My Boy Scout Summer: The Whitewater Canoe

Do you have any stories so stupid, so crazy, that if you'd have died you surely would be in the running for an annual Darwin Award? I do, and here it is.

All of the stupidest things men have done have started with these words, “Hey, watch this."
                                                                              - CV Rick

In the town of Jackson, Wyoming there's a sporting goods store with a demolished canoe on a rock pedestal. It's a warning to all people that the whitewater rapids in Alpine Canyon are not for canoes.  It's a stretch of the Snake River for expert kayakers and whitewater rafts navigated by guides.  At the base of that rock, chipped into the stone are five names.  The five men who made it all the way through the Alpine Canyon in a canoe are enshrined on that rock, behind and really low.  Each of those men chipped their initials into the stone at night, after the store closed, because what kind of warning would that splintered canoe be if it were also known to be an award to the guys who succeeded?

Big R had checked out as far as I was concerned.  He wanted nothing more to do with me and I was happy to be rid of him as a scout-leader and happy to be rid of his eternally teasing daughter, Lisa.  I had my Eagle Papers signed, the project was done, the review would be in my favor and there was almost nothing more to do in the scouts except to match Little R. 

I told you before that I was doing part-time service as a canoe instructor up at the camp.  That means I'd drive up once a week and teach all the younger boys about paddling, steering, safety and unswamping canoes in various ways.  So, you might say I was an expert of sorts.  That's not what I said at the time.  Back then I would look you right in the eye and tell you that I was THE EXPERT.  But, it wasn't true then, and it isn't true now.  The one thing I really know was that there was one older boy who could handle a canoe better than I could and he'd proven it. I wanted my chance.  

So, I went to Little R, whose real name was Arthur, and I asked him to teach me how to do the Alpine Run. See, of those five names, one of them was Arthur's.   He agreed and we went over all the precautions and dangers of doing class 4 rapids (at other times of the year a couple of them hit class 5) in an open canoe.  Now as you might imagine, canoing rapids is a whole different animal than kayaking them.  In a Kayak you can right yourself and Kayaks don't easily swamp, meaning they're designed in a way that they don't hold water in.  Canoes will swamp and when they fill with water in a river there's no quick solution.  The trick then is to prevent them from taking in water.

Tricks are clever, and so I was going to be a clever paddler.  Those of you with some common sense can start cringing now. 

The first trick to canoing rapids is surface area.  A canoe has a lot of surface area in the water, and in rapids that makes steering really tough since you have to fight the force of the water on the front of the canoe from a steering position in the rear.  Our first trick to decrease surface area in the water was to load the back of the canoe with rocks.  With enough ballast, the front of the canoe lifts completely out of the water and steering becomes a breeze. 

However with the rocks loaded into the canoe, you really can't sit well and have the leverage to dig into the water with your paddle like you need.  So, our second brilliant trick was to sit on the gunwhales, behind the seat up on the stern. Really, it's like sitting outside the canoe.

As you might imagine, it's really hard to maintain a purchase sitting on top of the canoe like that.  It's too easy to slip right off the back and it takes enormous thigh pressure to stay on.  So, our third great trick was to tie my feet together, under the canoe in order to make riding this thing easier.

You should take a moment to visualize this.  My skinny legs were going to be wrapped around the outside of a canoe, tied at the ankles underneath, and the canoe was going to be loaded with rocks so that it stood upright in the water.  All this so I could sneak into Jackson in the middle of the night and chip my name into a rock.  Have I mentioned to y'all that I really did well on my SAT's?  I say this because it might seem a little hard to believe at this point.

Now, whose canoe did I decide to use? Bingo if you guessed my father's canoe.  He'd managed to get enough money together for a green vinyl canoe that he'd use for fishing.  My mother was so mad that he sacrificed another couple months worth of money that could've gone to paying bills ON TIME for another fishing toy.  He'd pay his tithing on time because that was a ticket into heaven, but he couldn't care less about any other bill.  So, there we were in the middle of the week taking his canoe for a joy ride down the Snake River. 

Time for a little description of the river.  We're talking about an 8-mile stretch of some of the toughest rapids in the country.  They all have unique names, by the way, but I'm only going to discuss the highlights.  A brilliant class 2 is called Three Oar Deal and for this trip that was the warm-up.  If someone wrecked there, it was pretty easy to fish them out of the water since it was in a lazy turn with a nice shoreline.  Then there was a hundred yard stretch of bubbling whiteness called Gauging Straights which Little R assured me was the toughest part since you had to ride that canoe like a bucking bull and there was no relief until you made it all the way through.  Then the two big ones, both class 4's.  Kahuna was this monster wave with a waterfall drop-off and if you missed your mark, you'd be in a whirlpool eddie that would spin you around and suck you under.  Following that was Lunch Counter, the meanest turn in a river that I've seen.  It was a six foot rapid followed by an eight foot drop and then a fourteen foot wave that you had to plow through.  Once you were through all that, it was smooth sailing through Champagne, which was a long stretch of four-footers.  

Here we go.  I was tied up and ready to ride, excited by the challenge.  See the guy in this photo?  He's got a helmet on.  That would've been a good idea.

I'll cut right to the chase here.  I made it all the way to Kahuna without too much trouble, but I was exhausted and when I hit that drop-off, I felt my feet slip back on the canoe and I almost went off the back end.  But I made it, avoided the eddie and slipped through into main channel looking at Lunch Counter looming ahead.  With my left hand I grabbed the front of the stern and tried to jam myself back onto the canoe tighter before hitting that wave, but I underestimated my speed.  I hit the rapid full on and when I reached back to get both hands on the paddle I was too late.  The paddle was ripped from my hands and I spun awkwardly through the first wave and then off the falls.  What I saw next was the big wave capturing the front of the canoe and throwing it into the air, which would've been cool if I hadn't been attached to it.

I don't know how I managed to get off the canoe, or how I managed to get my feet going downriver first, but I did.  I don't remember anything else until I saw blue sky and was coughing up buckets of water.  Little R and Shane pulled me from the river about a half mile after Lunch Counter.  I'd nearly drowned. 

A nice raft guide fished the canoe out. It was twisted and snapped almost in two.  The aluminum frame was in pieces.  The vinyl was torn and seamed a dozen times. 

The only really good thing is, I lived. I have a great story of stupidity to tell, and despite the way it felt at the time, my dad didn't beat me to death although he really gave it a good try. 

- rick, whitewater warrior

Next Episode:  Hiking along Wolverine Trail (not its real name, but what we named it)

First Episode:  My Boy Scout Summer

Comments

[mark]

and you say you are the smart one!

[a rose is a rose]

you tied your feet together UNDER the canoe? i am stunned. just stunned

[Cherise]

Right when I was thinking that all the brains and smarts you seem to display now must have been acquired later in life, you mentioned the SAT's. I nearly choked to death on my coffee. *hears the Twilight Zone music* Good blog, lots of stunned gasping on this end. You did so many idiotic things in this one story, the mind boggles! :)

[Sister Mary Lisa]

Actually, CV Rick, I'm thinking I'm damn good and glad you did this thing in your youth.

1. I love how you changed Big R to Little R. Now that's funny.
2. I laughed at how seriously he helped you, but thank Gawd he did.
3. If you hadn't done it, we wouldn't have all been able to enjoy the great way you told the story. Thanks for the laugh first thing Monday morning. I needed that!

I'm glad you lived to tell the tale. Sorry you couldn't put your name on that rock. I must admit I'm also glad I'm a woman and not ruled by machismo.

[Success Warrior]

I've been through that stretch of river. I didn't tie myself to a canoe filled with rocks though. Just used a plain ole white water raft.

[CV Rick]

SML, testosterone is a real bitch, let me tell you.

As I was writing this, Cherise, I got the part where it was as stupid as possible, then I remembered that some dumbasses at school used to call me a "brain" because I could ace a math test. I never smoked though, 'cause it's bad for you. LMAO!

S.W., you left Buttrock one year too soon. If you'd have stayed, you'd have strapped yourself to a canoe as well.

Come on, Rose. Does it really have to be so blunt? I mean, let's rephrase and say that I secured myself to a watercraft. Or that I took precautions to avoid losing my father's canoe.

[Success Warrior]

I doubt that I would but I probably would have thrown a couple of extra rocks into the canoe, just to be safe.

[Cele]

I use to love canoeing. Especially a CALM, FLAT lake while high on mescaline.

I've white watered the Snake once, the Deschuttes, the Rogue, the Russian. Not in a canoe, and not placidly high, but stone cold sober. Dude you're insane.

Tying your feet under the canoe? You literally had me agog more than once, the whole time wondering how your father took the loss of his canoe.

[CV Rick]

Yes, Cele - I might not have the best judgment.