By Rebecca Dennis Every summer of my childhood started with the same celebratory ritual. We would load up in our big blue van with a rickety Datsun truck bed trailer in tow. The four of us kids and a lucky friend or two squeezed in tight behind my folks, squabbling for the window seat and giggling with anticipation for the cold water and long journey ahead. I grew up in the Sierra Nevada foothills, a love child of the river.  My parents met in the early 70’s on the Stanislaus River while my 20 year old mother Jacqueline was going to school and living in a canvas tent by the river and my father Fred was working with Mark Dubois and Ron Coldwell offering free trips down the river for inner city kids.…