.

“I know at some point you're going to break down. It's going to be lonely, it's hard, it's just going to be you out there, and I think at some point you'll get tired of that.”

Focus on fresh air, experiences

Nevertheless, the thought of rewarding experiences is enough to keep this lone adventurer pushing toward his goals. Between Minnesota and the Gulf Coast, there's a rich variety of scenery, nature and local color to be taken in — all of which he'll be documenting in a blog he'll be writing along the way.

“Most of the other journals I've read about this trip focused on how many miles they paddled,” he said. “Mine's going to be all about the wildlife I see, the experiences. I'm looking forward to what I'll be seeing — I've been to 31 countries, but I've never seen the wildlife in Minnesota.”