Middle Fork of the Salmon – David Luinstra

Plainly put, it was AWFUL, six full days and nights of suffering.

The towering mountains and tight canyon walls restricting what had to have been a great view. The massive Ponderosa Pines were reaching to the heavens. The merciless sun was beating down, baking our bodies day after day. The constant thought, "but it's a dry heat." Duh, just like the oven. Gravity was pulling the crystal clear water (59 degrees), down and around the ever present rocks blocking the gradient, creating awful rapids and "play spots" for our Rodeo Queens. All those stars and a full moon keeping us awake at night.

We were tired from a day of paddling miles and miles and miles of whitewater. We needed our rest for the next day of paddling the unknown river. We lounged in hot springs, hoping to soothe away the aches and pains induced by the paddling of crashing rapids.

The bears were threatening us everyday, okay, almost everyday. All the camps contained Big Horn Sheep scat, and Big Horn scampered up canyon walls daily, distracting us from the harrowing paddle down the forbidding river. A Sage Grouse couple put on a disgusting, and embarrassing courting display behind camp one night, even as her children scampered nearby. Peeping Paul moved ever closer, reasoning if he was bobbing like the cock, he would not be noticed in his quest to intimately record the mating ritual.

We were forced to eat breakfast cooked to order, endured never having kitchen, dishwashing or groover duty. And despite pleas for civility, lunch was served buffet style riverside everyday, no chairs or tables, just cold brews and sodas. Dinner was again a buffet (grilled salmon, steak, tenderloin, chicken, brats and DO lasagna). Day 2, all learned not to tarry when meals were announced, the vultures circled and descended quickly leaving the tardy at the back of the line. There was no wanting for food, but the vultures moved down the buffet SLOWLY, leaving the tardy to drool. The winos suffered badly each evening from the free flow of reds and whites. And the beer drinkers fetched ice cold cans from the cooler.