Katie Siber of The New York Times explores the paddling opportunities on the Colorado River above Lee’s Ferry (“sandwiched between Lake Powell and the Grand Canyon” in northern Arizona), where river permits are much easier to come by, the water is flatter, and the couple-day kayaking legs are perfect for beginners.

“One of the remarkable things about the Colorado is that no matter how many people have traveled it and no matter how many have tried to plunder it, from railroad builders to miners and even Hollywood movie crews (parts of “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” “Broken Arrow” and “Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle” were filmed here), it retains a palpable sense of wildness.

River trips on peaceful stretches like this invite laziness and lingering, so the next morning we lounged about and sipped coffee, did some cursory yoga and inspected the tracks of ringtails and centipedes circling our tents and the bushes.”

photo credit: Wolfgang Staudt

The passing in April of the 100-year-old man whose dams plugged up the Colorado and other majestic western rivers suddenly got plenty of attention this week, from sources as different in scope as the High Country News and the Wall Street Journal.

In The New York Times, Douglas Martin quotes Marc Reisner, who in his 1986 book Cadillac Desert: The American West and its Disappearing Water said Mr. Dominy cultivated Congress “as if he were tending prize-winning orchids.”

Here’s Dominy in an interview with Outside magazine in 1999, talking about the push to build Glen Canyon Dam: “‘Of course we covered up some delightful country: country that was inaccessible, country that would never be visited by very many people, which we turned into one of the most beautiful lakes in the world.’”

But our favorite coverage of Dominy’s legacy came yesterday from NPR’s Elizabeth Arnold, whose three-minute podcast includes the surprising reminder that the Sierra Club supported Glen Canyon in return for the bureau passing up on other damming projects.

photo credit: the_tahoe_guy

Executive Pursuits: Harry Hurt III of The New York Times writes about running the “boiling cauldron” that is the Nantahala River (the “Natty”) in western North Carolina, as he learns to kayak for the first time with whitewater kayaking instructor Jon Clark of Nantahala Outdoor Center.

“Over the preceding 24 hours, Jon and his colleagues at the Nantahala Outdoor Center had given me a crash course in the basics of whitewater kayaking. I’d practiced on a flat-water section of the Chattooga River, where the movie ‘Deliverance’ was shot, and I’d run some Class II rapids on the Nantahala River. But Nantahala Falls was a full-fledged Class III rapids, and I was still a rank novice.”

photo credit: Fredde Cooney Ahlstrom

Rogue River Rafts

Bonnie Tsui of The New York Times writes about the growing trend among whitewater rafting companies in offering culinary cooking camps in addition to their standard river experience. ROW Adventures’ Culinary Whitewater Series (rafting the Snake and Salmon Rivers in Idaho, or northeast Oregon’s Grande Ronde) and O.A.R.S. adventure rafting company’s Wilderness Gourmet trip series (Oregon’s Rogue River) are just two such examples.

“Peter Grubb, president and founder of ROW Adventures, said the company started the Culinary Whitewater Series last year in response to the growing interest in culinary travel… ‘we thought it would be fun to do with some guides on our staff who are experienced cooks and natural teachers. We wanted it to be experiential, so that people could learn how to do gourmet camp cooking at home or on their own camping trips.’”

photo credit: nwrafting

Dan Frosch of The New York Times weighs in on the rafting vs. private land development wars brewing this summer in Colorado’s Gunnison Valley

“Now, the dispute over the Taylor is reviving an old battle in Colorado, long a mecca for white-water rafting. At issue are the state’s water and property laws, which say that while the water in local rivers and streams is public, the beds and banks belong to whoever owns the adjacent land.”

Edward Nickens of Popular Mechanics spends a few days paddling Louisiana’s salt marsh in search of sea trout and redfish and writes about the new breed of fishing kayaks: stable casting platforms, easy to paddle and maneuver, relatively indestructible, light and portable, and most of all, comfortable.

“These new fishing-friendly designs have ushered in a golden age of small-craft angling. According to the Paddlesports Industry Association, kayak fishing is the fastest growing segment of human-powered water recreation. These boats are introducing outdoor enthusiasts who might never have considered themselves paddlers to a new kind of fishing adventure.”

Native’s Ultimate Hybrid and Hobie’s Mirage Pro Angler are loosely reviewed.

Susan Carpenter of The Los Angeles Times writes about her Panamanian excursion to the Valle Escondido Resort & Spa, where hiking, beach time, and whitewater rafting are daily eco-tourism attractions.

“The driver, who also turned out to be the rafting guide, was exactly on time the next morning, at the brutal-for-vacation hour of 7. Scooping up two other couples on the way, we raced northwest on the Pan-American Highway, then took secondary roads and, finally, a treacherous deep-in-the-jungle dirt road. Twenty minutes from the river we would be rafting, the driver slowed to pick up another man who seemed to appear out of nowhere. He was the driver who would move the van from the head of the river to its tail and pick us up a few hours later.”

Yes, “skyaking” is what it sounds like: skydiving with a kayak. Miles Daisher, a resident of Twin Falls, Idaho and a longtime BASE jumper and skydiver, tells The Daily Telegraph how he came up with the idea of throwing himself and plastic boats out of planes and helicopters.

“‘It took us nearly a year before we could get our wish to come true as no one was really looking to throw a kayak out of an aeroplane. To begin with we did it off a 600ft bridge on a static line, and landed in Feather River, California,’” says Daisher. “‘A year later I got permission to jump out of an aeroplane and so since that time I have jumped out of four different aircraft, including a helicopter.’”

In the last few years, thousands of Texas anglers have begun utilizing kayaks to explore everything from Hill Country rivers to coastal estuaries in search freshwater bass and saltwater redfish and sea trout. Shannon Tompkins of the Houston Chronicle writes about the advantages of these nimble and cost effective fishing solutions.

“Kayaks are relatively inexpensive (certainly when compared to power boats); can be easily transported without a trailer; allow anglers to access places such as narrow, shallow, rocky Hill Country rivers or knee-deep, back-bay flats that powerboats can’t; and, perhaps most importantly, can be a tremendously effective way to fish.”

Important options to consider for any quality fishing kayak: comfortable seat, durable rod holders and leashes, carrying weight, dry storage, and soft cooler storage.

photo credit: paddling

Amazon Headwaters

Helen Skelton, an English television personality for the British children’s series Blue Peter and life long outdoorswoman, recently kayaked the entire Amazon River (roughly 2,010 miles) from Nauta, Peru to Almeirim, Brazil, setting two world records for “longest solo journey by kayak and the longest distance travelled in a kayak in 24 hours by a woman.” Before the journey, she had never set foot in a kayak.

The extensive journey–to provide aid for the charity Sport Relief–was not without challenges: “[Skelton] had two injections to counteract heat exhaustion and was bitten by insects hundreds of times. She endured blisters, sores and seasickness so bad she sometimes felt like giving up. Making more than a million strokes, she went through some 150ft of medical tape to protect her hands,” reports Stephen Adams and Ben Leach of The Daily Telegraph.

photo credit: quinet