IT'S ONLY FLICKING ITS TAIL

This year may be remembered for many things. 2011 the year Bin Laden was killed. 2011, the year of the tornadoes. Joplin, Sedalia, and Bridgeton in Missouri and many more across the Deep South. 2011, the year west Texas burned....and Arizona and New Mexico.

But for many thousands from Montana to Louisiana it will be remembered as the year of the flood. Along the Mississippi and Missouri rivers many farms, homes and businesses are facing the worst flooding in decades.

Sometimes the water comes from blown levees or opened spillways. Showing that even the government of the greatest nation on Earth can't out fox or out muscle a river with an attitude. The very structures built to protect are proving to be the downfall of some areas. Purposeful flooding of homes here, farms there or an entire community may save a larger one somewhere else. But we should pray for the men who must give these orders. I can't imagine how it must feel to order the blasting of levees and opening of spillways knowing full well it will result in the destruction of homes and disruption of lives, regardless of the reasons.

Many people have fought the river before. Some are facing floods for the first time. For each it is an exhausting and heart rending time and each will deal with the water and its aftermath in their own ways.

Many others will see short clips on the evening news. But out of the path of the high water, they will only empathize with those in trouble. They don't feel the pain the same way.

These lines I write are an attempt to help those people understand more closely how it feels to be directly affected by the floods.

The battle against the rivers will leave scars to heal and bills to pay. It will exact a price in lost time and lost wages, in anxiety and fear and debt. Some will move away from the rivers and others will return, but none in the waters path will escape unscathed.

Some communities will build levees higher and hold off the water. It can sometimes be done, given enough time to prepare and adequate resources to mount a defense. But when these aren't available the waters wash away our efforts. It does so with a power so impersonal, so unaware and so uncaring of our plight. I think that is the most frightening thing about the flood. It ignores me, it pushes through, and it fails to acknowledge that we even exist. We aren't just small in the eyes of the river. When it rages we are nothing.

Unlike a storm or a fire, a flood is often a slow motion disaster. The people in harms way may spend days or weeks working and worrying themselves sick. And when your home or business and your family's welfare is at stake you will get physically sick, maybe violently sick and maybe over and over again. But the river doesn't care.

A person will watch the water creeping closer. They will check the forecasts and then check them again and again. As the ordeal stretches out nerves will fray, tempers may flair and willpower might ebb.

To fight a river is to engage a force of nature that takes its time and gets in your head. And win or lose, afterwards you may be drained and limp and emotionally wrecked.

Some people can take it in stride. They have the fortitude to deal with the adversity and look beyond the trouble and into the future. Some people will blame the government and some will blame Mother Nature, but blame no longer matters once the rivers rise.

To watch a flood up close and personal is an amazing thing. The water tops or bursts a levee and though it roars through the breach it spreads slowly at first. Swags and road ditches fill first. It's interesting, the detachment you may feel, to see which areas fill, or where it crosses the road first. You'll think "Wow, I didn't know that spot was so low." Or "It looks so level but see the path it takes?"

Soon though it's in your house and what once was a river a mile away is now a fast flowing lake, maybe two or three miles wide and two thousand miles long.

It may engulf your home to the eves or stop half way up a wall, it really doesn't matter. For now the structure is shot. A few hours will leave a coating of silt everywhere. Flood lines on even the exterior walls will last for decades unless scrubbed away by hand. Insulation, carpeting and drywall are ruined immediately. If the water stays up for weeks floors may sag and collapse under the weight of accumulated silt as the water falls. Digging out any possessions you may have left behind will be like digging them out of wet cement. The lake that surrounds your home may be whipped by wind into waves two or three feet tall. Waves that will bash out your windows, rip and tear siding or peel away roofing. The current passing through your yard will leave behind all manner of trash and debris and the ever present mud and stench will coat it all.

After the water has gone the mud dries and cakes and your lawn will look like the floor of Death Valley with small cracks and fissures and cakes of dirt everywhere. And what wasn't destroyed in your home, things like rafters and studs and the basic structure of the house will hold the moisture and begin to mold.

The beautiful pastoral landscape that surrounded your home will look like a wasteland once the water recedes. Weeds will grow; fields once fertile might be covered with fine blowing sand. Where the levees were breached, blow holes covering acres will form sometimes holding water as much as fifty feet deep.

The river is like a bull; it's been grazing in the valley for eons and will never move away. In the last two hundred years we arrived like flies and landed on its back. And in spite of the fact that we know the bull will occasionally swat its tail, each time we swarm right back and make the same mistakes again. The rivers own the valleys and though we may occasionally cause the bull to flinch or flick its tail we will never take possession of the valley.

Flies just aren't all that smart you know.

As Good As It Gets

As a new phenomenon, Ultra-marathon canoe racing has established itself here in the mid-west. Ok, it’s not a new thing, after all they’ve been doing it in Texas for more than forty years. But for us here, thanks to the Rivermiles team, it has taken hold over the last five years and seems to be gaining strength each year.

From the first MR340 in 2006, a race with fifteen entries, to the past couple of year’s races with hundreds of entrants this thing just keeps growing.

It’s not an event that is easy to watch as the ‘action’ is mostly on desolate sections of the river far from ramps or bridges or parks.

The friends and families of the participants see their racers dragging in after a hundred or two hundred or three hundred miles of competition and see the toll the effort is taking on their heroes. But if you aren’t out on the water”in over your head” so to speak, it’s impossible to understand what these competitors are actually enduring. Only the racers themselves and the race staff are privileged to have a front row seat to this event. Only these people really gain an understanding of what is being endured and what qualities are being developed and displayed by the entrants.

To paddle for forty or fifty or eighty hours is an astounding accomplishment regardless of where the racer places. To team up with another person or persons and maintain a working relationship throughout the race takes a level of respect for your teammate seldom seen in the every day world.

I am not privileged to call myself a military veteran. I have not “been there and done that”. And so I cannot say with authority that the dependence of these teammates on one another is like the military brotherhood of arms. But as a past racer and observer I can think of nothing else with the exception of military service that might tax the character and strength of the individual or team more than this type of racing.

It is not a particular type of person who enters this race. Some are athletes and competitors of the highest order. Some are adventurers. And some are simply curious, about the river or the race or themselves. The paddlers may come from Texas, expecting to escape the blazing heat of a southwest summer only to find themselves broiling in a boat in 95 degree heat with no shade for hours. Others may come from the frozen north possibly hoping to enjoy balmy breezes down a nice warm river. And then shiver through cold wet nights and battering headwinds and blinding fog.

But what is it like? For the man or woman on the water, there are as many different experiences as there are moments in the race. Only a few get the adrenaline rush of bouncing off a buoy, or bridge, or boat or barge. A few will dump and a few will suffer the indignation of assaults from flying carp. Everyone will get hot and cold and wet and chafed.

Picture yourself in the cockpit of a kayak, your legs are cramping and you’ve no room to flex, you are puking over the side. Well, mostly over the side. Your stomach is tied in a knot just like the one you felt when the Principal picked up his paddle (Ok, maybe you aren’t that old). You know you’re dehydrated and light headed but you don’t care. And you are aching in thousands of muscles. The experts say there are only about 640 muscles in your body, but right now you know they lie. The makeshift band aids won’t stay put on the blisters on your hands and your forearms are swollen and your butt feels like it’s been rammed by a freight train.

You see a bank marker that says the next ramp and therefore the next relief is 25 miles away. You can be there in ten hours if you just let the river carry you or you can dig in and be there in four if you ignore the pain. You have to force yourself to take a drink of water; you pick up the paddle and go back to work. That’s when you realize you have to pee.

An hour later you are puking over the side again, well some of it went over the side. You already understand that your nose has been burned out by the aroma of the bilge water and will never work again. You are maddeningly hungry and deathly sick at the thought of eating, all at the same time.

You do the math again, with luck in twenty or maybe thirty hours it’ll all be done. Then you’ll be able to throw this stupid boat on the bonfire at the finish line.

You’ve sacrificed your vacation and paid good money to experience this pain. You’ve worried about your family, your support team, running the Missouri back roads in the dead of night. And they have worried about you too, but you’ve been to tired to notice. You know that only a madman would allow all this to happen….. and then somewhere in the darkness, alone on the water, you realize you don’t want to be anywhere else. Maybe, you conclude, that only a madman would pass up the opportunity to attempt this race.

A hundred miles to go and you already know there will be no way to describe this whole experience to your co-workers when you return to the office. They’ll assume you have sunstroke or hypothermia or bugs in your ears (yes, that one maybe true) or all of the above. And you’ll know they can never comprehend this race, no matter how eloquent you are, unless they take up the paddle themselves.

Actually, not everyone gets sick or falls on the rocks or drops a boat on their ribs or splits their head open on a concrete table or sees the underside of a barge but all have happened. And more. And each year we seem to find new ways to muddy the waters.

So if you seek a real adventure here in the mid-west this just may be as good as it gets.

Winners at both Ends

The Week that is the MR340 is one of the highlights of my year and after its conclusion I always feel as though I'm drifting, a little lost and rudderless, so to speak. I'm drawn back to the rivermiles forum over and over to try to reconnect with the race but afterwards it is different.
The stories are great, the praise for the staff and volunteers, heartwarming, but the anticipation is gone. Replaced by pride in a job well done from some of the paddlers. Anquish from others and a pervading sense of an adventure completed by most.
As in years before the athletes were finishing in the 30's and 40's and 50 hour time frames. That is a good and wonderful thing, it keeps the back of the pack from becoming too congested. For there, you see, is were I've always found my comfort zone.
I've always contended that anyone can paddle for forty or fifty hours but it takes some special kind of grit to keep hammering for seventy or eighty hours. Just the logistics of keeping a man alive and working after eighty hours of grinding down the river places these teams at the back of the pack in a class of their own.
No they aren't the fastest, they don't set the records or take home the trophies. But they are the grinders who grab a couple of hours sleep and then roll back into the boat still wet from the last run. Only now they are also cold and stiff from lack of exertion. With stomachs sour from 3 days and nights of odd hours and odd food. With arms and backs and butts in pain. And they do it over and over again.
With minds fogged and sight blurry and blistered hands these people have all the marks and scars of champions except one....Speed.
If I were looking for traits to pass on to the next generation I might choose tenacity, attitude and perseverance over speed. I might choose compassion and congeniality over competitiveness.
Now don't get me wrong I would never suggest that these traits aren't exhibited by the winners as well, in fact they are and in spades. That is one of the things that has come to mark the MR340 as the spectacular venue it is.
But this is very important, I must impress on the "Back of the pack gang" that they are recognized as champions as well. Not speedy champions maybe, but champions none the less.

2010 MR340 Canoe and Kayak Race

I have just returned from a week on the river participating in one of the greatest adventures that it has been my pleasure to enjoy.
The 5th annual MR340(http://www.rivermiles.com/) has finally come and gone and again the great stories abound. I saw disasters and triumps and victories and defeats. I witnessed people reaching into the depths of their souls and pulling out strengths they never knew existed and may never have discovered had they not had the courage to enter this race.
Sadly I also saw people defeated, sometimes by the river itself and sometimes by poor planning or lack of experience or countless other reasons.
Actually, there were exactly as many reasons to quit as there were boats that did not finish. No two stories are the same, but even those who didn't finish displayed the courage to make the attempt. And if everyone could pull it off, it wouldn't be the magnificent event that it is.
Many of those who failed will return with knowledge gained and they will succeed next time. Many who barely finished will modify their training and preparation, or change their equipment, or maybe just their attitude and they will compete at a higher level next time.
All the entrants and their teams will have memories to relive and stories to tell. And some very lucky people like myself will have many tales to share. It will take a little time for me to organize my thoughts and present them in a manner befitting the efforts I witnessed. Heroic or triumphant moments, Pain and suffering, crushed goals and crushed boats, comraderie and competition, these were flourishing on all fronts. I saw friendships established, and simple acts of kindness to strangers were abundant.
All these things happen on a daily basis in the natural world but in the condenced time frame of an 88 hour endurance race events happen so quickly and in such rapid succession that it presents a verson of life that comes at the observer compressed and so intense that only by thinking it through afterwards can one sort out the golden moments.
That is what I'll be doing for a while, sorting and recording those moments. A few I will share if I can figure a way to do justice to the efforts of these paddlers. Though I fear I may not be eloquent enough to display their talents and their character in the fashion they deserve.
I have entered this race in the past as a paddler. I have finished and I have failed, I have never won or come close but I have never walked away a poorer man. Tired, sore, dazed and daffy, but never with less than when I began.
This year I was offered the opportunity to man one of the safety boats (maybe they thought that anyone who had gotten himself into as many difficulties as I would be a natural at this) and I take great pride in the fact that I ran over not a single contestant. And I'm certain that with proper therapy many of the paddlers will get over their newfound fear of bearded bald guys driving fast boats.
This position gave me the chance to interact with many more people and witness the race from new perspectives and I hope I will use that wider vision to advantage. So, as I say, give me a short time to organize myself and I will offer a view that few have seen, a canoe race from the seat of a power boat.

The Real First Dragon Boat

After only a few years the MR340 race has developed into both a traditional competition and hotbed for less than traditional approaches. Canoes verses kayaks, young verses old and carbon fiber verses recycled barrels have all contended. And as often as not the results are different than one would expect.
And so it has become a pageant of firsts.
This year we'll see a dragon boat competing for the first time. A forty foot behemoth of a canoe with a crew of twenty or so paddlers. And if one were to look at a cross section of previous competitors and put together an all star team, then it might look just like this dragon boat crew.
If they are successful, we will see the longest competitive run by far of a boat of this type. And to the best of my knowledge it will be the first time a dragon boat has raced on the Missouri river.
But it will not be the first dragon boat on the river.
In 1819, you see, a sternwheeler named the Western Engineer was built in Pittsburg, PA and brought to Missouri as part of a military expedition under the command of Major Stephen Long. As a military vessel the pilot house was built to be bullit proof and the paddle wheel was enclosed.
In an attempt to intimidate the native Indian population, a large serpent or dragon's head was built on the bow of the ship. The smoke from the firebox as well as steam from the boiler and engine exhaust were routed through the mouth and nostrils of this head. At 75 feet long and 50 tons displacement and with steam and glowing cinders exhaled from the beast's head it was thought the boat would strike terror in the Indians and command their respect.
It seems that most whites who witnessed the vessel simply thought it odd. As for the indians, it did apparently arouse their interest, and though they found it curious, they seem to have just chalked it up to more of the white man's unussual ways. Nowhere in the records of the expedition does it mention any fear occasioned by the dragon boat.
The Western Engineer did successfully ascend the river all the way to the site of today's Council Bluffs, Iowa, however its boiler became clogged and required cleaning so often that it made little better time than Lewis and Clark's previous ascent in manually powered vessels.
So, even though the dragon boat in this year's MR340 won't be the first the Missouri river has ever seen, it may still turn out to be the fastest.

To Race, To Dream, To Bloop?

Most folks who read this blog are familiar with the MR340 canoe and kayak race from Kansas City to St. Charles. This race has become a consuming force in the lives of many people and I must confess I am one of those people. Of course I know there are things in life that are more important. But thankfully, I've learned to ignore most of them.
I am one who thinks about the 340 all the time. It matters not if I'm addressing a stranger, an old friend or a co-worker, I've soon worked the conversation around to the race.
I even dream of it and one disturbing dream of one particular moment seems to reoccur more often than most.
Its not the time when I first find myself paddling in darkness on one of the world's greatest rivers. Nor is it the moment when I find myself on a collision course with a barge, knowing the other vessel has me outweighed by about a million times to the tenth power. That one doesn't bother me at all. Its not the embarrassing dream of emptying my water jug and dieing of thirst in the middle of the river or getting knocked cold by flying carp just yards from the finish line.
No the one that forces me awake in a cold sweat is the dream about a moment shortly before the race begins.
Hundreds of paddlers are present some already on the water and some still preparing their boats, arranging and trimming and launching. A thousand spectators line the banks and reporters are grabbing last minute quotes from those racers willing to talk. Helicoptors circle above and I'm sure NASA has at least one satelite zeroed in on the starting line. The Naval Atache' from the Swiss Consulate is chatting with a competitor to my right about amphibious tactics and I and my boat are ready to go.
Then it happens. I step into the boat and for the first time in forty years perform a wet entry. My boat shoots from beneath me and as I somersault into the river the last thing I see before submerging, head down and feet in the air, into the river are a thousand flashes from a thousand cameras all pointed right at me.
Sure every one has flipped a boat on entry at least once in his life. I'm sure it has happened to me sometime in the past but its been so long ago that I don't remember (I'm pretty good at forgetting that type of memory anyway).
Anyway, in my dream, the thousand souls that were so preoccupied an instant before all seem to turn in unison to catch my theatrics. I have visions of Scout Masters teaching canoeing all across the country and using photos of me as the example not to follow. I get calls from insurance companies wanting me to perform in a caveman suit. National Geographic finally prints a Greatest Bloopers in History edition and I make the cover.
My spraddled form makes the headlines across the country and youtube runs a contest just to choose the best video of my blunder.
Yes, that friends is the dream I awaken to at least once a week. It isn't paddling 340 miles that takes courage. It isn't sweating in the midwestern heat and humidity for days. Its not the ability to handle cramps and blisters and pain. Those aren't the things that make a racer who he is. Its the ability to face the nightmares and fears and be still goofy enough to just go out and step into that boat anyway. That is what makes a 340 racer what he is.

Pick up the Ball and Run

Missouri's problems are no different today than those of any other state. A shrinking budget has hampered the efforts of the various agencies to do their jobs and in many instances has forced them to cutback. This doesn't mean the work doesn't need to be done, just that it falls on someone else to pick up the ball and run with it.
What this means is like if we were all members of a basketball team and the stars have suffered a series of injuries. Now its time for you and I to get off the bench and score for the home team.
The Missouri Coalition for the Evironment has just this past week filed a lawsuit against the EPA to force them to take over responsibilities for monitering water quality in many streams in the state. This would normally be done by the Missouri Department of Natural Resources if they had the ability, however they don't presently have the manpower or the facilities available because they don't have the money. And knowing enough about both the government and our legal system I believe that the Coalitions law suit, though maybe a step in the right direction, is simply an exercise in futility. During the time this suit is slugging it's way through the system nothing constructive is getting done. Just the thought of trying to force the EPA's beauracracy to move brings a knot to my stomach.
We should not let this time be lost. The fight for evironmental improvement is like a tug of war match. If you ain't pulling on the rope all the time then you're headed for the mud pit buddy.
We as private citizens simply have to take over where the government is stalling. And fortunately we have groups that can coach us in just what to do and how to do it. Check out the home page of the Coalition for the Environment these are good people. Donate to Missouri River Relief whose link is listed on this site. But another way is to go to the Missouri Dept. of Conservation site: http://mostreamteam.org/ . Here you can find out how to help in many different ways.
Maybe you are unable to lug a trash bag through the mud, or don't have the money to donate to one of the environmental groups. That doesn't mean you are helpless. Can you take a water sample? Can you help spread the word about the needs of our watersheds? Can you simply, with their help, educate yourself. So that when you are sitting in the coffee shop talking to your friends, you can offer encouragement and enlightened conversation to others.
Getting the word out about our environmental needs is as important as stuffing trash in a bag. Learning what we as individuals can do is far more constructive than sitting back and waiting for the EPA or the DNR or any of the other big players to recover and renew their efforts.
Please take a moment and find out in what ways you are suited to help. Everyone has different abilities but the job at hand is so large that we need you all.
Thank you,
Walt