HAUNTED WATERS

In spring of youth it was my lot 

 To haunt of the wide earth a spot 

 The which I could not love the less— 

 So lovely was the loneliness

 Of a wild lake,  with black rock bound, 

 And the tall pines that tower’d around. 

 But when the Night had thrown her pall 

 Upon that spot, as upon all,

 And the mystic wind went by 

 Murmuring in melody— 

 Then—ah then I would awake 

 To the terror of the lone lake. 

 Yet that terror was not fright, 

 But a tremulous delight— 

 A feeling not the jewelled mine 

 Could teach or bribe me to define— 

 Nor Love—although the Love were thine. 

 Death was in that poisonous wave, 

 And in its gulf a fitting grave 

 For him who thence could solace bring 

 To his lone imagining— 

 Whose solitary soul could make 

 An Eden of that dim lake. 

Edgar Allan Poe 

The Master of the Macabre Edgar Allan Poe Certainly does paint A picture of water we all know I'll know in his poem simply titled The Lake. The lake is beautiful enchanting, and endearing by day and mysterious and dark at night. Poe plays on the fondness and thrill of this serene and wild place. But then haunts us later as he describes his "delight" at waking to "the terror on the lone lake."
But what else would expect from this writer who has been fighting us with scary tales such as the Ravin, Murder in Rouge Morgue, and The Telltale Heart?
And while the location of Poe's dedication remains unidentified. Historians have suggested, Poe could have written the poem about Lake Drummond, a lake outside Norfolk, Virginia, also known as the Great Dismal Swamp. One of only two natural lakes in Virginia, Lake Drummond offers a jungle atmosphere of lush and beautiful scenery and dark waters of unsolved mysteries.
Poe is said to have visited the lake and possibly could have been inspired by the lake's creepy history.
According to legend, the lake is haunted by the supernatural canoeing spirits of two star-crossed lovers and the ghostly Lady of the Lake. 

Edgar Allan Poe

First, it's the tragic story of a young Native American couple who lost their lives on the lake. The young woman had died on their wedding day. Mad with grief, the young man has a vision of her paddling her canoe in the distance. He fashions together a raft that comes apart while on the lake and drowns while attempting to reach her. It is said that at night one can see this ghostly bride and groom floating together in the moonlight.
Over the years, many have also claimed to see the Lady of the Lake paddling a white canoe holding a firefly lamp.
Could Poe have heard these tales to inspire his poem or perhaps have seen them for himself? The answer is unknown. But what we do know is folklore has a way of spilling into our waterways, especially after dark.
So whether you're courageous or skeptical, here are a few of our nation's haunted waters you just might want to paddle (if got the nerve) this Halloween or anytime for your chance to see a ghost.

Saco River, New Hampshire & Maine 

The Saco River is a popular recreational river that draws canoeists and kayakers across the northeast. While there are a few rapids, for most of its 136 miles, it's steady, calm, and it's cursed. Most of the locals have already heard the story that dates back to 1675. It's been told, three white-drunken sailors were rowing upriver when they came upon a Native American pregnant woman and her young son in a canoe. According to the story, the sailors believing in a myth that all baby natives could swim, attacked the canoe, grabbed the baby, and much to the horror of the child's mother, tossed the baby into the river. The infant sank, and the mother dove in and retrieved him. However, it was enough, and the baby and pregnant mother would tragically die not long afterward.

 

Saco River

As it turned out, the husband and father of the baby was the chief of a local tribe by the name of Squando. He was in despair and rage at the death of his pregnant wife and his young son. The incident would soon ignite violence between the tribe and white settlers. But Squando would conjure a more sinister type of vengeance. He asked the spirits to lay a curse over the waters of Saco saying, the river would "claim three lives a year until all white men fled its banks" to replace the lives of the three lost that day.
For the record, there are no official records of drownings and deaths on the Saco River, but locals swear that “Curse of the Saco River” is real and do not go near the river in fear of the ominous prophecy. Skeptics say it's just an old superstition. They say the river can be dangerous because it flows through many deep gorges with stronger currents. Over time accidents are bound to happen. However, in 1947 the Maine Sunday Telegram proclaimed that the curse was broken with the headline, "Saco River Outlives Curse of Indian Chief," after no deaths were reported that year.
Squandro eventually made his peace with the whites, but he never rescinded his curse. News of deaths is still reported during the summer months as the curse still looks for victims up and down the length of the Saco River.

Pocantico River, New York

The Pocantico River in western New York was made famous by Washington Irving's Halloween classic The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Ever since people have been keeping a keen out for the Headless Horseman. Who, as the story said, would ride alongside the river looking for hapless victims.
The Pocantico is a nine-mile-long tributary of the Hudson River following an urban setting, But even today, it has a dark and unnerving nature. "The Pocantico winds its wizard stream among the mazes of its old Indian haunts, sometimes running darkly in pieces of woodland," wrote Irving.
He had obviously had heard the tales surrounding the Old Dutch Church, Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, and Spook Rock to inspire his story of the Headless Horseman. 

Pocantico River

Spook Rock, sit on the east­ern side of Rock­e­feller State Park, next to the Saw Mill River Park­way. Just its name conjures up ghosts. The his­tory of Tar­ry­town tells the leg­end of the Lady in White who haunts the rock after dying in a snow­storm. It's said you can still hear her cries of the howl­ing of the wind and see her ges­tures to warn of impending winter storms.
It also tells of the ghost of a colo­nial girl, who jumped to her death there to escape a Tory raider dur­ing the rev­o­lu­tion. As well as the heartbreaking tale of Star Girl the spirit of an In­dian girl who roams the area lament­ing her death of for her lover and son.
It is said that even to­day, on a quiet spring night, one can stand on the banks of the Pocan­tico River and still hear Star Girl cry­ing out for her lover and child.

The Tar River, North Carolina

Known as a river for large catfish and kayak fishing, but if you encounter The Tar River Banshee and live, you'll tell a different tale of the one that got away.
The Tar River meanders past the farm fields and small towns for some 200 miles through the northeast part of North Carolina toward the estuary of Pamlico Sound. The river gets its name when the British Navy used the area's dense longleaf pine forests to provide much of the tar, turpentine, and pitch needed for shipbuilding. The name stuck when it became a major shipping route for tar-laden barges transporting goods throughout the colonies and abroad. 

Tar River

It's also about that time when the legend of the river's banshee, was spawned. It was during the Revolutionary War when British soldiers gunned down an Irish miller on the banks of the river. His crime, supplying aid to the patriot militia and not being loyal to the crown. As the water turned red with the Irishman's blood, he swore his revenge on the soldiers. He told them that they would be visited by a Banshee, a wailing and shrieking messenger of death. They shot him again, and he disappeared under the murky brown water.
Later that night, true to the Irishman's words, the British soldiers were awakened by the sorrowful wailing of the Banshee, the female apparition told them they did not have long to live and, they would soon all die in battle. And Not long after, the soldiers were all shot and killed in a skirmish with North Carolina militiamen.
Area folklore says the Tar River Banshee still roams the river shore. To this day, anyone unlucky enough to wade into the waters where the Irishman died so long ago, will be visited by the Banshee, who will wail her sorrowful song into the night and foretell their deaths.

The Wolf River, Tennessee

One would think that a section of the Wolf River in west Tennessee fittingly called the “Ghost river.” would be haunted, and you would be right. The Wolf River is a paddling favorite. The river is known for beautiful pristine and unspoiled countryside that meanders through bottomland hardwood forests, cypress-tupelo swamps, and open marshes. One missed sign on the 8-mile Ghost River canoe trail, and you could find yourself hopelessly lost drifting the cool and dark swampy waters shaded among spooky 100-foot moss-draped cypress tree on a river with no current. Some suggest that this eerie stop of flow is how the river section got its name. Others, however, point to the river's forlorn history. A Native American scout vanished without a trace in these waters in 1682. While on December 4, 1863, Union and Confederate forces clashed in a desperate struggle on a railroad bridge over the river. 

Wolf River

Pvt. Augustus Hurff of the 6th Illinois Cavalry described what happened, "We had no sooner crossed the bridge than were fired upon from ambush. This threw our forces into a panic. They forced us back to the river; we were ordered to draw our sabers and charge... but the rebels were reinforced. We dismounted and fought as infantry. Many of our horses were shot in the river, as were a great number of our men. The rivers seemed like running blood instead of water."
In the disorienting maze of willow, cypress, and tupelo, you will have to figure out on your own how the Ghost River section got its name. Is it because the river seems to get lost while running through a swamp? Or as others claim, because they still see ghosts of Civil War soldiers wandering about the shores.

Chicago River, Illinois

You will be traveling through the heart of the Windy City when paddling down the Chicago River. Looking up, you will find yourself surrounded by Chicago's legendary skyline. However, while gazing into the river's dark waters, you might see a strange reflection that is not your own staring back and possibly hear sounds of Screams, moans and splashes coming over the calm waters. Local paranormalists say without a doubt, they are the ghosts of the sinking of the SS Eastland.

The Eastland Disaster on the Chicago River 

The morning of July 24, 1915, passengers were boarding the Eastland for a summertime excursion at a dock in downtown Chicago when the ship began listing on the starboard side. To correct the imbalance, the ship’s crew let water into the ship’s ballast tanks. Only to have the vessel began listing again, this time on the port side. By this time, the boat had reached its limit of 2,500 passengers. Minutes later, the ship began taking on water. The vessel drifted away from the dock. At approximately 7:30 AM, the Eastland rolled onto its side. Onlookers were horrified as hundreds of people began to drown before their eyes.

"I looked across the river," reported one witness, "As I watched in disoriented stupefaction a steamer large as an ocean liner slowly turned over on its side as though it were a whale going to take a nap. I didn’t believe a huge steamer had done this before my eyes, lashed to a dock, in perfectly calm water, in excellent weather, with no explosion, no fire, nothing. I thought I had gone crazy."

On the upper deck, the panicking passengers, many holding children, spilled into the river. While below deck, other passengers were crushed by heavy furniture as the water poured inside the capsized ship.

Despite the Eastland being in just 20 feet of water and just a few yards from shore, its sinking killed 844 people, ranking it as one the worst maritime disasters in American history. It was among the city’s deadliest catastrophes. Hundreds of more died in the Eastland disaster than in the Chicago fire of 1871.

For years now, people have sensed paranormal activity along the river. Pedestrians on a river walk stroll have heard what sounds like a loud commotion coming from the water. Screams and splashes accompany the murmurer of a large number of people are floundering around in the water. Of course, they look to the river, and the water is perfectly calm. Some have seen a large wash of water suddenly overflow the area, while others have been shocked to see the ghost-like reflections staring back at them from the depths of the Chicago River.

Medina River, Texas

It is hard to scare Texans. But the tale of the Donkey Lady Bridge over the Medina River south of San Antonio for over a century has had them shaking in their boots. The Medina River is one of the gentlest rivers in the Texas Hill Country. Paddlers will enjoy amazing views and face very few hazards while journeying down this 120-mile waterway, that is until they approach the Donkey Lady Bridge. "It is extremely scary, very frightening. It's the most haunted places of ALL haunted places," wrote one visitor. 

The Donkey Lady Bridge

In one of Texas' legendary ghost stories, it's told that a man went mad and murdered all of his children and set his nearby farmhouse on fire. Escaping the house, the wife ran away, burning alive and throwing herself over the bridge into the water to extinguish the flames. Her body was left horribly disfigured. Her face was charred, and her hands had been melted into hoof-like stumps of a donkey. Over the years, she has become one of Texas' most terrifying apparitions in all of Texas.

Witnesses have report screeches, screams, and the sound of braying coming from the bridge.  Others have said they were attacked by the menacing specter while driving over the bridge. It has been told that the Donkey Lady would jump on the hoods of cars, leaving dents and broken windshields behind.

Since the bridge has been converted pedestrian bridge as part of the Medina River Green Way Trail System, but paddlers still might consider crossing under the bridge.

Missouri River, Nebraska

Blackbird Hill is a distinctive 300-foot-high landmark on the west side of the Missouri River in northeastern Nebraska. It was well known to river travelers throughout the 19th century. In 1804, Lewis and Clark climbed the rise to visit the grave of an Omaha chief, while famed frontier artists George Catlin and Karl Bodmer painted it in the 1830s. Traditional Native American accounts say that Chief Big Elk is buried at the site. It is also said to be haunted by the spirit of a young woman who was murdered on the hill more than a century and a half ago.
According to local folklore, a young couple fell in love and agreed to marry. But first, the boy had to make his fortune, promising her he would return for her. But after years of waiting, the young girl finally gave up, thinking her husband-to-be was dead. She married another man and settled atop Blackbird Hill.

Blackbird Hill by Karl Bodmer

 As the story goes, it was years later when the former lovers were once again reunited, when the young man came looking for her on the banks of the Missouri River. Overjoyed to see him, she confessed that she had never stopped loving him and only married another because she thought he was dead. Surely, it was fate that brought the long-lost lovers back together. She told him that she would go home to tell her husband that she wanted out of their marriage, so they could leave together in the morning.
When the girl returned to the cabin, she explained the situation to her husband, saying she did not love him and intended to leave him to marry her first love. At first, the husband begged her to stay. But when she refused, he went into a bitter rage and attacked her with his hunting knife. Mortally wounding her and with nothing to live for, he carried her to the cliff of the hill overlooking the river and leaped with her into the river far below. The woman’s death scream pierced the air until it was silenced by the muddy waters of the Missouri River. The young lover witnessed the couple tumble and drowning in the river, and he also became a victim as he later died of a broken heart.
A century and a half later, the river no longer touches the base of the hill Blackbird Hill, but the young woman’s restless soul remains. According to the legend, on October 17th the anniversary of the murder-suicide, the woman’s chilling screams can be heard at the top of the hill. Over the years, dozens of people reportedly have heard her cries of terror.

The Colorado River, Lake Mead & Hoover Dam, Nevada and Arizona

The massive concrete arch-gravity Hoover Dam spanning the Colorado River is an American icon. It's 660 feet thick at its base, over sixty stories tall, and over 1,200 feet wide. It supplies both significant amounts of hydroelectric power and irrigation water to the southwest United States.  Many maintain that the dam is haunted by the workers who lost their lives while building the colossal structure.

Built during the height of the Great Depression between 1931 and 1935. It's said, some 112 people died during its construction. The deaths were all typical industrial accidents such as drowning, most common in dam construction, being struck by equipment or debris, and of course, accidental falls. A traditional story often told says that a few of those killed fell into the concrete while it was being poured and now encased the dam itself. While a popular myth, it isn't true. Experts say having human bodies mixed within the concrete would make the dam structurally unsound. 

Hoover Dam by Ansel Adams

However, the construction company said 42 workers not listed in the body count died of pneumonia. Most think that they actually perished from carbon monoxide poisoning while operating vehicles inside the diversion tunnels, and the company made up the pneumonia story to avoid any lawsuits.

No matter what the actual number of people who died may be, many think the dam is a harborage for all the lost souls. Dam workers and visitors have reported experiencing temperature drops in hallways and flickering lights and hearing footsteps in empty corridors of the Hoover Dam facility. Some have even been startled by the creepy apparition of men dressed in old-fashioned worker's clothing wandering the area. 

This year, with Lake Mead forecast to be at 34 percent of full capacity, the lowest level since the completion of the Hoover Dam in the 1930s, the lake too is a ghost of what it should be. 

Pinto Lake, California

Native American legends, a history of tragic drownings, and an unsolved murder plague this Northern California lake. Add in a paranormal activity along with massive algal toxin blooms will only add to the creepiness of Pinto Lake. 

Pinto Lake

Pinto Lake is a 120-acre recreational lake in Watsonville, CA. It's a great place to bring your kayak or canoe for an afternoon float, but according to the local folklore, you might want to be off the water after the sunsets. Allegedly it was an old Native American burial ground. Over the years, both artifacts and remains have been found in and around the lake. Some believe the spirits of those Indians still reside along the banks.

Over time several drownings have also taken place at the lake. Many think these lost souls walk the shore after dark. It's said, the apparition of the young woman in a white nurse's uniform dating back to World War II.  In the 1970s four locals, all claimed to have seen the phantom nurse from across the lake.

 “Talk about being scared," reported one witness, "This silhouette of this girl chased us all the way until we got out. We swore never again to be caught there after dark.” 

However, the ghost of whom some people think is Bonnie Brashers will send shivered down anyone's spine. In 1973, Bonnie, a local housewife, and mother of nine went out for a walk along Pinto Lake and never returned. Her husband was the main suspect in disappearance yet never was charged for her murder since her body was never found. Many believe, Bonnie was murdered by her husband. They say, he threw her body in the murky waters of the lake.  Her ghost now roams the shores there on occasion seeking justice and waiting for her body to be finally found to solve the mystery. 

So what do you believe? Are these just good old-fashion ghost stories passed down over the years?
Or are there really haunting spirits out there at the edge of the water?
Whatever you believe, these tales have intertwined with the history and folklore of these waterways. They have captured our imaginations and can provide us, that is if you’re feeling especially brave, a spooky paddling adventure where you can go see for yourself. But, only if you dare.

Happy Halloween

Keep up with Outside Adventure to the Max, on our Facebook page and Instagram, and now on Youtube.

RIVER & PADDLING RELATED MOVIES TO WATCH WHILE QUARANTINED DURING THE COVID-19 OUTBREAK

If you don't know what day it is, you're not alone. As the novel coronavirus know COVID-19 has halted all social activities everywhere to slow the spread of the disease, people have gotten the feel of "River Time" while sheltering in place these past few weeks.
For a lot of paddling folks, it being means stuck inside playing video games and streaming movies, instead of paddling in the stream or river.
So while you can't go to the river, here are some movies to watch (or perhaps, in some cases, revisit) that will keep you in a paddling mood in the coming days and weeks ahead.

The African Queen (1951)
Arguably one of the greatest river movies of all time, as Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn, take on the jungle, the rapids, and the German Navy in this classic movie adventure.

Filmed on the Ruiki River, in the heart of the Belgian Congo at Murchison Falls near Lake Victoria in Uganda, just making this movie was a monumental test of endurance for the cast and crew. They endured sickness, spartan living conditions, and even had brushes with wild animals and poisonous snakes while on location.
The African Queen deck was tight and too small to shoot on, given the size of the bulky Technicolor cameras. While on the river, most of the filming had to be done on a sprawling raft mock-up to shoot the close-ups. The cumbersome raft (built over three large canoes) would get stuck on submerged logs, while cameras and lights would get caught in the overhanging foliage of the jungle.

"The hysteria of each shot was a nightmare”, wrote Hepburn in her 1987 memoir The Making of The African Queen. “The engine on the Queen would stop. Or one of the propellers would be fouled up by the dragging rope. Or we would be attacked by hornets.”
The scenes considered too dangerous to shoot on the river were shot in studio water tanks in Isleworth Studios, Middlesex.
And in the days before CGI, the dramatic sequence of the African Queen going over a waterfall and through rapids was actually an eight-foot model boat shot through a telephoto lens. Flim makers layered their footage, incorporating the location sequences with the miniature boat careening over a waterfall.


The River of No Return (1954)
Riding the wave of the success of The African Queen, moviegoers returned to theaters to journey downriver again, but this time with blonde bombshell Marilyn Monroe rocking the boat.
While trying to start a new life together with his son after being released from prison, Robert Mitchum works his farm along the river, only to have Monroe and her low-life gambler fiance wash up along its shores.

On the run, the gambler knocks out Mitchum, steals his horse and rifle, and leaves the three stranded and surrounded by hostile Indians, with only one escape.
"The Indians call it the River of No Return,"  Mitchum's character says as they head into a series of treacherous rapids.  "From here on, you'll find out why."
Including the raft trip down the river, the film is an action-packed western with mountain lions, gunfights, and Indian attacks, but Monroe is still given time to serenade us with four songs, including the movie's willowy title tune.
Flimed in British Columbia on the Bow River, the production was plagued with problems, with the insistence from the director that the cast would perform many of their own stunts. In one incident, Monroe's hip waders filled with water, dragging her under and nearly drowning her after slipping on a rock in the river. Mitchum and others jumped to her rescue, but her ankle was injured as a result.
Another mishap occurred when Monroe and Mitchum's raft became broached on the rocks in the middle of the river, nearly capsizing before some quick thinking stuntmen saved the day and pulled them off the rocks.
It was much safer but not much drier for them while filming the remaining scenes indoors in Los Angeles. Onboard a hydraulic platform in front of a giant screen, Monroe and Mitchum clung to rafting props, while men stood to the sides and splashed them with buckets of water.

Deliverance (1972)

Even people who have never seen the film have encountered Deliverance's legacy, especially those who are connected to the canoe and kayak community. From bumper stickers and T-shirt reading, ‘Paddle faster, I hear banjos,’ to the hearing the iconic movie line "squeal like a pig,” the will film will forever as cause us to "squirm with angst."

It's a Heart of Darkness-like voyage into the rural backwoods of the south, as four suburban Atlanta men take a weekend canoe trip down the fictional Cahulawassee River in the Georgia wilderness. Burt Reynolds' character calls it the “the last wild, untamed, unpolluted, unf*cked-up river in the South." But time is ticking. In a short time the river, the rapids, and even the town will be flooded over with the imminent construction of a dam.
After a bumpy ride through rapids, the light-hearted adventure turns to horror when they encounter a pair of dangerous mountain men. Separated from the others, John Voight's character was tied to a tree and could only watch helplessly as his canoe partner Ned Beatty is violently raped by one of the men. That attack sets off a chilling sequence of events, including a disastrous turn through whitewater that challenges the canoeist's moral codes as they fight to survive.
Flimed on Northern Georgia's Chattooga River, the actors who performed their own stunts spent two weeks learning to canoe the rapids.
"We rehearsed for quite a long period," director John Boorman, told The Guardian in a 2017 interview, "Because we had to get the actors up to scratch in archery and canoeing. I had already been down the Chattooga, a ferocious river, to make sure it was safe."
In the scene where the canoe broke in two (five were actually destroyed during filming), Boorman coordinated a release of water from the upstream Tallulah Falls dam.

"I got them to close all the sluice gates upstream, so only a trickle came down," Boorman recalled in the interview, "That let us build rails on the riverbed, so we could mount the canoe on them, and trigger the breakup later. When we came to shoot, I was down at the bottom of the cataract on the phone to the dam. But I got impatient and got them to open all the gates. We just about survived the avalanche of water."
While Boorman was down below, tough-guy Reynolds (who nixed using a dummy in the shot because the stunt coordinator thought it looked too phony), requested to have the scene re-shot with himself going over the falls instead.
"I dream sometimes of the water coming," years later Reynolds told the Hollywood Reporter, "I looked around and there was a tidal wave coming at me. I went over the falls and the first thing that happened I hit a rock and cracked my tailbone, and to this day it hurts. Then I went down to the water below and it was a whirlpool. I couldn’t get out and a guy there said if you get caught, just go to the bottom. You can get out but you can't swim against it. So I went down to the bottom. What he didn’t tell me was it was going to shoot me up like a torpedo. So I went out."
Years before the phrase "wardrobe malfunction" would become popular, Reynolds would have one while caught in the force of that churning whirlpool.
"They said later that they saw this 30-year-old guy in costume go over the waterfall and then about fifteen minutes later they saw this nude man come out," Reynolds recalled in the interview, "It had torn everything—my boots and everything off."
For more about the movie see Canoe and Kayak Magazine article Summer of Deliverance.


Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown (1977)

The Peanuts gang heads off to Camp Remote in this animated adventure. Hoping to use this experience in building confidence, Charlie Brown leads the group in a river-raft race against some cheating bullies. The action transpires as the kids, get lost, battle thunderstorms, wild river rapids, and Peppermint Patty's endless calls for a vote.
After overcoming considerable odds Charlie Brown takes charge. "Let's go to the river," he commands as he leads the gang in paddling over a waterfall and to the movie's climax.
The longtime executive producer of the Peanuts Specials, Lee Mendelson said that he and Peanuts creator Charles Schulz came up with the idea after going on a river trip to Oregon.
"I said to him (Schulz)," recalled Mendelson in a 2015 interview with ToonZone News, “We’ve got to do research and go down the Rogue River.” He said, “Well, it rains a lot up in Oregon,” and I said, “I’m going to find out when the perfect time to go is.” They told me in July, it never rains in Oregon. So we spent three days on a raft in a thunderstorm. Rained the whole time. (laughter) That was the research we did for that movie."

White Water Summer  (1987)
Footloose's Kevin Bacon trades his dancing shoes for a PFD and hiking boots as he leads a group of young teenagers including Sean Astin on a trip into the wilderness. Attempting to toughen up the boys, Bacon and Astin are constantly at odds as they fish by hand, survive storms, cling to mountains and causing the others to become a bit annoyed when they paddle off through rapids.
"We carry the goddamn thing, and look who gets to ride in it!” complains one of the boys as Bacon and Austin canoe off on a difficult stretch of the river.
Mostly shot in Northern California, the filmmakers, however, would travel all the way to New Zealand to film some of the exciting canoeing sequences.
It would only be warm-up for Bacon, as he would take to the river again in River Wild.
"The River Wild' was great, with Meryl Streep," said Bacon, "That guy was really a bad dude who ultimately sorted of fundamentally impotent in a weird way. That was kind of interesting."



River Wild (1994)

We don't think of Meryl Streep as an action star, but when she says "We're are risking death a number of times on this trip", we know we're in for a wild ride. called the Gauntlet. "It's off the scale," Streep's character says. "One man was killed, and another one paralyzed for life. The Rangers no longer allow anyone to try it."
She stars as a suburban mom and former white-water rafter who, while trying to save her marriage, battles wits with an evil Kevin Bacon and runs a dangerous stretch of river
Many of the movie's whitewater scenes were filmed on Montana's Kootenai River, while other scenes were shot on the Middle Fork of the Flathead River, the Colorado River in Utah, and Oregon's Rogue River.
While most of the dangerous river scenes did require expert stunt doubles, Streep did several of her own stunts in the film on some milder river sections, but even those had some peril when the star was swept off the raft into the river.
''Actually, I was really very quiet and not scared, which is not at all how I thought I'd react under these circumstances", Streep told the New York Times in 1994. ''I remember sinking down to the bottom with this powerful and freezing water pulling me in deeper."
Wearing a PFD, she was rescued by a hired kayaker after the river pushed her 500 yards downstream.

The White Mile (1994)
Like The Titanic and A Perfect Storm, we have no doubts about the fate of the rafters. But it's hard to look away as we watch their misguided steps that lead to disaster. In the end, five men are killed, setting up moral crises within their corporate world when the surviving relatives file a liability suit against the firm.

Loosely based on a true story, the movie depicts an advertising agency taking 11 executives rafting on Canada's Chilko River. On a Class V section of the river known as the White Mile, the rafters suffer catastrophe after their raft capsizes, tossing them all into the raging current.
A not-so-nice Alan Alda stars as a hard-charging and unrepentant advertising executive who bullies not only his colleagues and clients into the male-bonding trip but also the raft guide by piling too many men into the raft.
During filming, however, California's South Fork of the American River (standing in for the Chilko River) dished out more than a few licks on Alda.
In a 1994 interview with St Louis Post-Dispatch, Alda tells how he and co-star Robert Loggia were struggling to stay afloat in the rapids while shooting one of the extremely edgy and authentic whitewater sequences above a big drop in the river.
"We didn't go over, but we came close enough I remember thinking to myself," recalled Alda "When the hell are they going to come out here with one of those kayaks?' Everybody thought the scene was going great and they weren't going to interrupt it. We had gone twice as far they said we would before they stopped us. And we were heading for the waterfall!"

Without A Paddle (2004)
While Deliverance and The White Mile made us all cringe, the trio in Without A Paddle can only make us smile at their awkward ineptness on the wild river.

When asked if he had done any paddling before, Dax Shepard's character boasts with confidence. When pressed by the outfitter, "So... are you a Class... 4,5?", Shepard's character gloats, "Why don't you try to put those numbers together. Yeah. I shot a Class 45, and haven't lost a man yet."

In search of legendary skyjacker D.B. Cooper's loot in the Oregon wilderness, the three childhood buddies encounter a bear, a pair of sexy treehuggers, a couple of bumbling but well-armed pot farmers and, with a nod to Deliverance, even wild-bearded Burt Reynolds.
Shot in New Zealand, the producers use sections of the Waikato River and Wellington’s Hutt River for the boating scenes and South Auckland’s Hunua Falls for our hapless canoeist's trip over the falls. The actors performed many of their own stunts, including paddling their canoe through some hurtling rapids.
"We capsized that boat more times than I care to relate to you," actor Seth Green told The Morning Call in 2004 interview.

And some other favorites

The River Why
The Bridge of the River Kwai 
Cape Fear 
Apocalypse Now 
Rooster Cogburn and The Lady
A River Runs Through It
Black Robe
Eyewitness
Damn River
Up The Creek

Hopefully, this list reminded you of some classics you want to watch again or gave you some new ones to rent or stream while you stay home and stay safe.

 

Want to see more about Outside Adventure to the Max. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram

UNALIENABLE RIGHTS: THE PURSUIT OF PERSONHOOD FOR RIVERS AND LAKES

The river as plaintiff speaks for the ecological unit of life that is part of it. Those people who have a meaningful relation to that body of water—whether it be a fisherman, a canoeist, a zoologist, or a logger—must be able to speak for the values which the river represents, and which are threatened with destruction. --William Douglas

 

Sliding my kayak gently into the water, it's not hard to grasp why in a few short years how this river has become so significant to me. I've come to know this river's fickle moods. Its high water winters and early spring rush, Its summertime playfulness, and its autumn bounty when the native Chinook salmon swim back upstream to spawn. I've paddled its slumberous wide curves and through its fast water rapids. I've watched its water roaring like thunder pouring its last dam and followed its a clear and bright ribbon of water all the way to its end to dip my bow at its milky confluence.
Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “A river is more than an amenity, it is a treasure.” I heartily agree. For me and many others, Northern California's American River is a rare jewel to behold. Fed by the melting snowpack of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, the river is an essential source for the area's drinking water, a productive provider of irrigation and hydroelectric power, and recreational highway for paddlers and fishermen. In its final twenty-some miles before pouring into the Sacramento River, it dispenses a peaceful serenity and magic to every creature along its wild banks despite being so near urban complexities of the city. And yes, to a certain extent it seems to be a living being in itself.

The Whanganui River

The idea of environmental personhood, a legal concept that designates certain environmental entities such as rivers and lakes with the same rights and protections as a person in hopes of establishing new statutory frameworks that go beyond normal environmental protection. The theory has been gaining ground in recent years. In 2008, Ecuador became the first country to enshrine the legal rights of nature in its constitution and in 2011, Bolivia passed a similar law. New Zealand became the first country to grant a specific river legal rights to the Whanganui River in 2017 and was followed by India’s northern state of Uttarakhand granting the right to be legally protected and not be harmed to the Ganges and its longest tributary, the Yamuna River held sacred by millions of Hindus.

This past July Bangladesh became the first country to grant legal status to all of its rivers. In its landmark ruling, the Bangladeshi Supreme Court move is meant to protect the world's largest delta from further degradation from pollution, illegal dredging, and human encroachment. In its ruling, the court said, “Water is likely to be the most pressing environmental concern of the next century,” calling for their countries' rivers to be protected “at all costs”.

Blue-green algae bloom on the shore of Catawaba Island on Lake Erie in 2009.

Meanwhile, in Toledo, Ohio, toxic algae bloom in Lake Erie contaminated drinking water shutting off the city's water supply for three days in 2014. Many blamed nearby farms fertilizer runoff as the culprit. Whereupon, this past February, Toledo voters passed what is known as the Lake Erie Bill of Rights aimed at protecting the great lake and giving empowers Toledo citizens the right to file lawsuits on behalf of the lake. The ordinance's constitutionality was immediately challenged court by an area farmer sighting "it can never guarantee that all runoff will be prevented from entering the Lake Erie watershed." The state of Ohio also joined in on the lawsuit, arguing the state, not the citizens of Toledo has the "legal responsibility" for environmental regulatory programs. The case still remains in litigation. However, this past month, Gov. Mike DeWine unveiled the voluntary “H2Ohio” initiative to address phosphorus runoff.

"It gives the right to the river to exist, to flourish and to naturally evolve and a right to a stable climate free from human-caused climate change impacts," Yurok Tribe General Counsel's Amy Cordalis told National Public Radio after the native American tribe has granted personhood to northern California's Klamath River, making it the first known river in North America given that status at least under tribal law this past spring.

Cordalis says the Klamath's water management and climate change have led to lower water flows and even fewer salmon, the Yurok's main source for food.
"The salmon runs are the lowest they've ever been," Cordalis told NPR, "Even this year, it was anticipated that the returning salmon runs were going to be strong, but they never showed up. We don't know where they are. We have been doing all we can to protect the river and, you know, working within existing legal frameworks. And it's not enough."

The Klamath River

As the movement to give in legal rights to rivers and lakes grows with support even coming from the United Nations, it has also been met with resistance from industry, farmers and river communities, who argue that giving the laws will infringe on their rights and livelihoods without a clear path forward.
“The biggest danger is that if you establish that a river has a right, then who is going to determine what that right is?” Don Shawcroft, president of the Colorado Farm Bureau told the Boulder Weekly in 2017, as proponents were pushing the state to grant the Colorado River legal rights.
For the rivers and lakes which lack a voice of their own, those decisions will be left to future policymakers to determine, as advocates warn of climate change, pollution, urban sprawl, mining, poor infrastructure management as well as drought and floods that currently endanger our bodies of water

"I think this is, is a reflection of a change of societal values," Cordalis concluded with NPR, "So we're in a climate crisis. And we need new tools to respond to that crisis. And in this country right now, corporations have rights as a person. And that's because historically our country valued commerce. And so I think it's a logical next step in this era of climate change to give the same kind of legal recognition to the natural environment and to nature."

Photographer Laura Gilpin declared, “A river seems a magic thing. A magic, moving, living part of the very earth itself.” Sitting alongside the Lower American River earlier this week, the river does seem alive as it moved steadily to the sea. Flashes of Chinook salmon among the river's ripples, scores of gulls, ducks and turkey vultures soar and flutter above, while I catch sight of black-tailed deer bounding through the stream. It's nature's age-old symbiotic relationships between the river and its creatures. As long as the water keeps flowing, the river and its wildlife will continue to exist. As humans, facing climate change, we need to recognize this natural world around us and make our duty to care for it, protect it and pass it on to generations to come.
By granting a river a right to be a river, we can all take the giant steps in understanding the other living beings around us and bare the responsibilities we owe to them.

Want to see more about Outside Adventure to the Max. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram

LIGHTS, CAMERA, AND RIVER ACTION: Six Hollywood Movies Featuring Action-Packed Whitewater Scenes

Flim makers have had a fascination with using rivers as a location throughout cinematic history. They have woven timeless stories around these waterways that have both enthralled us and haunted us. How can we ever forget such movie classics as The Bridge of the River Kwai, Cape Fear, Apocalypse Now, and A River Runs Through It?
These flowing streams not only serve as daunting obstacles in the struggle between man and nature, but also as stunning backdrops. They showcase our leading star's perilous journey through rough and churning waters on a voyage that will lead them to either triumph or transformation.
Humphrey Bogart, who won his only Oscar for his role in The African Queen, uttered one my favorite river movies lines: "I don't blame you for being scared - not one bit. Nobody with good sense ain't scared of white water".
But we're glad to be onboard this trip. We have enthusiastically embraced the river, just as Katharine Hepburn's character did when she replied: "I never dreamed that any mere physical experience could be so stimulating!"
So as the 91st Academy Awards are quickly approaching, here is a list of my favorites, involving some action-packed whitewater scenes and of course plenty of river time.

The African Queen (1951)
Arguably one of the greatest river movies of all time, as Humphrey Bogart and Katharine Hepburn, take on the jungle, the rapids, and the German Navy in this classic movie adventure.

Filmed on the Ruiki River, in the heart of the Belgian Congo at Murchison Falls near Lake Victoria in Uganda, just making this movie was a monumental test of endurance for the cast and crew. They endured sickness, spartan living conditions, and even had brushes with wild animals and poisonous snakes while on location.
The African Queen deck was tight and too small to shoot on, given the size of the bulky Technicolor cameras. While on the river, most of the filming had to be done on a sprawling raft mock-up in order to shoot the close-ups. The cumbersome raft (built over three large canoes) would get stuck on submerged logs, while cameras and lights would get caught in the overhanging foliage of the jungle.

"The hysteria of each shot was a nightmare”, wrote Hepburn in her 1987 memoir The Making of The African Queen. “The engine on the Queen would stop. Or one of the propellers would be fouled up by the dragging rope. Or we would be attacked by hornets.”
The scenes considered too dangerous to shoot on the river were shot in studio water tanks in Isleworth Studios, Middlesex.
And in the days before CGI, the dramatic sequence of the African Queen going over a waterfall and through rapids was actually an eight-foot model boat shot through a telephoto lens. Flim makers layered their footage, incorporating the location sequences with the miniature boat careening over a waterfall.


The River of No Return (1954)
Riding the wave of the success of The African Queen, moviegoers returned to theaters to journey downriver again, but this time with blonde bombshell Marilyn Monroe rocking the boat.
While trying to start a new life together with his son after being released from prison, Robert Mitchum works his farm along the river, only to have Monroe and her low-life gambler fiance wash up along its shores.

On the run, the gambler knocks out Mitchum, steals his horse and rifle, and leaves the three stranded and surrounded by hostile Indians, with only one escape.
"The Indians call it the River of No Return,"  Mitchum's character says as they head into a series of treacherous rapids.  "From here on, you'll find out why."
Including the raft trip down the river, the film is an action-packed western with mountain lions, gunfights, and Indian attacks, but Monroe is still given time to serenade us with four songs, including the movie's willowy title tune.
Flimed in British Columbia on the Bow River, the production was plagued with problems, with the insistence from the director that the cast would perform many of their own stunts. In one incident, Monroe's hip waders filled with water, dragging her under and nearly drowning her after slipping on a rock in the river. Mitchum and others jumped to her rescue, but her ankle was injured as a result.
Another mishap occurred when Monroe and Mitchum's raft became broached on the rocks in the middle of the river, nearly capsizing before some quick thinking stuntmen saved the day and pulled them off the rocks.
It was much safer but not much drier for them while filming the remaining scenes indoors in Los Angeles. Onboard a hydraulic platform in front of a giant screen, Monroe and Mitchum clung to rafting props, while men stood to the sides and splashed them with buckets of water.

Deliverance (1972)

Even people who have never seen the film have encountered Deliverance's legacy, especially those who are connected to the canoe and kayak community. From bumper stickers and T-shirt reading, ‘Paddle faster, I hear banjos,’ to the hearing the iconic movie line "squeal like a pig,” the will film will forever as cause us to "squirm with angst."

It's a Heart of Darkness-like voyage into the rural backwoods of the south, as four suburban Atlanta men take a weekend canoe trip down the fictional Cahulawassee River in the Georgia Mountain's wilderness. Burt Reynolds' character calls it the “the last wild, untamed, unpolluted, unf*cked-up river in the South." But time is ticking. In a short time the river, the rapids, and even the town will be flooded over with the imminent construction of a dam.
After a bumpy ride through rapids, the light-hearted adventure turns to horror when they encounter a pair of dangerous mountain men. Separated from the others, John Voight's character was tied to a tree and could only watch helplessly as his canoe partner Ned Beatty is violently raped by one of the men. That attack sets off a chilling sequence of events, including a disastrous turn through whitewater that challenges the canoeist's moral codes as they fight to survive.
Flimed on Northern Georgia's Chattooga River, the actors who performed their own stunts spent two weeks learning to canoe the rapids.
"We rehearsed for quite a long period," director John Boorman, told The Guardian in a 2017 interview, "Because we had to get the actors up to scratch in archery and canoeing. I had already been down the Chattooga, a ferocious river, to make sure it was safe."
In the scene where the canoe broke in two (five were actually destroyed during filming), Boorman coordinated a release of water from the upstream Tallulah Falls dam.

"I got them to close all the sluice gates upstream, so only a trickle came down," Boorman recalled in the interview, "That let us build rails on the riverbed, so we could mount the canoe on them, and trigger the breakup later. When we came to shoot, I was down at the bottom of the cataract on the phone to the dam. But I got impatient and got them to open all the gates. We just about survived the avalanche of water."
While Boorman was down below, tough-guy Reynolds (who nixed using a dummy in the shot because the stunt coordinator thought it looked too phony), requested to have the scene re-shot with himself going over the falls instead.
"I dream sometimes of the water coming," years later Reynolds told the Hollywood Reporter, "I looked around and there was a tidal wave coming at me. I went over the falls and the first thing that happened I hit a rock and cracked my tailbone, and to this day it hurts. Then I went down to the water below and it was a whirlpool. I couldn’t get out and a guy there said if you get caught, just go to the bottom. You can get out but you can't swim against it. So I went down to the bottom. What he didn’t tell me was it was going to shoot me up like a torpedo. So I went out."
Years before the phrase "wardrobe malfunction" would become popular, Reynolds would have one while caught in the force of that churning whirlpool.
"They said later that they saw this 30-year-old guy in costume go over the waterfall and then about fifteen minutes later they saw this nude man come out," Reynolds recalled in the interview, "It had torn everything—my boots and everything off."
For more about the movie see Canoe and Kayak Magazine article Summer of Deliverance.

River Wild (1994)

We don't think of Meryl Streep as an action star, but when she says "We're are risking death a number of times on this trip", we know we're in for a wild ride. called the Gauntlet. "It's off the scale," Streep's character says. "One man was killed, and another one paralyzed for life. The Rangers no longer allow anyone to try it."
She stars as a suburban mom and former white-water rafter who, while trying to save her marriage, battles wits with an evil Kevin Bacon and runs a dangerous stretch of river
Many of the movie's whitewater scenes were filmed on Montana's Kootenai River, while other scenes were shot on the Middle Fork of the Flathead River, the Colorado River in Utah, and Oregon's Rogue River.
While most of the dangerous river scenes did require expert stunt doubles, Streep did several of her own stunts in the film on some milder river sections, but even those had some peril when the star was swept off the raft into the river.
''Actually, I was really very quiet and not scared, which is not at all how I thought I'd react under these circumstances", Streep told the New York Times in 1994. ''I remember sinking down to the bottom with this powerful and freezing water pulling me in deeper."
Wearing a PFD, she was rescued by a hired kayaker after the river pushed her 500 yards downstream.

The White Mile (1994)
Like The Titanic and A Perfect Storm, we have no doubts about the fate of the rafters. But it's hard to look away as we watch their misguided steps that lead to disaster. In the end, five men are killed, setting up moral crises within their corporate world when the surviving relatives file a liability suit against the firm.

Loosely based on a true story, the movie depicts an advertising agency taking 11 executives rafting on Canada's Chilko River. On a Class V section of the river known as the White Mile, the rafters suffer catastrophe after their raft capsizes, tossing them all into the raging current.
A not-so-nice Alan Alda stars as a hard-charging and unrepentant advertising executive who bullies not only his colleagues and clients into the male-bonding trip, but also the raft guide by piling too many men into the raft.
During filming, however, California's South Fork of the American River (standing in for the Chilko River) dished out more than a few licks on Alda.
In a 1994 interview with St Louis Post-Dispatch, Alda tells how he and co-star Robert Loggia were struggling to stay afloat in the rapids while shooting one of the extremely edgy and authentic whitewater sequences above a big drop in the river.
"We didn't go over, but we came close enough I remember thinking to myself," recalled Alda "When the hell are they going to come out here with one of those kayaks?' Everybody thought the scene was going great and they weren't going to interrupt it. We had gone twice as far they said we would before they stopped us. And we were heading for the waterfall!"

Without A Paddle (2004)
While Deliverance and The White Mile made us all cringe, the trio in Without A Paddle can only make us smile at their awkward ineptness on the wild river.

When asked if he had done any paddling before, Dax Shepard's character boasts with confidence. When pressed by the outfitter, "So... are you a Class... 4,5?", Shepard's character gloats, "Why don't you try to put those numbers together. Yeah. I shot a Class 45, and haven't lost a man yet."

In search of legendary skyjacker D.B. Cooper's loot in the Oregon wilderness, the three childhood buddies encounter a bear, a pair of sexy treehuggers, a couple of bumbling but well-armed pot farmers and, with a nod to Deliverance, even wild-bearded Burt Reynolds.
Shot in New Zealand, the producers use sections of the Waikato River and Wellington’s Hutt River for the boating scenes and South Auckland’s Hunua Falls for our hapless canoeist's trip over the falls. The actors performed many of their own stunts, including paddling their canoe through some hurtling rapids.
"We capsized that boat more times than I care to relate to you," actor Seth Green told The Morning Call in 2004 interview.

And some of my other favorites include
Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown
Whitewater Summer
The River Why
Rooster Cogburn and The Lady
A River Runs Through It
Black Robe

For more about river movies checkout Canoe and Kayak Magazine article Between the Frames.

Want to see more about Outside Adventure to the Max. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram

"WHAT FALLS THERE ARE"... A GUIDE TO RIVER SCOUTING

We call upon the waters that rim the earth, horizon to horizon, that flow in our rivers and streams, that fall upon our gardens and fields, and we ask that they teach us and show us the way. -- Chinook Blessing

In 1869, ten men and four boats embarked on a journey through almost 1,000 miles of uncharted canyons trying to map one of the West's last great wildernesses and forever changing our view of it.

"We have an unknown distance yet to run, an unknown river to explore," said one-armed Civil War hero leader John Wesley Powell, "What falls there are, we know not; what rocks beset the channel, we know not; what walls ride over the river, we know not. Ah, well! we may conjecture many things."

The party experienced calamity after calamity. One of the boats sank in a rapid, taking with it all their scientific instruments and a quarter of the party’s provisions. Another near-sinking of a second boat took the remaining food through spoilage. Morale disappeared as party members gave up and abandoned the expedition. After three months, only five of the original company would emerge from the depths of the Grand Canyon. Although hailed a hero, Powell's first trip into the unknown was a disaster.

"The relief from danger, and the joy of success, are great." wrote Powell in Down the Colorado: Diary of the First Trip Through the Grand Canyon, describing the perils of the trip, "The first hour of convalescent freedom seems rich recompense for all—pain, gloom, terror.”

Photo by Roger Peka

There is an old whitewater kayaking adage that says, "When in doubt, scout." If Powell's trip down the Colorado River teaches us anything, it's that the party didn't know anything about what they were likely to face. Today's whitewater paddling experts give us several reasons why you might want to scout a rapid first before running it.

"The first is just to make sure it has an exit. If I’m paddling on an unfamiliar stretch of river and no one in the crew knows it then it’s crucial that there is a way out of a rapid before you commit to dropping in." said Current Adventures Kayak School & Trips instructor Pete Delosa, "In California it’s not uncommon for the river to run into and under a pile of boulders. In the Northwest, it might end in a pile of trees. If you can’t see the exit from the top, you don’t really know."

The California-based kayaker Delosa sponsored by Immersion Research and member of Team Pyranha, recommends that if you know it’s going to be a hard rapid to paddle, to study the flow and get an understanding of what the water is doing. Look for hazards you want to avoid and the line you want to make. See how much of the water is going into the hazards versus where you want to go.

"Are there certain features that are going to flip me?" said Delosa, "Maybe there is a feature like a small eddy that I can use to get to where I want to go, or maybe there’s a really big hole that I need to avoid because it feeds into a sieve."

Rafa Ortiz via Facebook

Red Bull athlete Rafa Ortiz never runs anything too stout or dangerous without a proper scout. Ortiz is one of whitewater kayaking's superstars and the focus of “Chasing Niagara," a film produced by Red Bull chronicling his pursuit of being the first person ever to go over Niagara Falls in a kayak. However, he says, when he is guiding someone down a river they've never paddled, he finds it tricky choosing when to get them and scout it.

"I often find that too much information doesn't necessarily result in them having a good line, " Ortiz wrote on Facebook Messenger, "When you scout a rapid, for example, with a bad hole on the left, as you get in your boat and paddle into it, all that is in your mind is the dimension and apparent stickiness of the monster on river left. Your mind is often blurred by fear."

On the other hand, he warns, not to make someone drop into a rapid their first time without enough information. He says it would be neglectful on his part if they ended up in the gnarly hole on the left, swim and get body recirculated just because he didn't emphasize its dimension.

"What I do nowadays is an in between," wrote Ortiz, "I suggest people scout a rapid that in my opinion does have a life-threat in it and even something that could result in a negative enough experience for them to want to quit kayaking. Otherwise, let them enjoy the pleasure of the one chance they have to run it blind."

Photo by Ethan Howard

After you've made the decision to run the rapid, start at the bottom and work your way back up to your boat, suggested DeLosa. He says to find landmarks that you will be able to spot from the water.

"Landmarks are really helpful for knowing where you are in a rapid when you can’t see the entire thing from the entrance." said Delosa,  "A good example is Skyscraper (rapid) on South Silver Creek in California. There are two really tiny standing waves right at the lip of the drop. From the pool above you can’t see anything past the horizon line, but if you go off between those two little waves with a slight left angle you’re in good shape to start."


Sacramento paddler Gavin Rieser agrees and thinks the biggest reason, is being able to see a pool at the bottom of the drop. 
"If I can't see what looks like a pool below," said Rieser,  "I have no idea if what I'm about to run is a huge monster drop or not."
Rieser also does his homework by reading up on the rivers he will be running and checking in with area boaters on what to expect.
"Another big factor is how much I've heard about the run or not." said Rieser, "If I know it's supposed to be a Class III to IV run, then I'm not likely to scout it much. If it's a Class V run, I will be scouting a lot more"

If you’re on a longer mission day to save time, a good habit to develop is to always take your rope with you whenever you get out to scout. Delosa says by doing this you won't have to go back to your boat and then back downstream if someone in your crew asks you to set as the safety.
"Also, while you’re scouting," said Delosa, "Another crew might come along and paddle into the rapid without scouting and you’ll be well positioned to help them should someone get in trouble."

In 1871–1872, Powell again retraced part of his ill-fated expedition down the Colorado River. This time, he would be fortified by knowledge instead of folklore. His scientific expedition filled in the blanks left behind on the previous trip and produced the first reliable maps of the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon. Wanting to be more comfortable, Powell acquired a sturdy armchair and tied it to the middle bulkhead of the pilot-boat. From there, he could view the river ahead of him, but this time, he had seen it before.

If you want to learn more and practice some advanced skills contact us at Current Adventures Kayaking School and Trips and ask about private advanced classes.
PHONE: 530-333-9115 or Toll-Free: 888-452-9254
FAX: 530-333-1291
USPS:Current Adventures, P.O. Box 828, Lotus, CA 95651
info@currentadventures.com
owner Dan Crandall dan@kayaking.com