Blakely,

THanks a million for taking the time out. I do appreciate it. Great
info as well as the reminder of the psychological aspect of "what's in
the water?" and it's only 3-5 feet deep. Thanks for the pointers of
historic diasters.

THanks again and best of luck out there.

GC
Railtramp wrote:
Michael Daly wrote:
wrote:

I knew this was a waste of time...people get so offended and not stop
and actually realize what someones intent it.

Maybe we're not infantile enough to think that a river can be "creepy". I've
been on a lot of rivers, but all of them (once away from industrial or
residential disasters) are beautiful.

Maybe you can write about the scary things under your bed.

Mike

Come on group troops, lets give the poster a break. We get a lot of
criticism in this group about being unfriendly. Lets not try to earn
that reputation.
-----
As for scary physical rivers, well, there are plenty of places that can
fit that description. To the unskilled and uninitiated, any large
rapid can meet that requirement. That is why we portage some rapids
and walk around others while people are comfortable running them. Part
of it is the rapid and the river itself. The rest is how we feel and
what *we* to the river bring with us.

When it gets dark and I am no where near my takeout, I can start seeing
a lot of things that could spook me out if I let them. At 55+, I know
better. But it is not hard to see how superstitions get their start.
It does not take much hanging moss or many oddly shaped trees to get
ones imagination working.

My own personal fear relates to dark water. I must have had a dream or
two about it in the past that made a deep impression in my sub concious
because I can occaisonally find myself thinking about "something"
rising suddenly from the depths, upsetting my boat and taking me down
to the depths forever.

For story developement, a river during Spring Flood is great setting.
High fast water is always exciting. And all the dynamics change.
Known rapids disappear, new rapids form, new channels form. Plenty of
complicating factors - entire trees, piles of slash, zero clearance
under bridges, etc. So even a known river can assume an entirely new
personality when at flood.

There are some historic disasters you can check out as well:
1) The 1983 high water rescue trip in the Grand Canyon.
2) The rafting deaths on the Illinois River in Oregon.
3) The "White Mile" story.
4) Todd Balf's "The Last River: The Tragic Race for Shangri-la"

Then there is the American Canoe Association's "River Safety Anthology"
by Charlie Walbridge. These are reviews of past incidents and offer a
detailed analysis of what went wrong and why.

Another resource is "Deep Survival - Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why" by
Laurence Gonzales. This is less about about rivers and more about the
sequence of events that lead to survival situations.

If you review these resources, I think you can get some background on
what makes a river "scary". And why every river has elements in it
that keeps our attention focused. Misjudgement on any water can lead
to injury and death.

Blakely
---
Blakely LaCroix
Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

"The best adventure is yet to come"