The Reclamation Bureau learned from Dave Brower's historic testimony
on evaporation rates from the surface or reservoirs in the desert that "The
Devil's in the Details." We face details here too. The detail stew is
richer and more confusing. None the less, to go off on rants about
swampers, sweeties, and NPS employees getting to run the Grand, AND NOT
EVEN BE COUNTED, when we cannot quite yet dip an oar misses the point. And
we don't know how sharp the point is, apparently. How many folks run the
Grand each year? How are they parceled between private and commercial
trips? Does this distribution raise equity questions that can stand on
their own?
Because commercial and private runners have quite different notions of
equity on this question, until some interested party in the crossfire (I
expect that'll be Grand Canyon National Park) establishes ground rules the
businesses and the dilletantes will talk right past each other. That's
impolite. It's a damnable waste of time too. If we hope to settle these
negotiations down to productive discussions, let's stop forging myriad axes
to grind and pound out some sort of workable wait list apparatus.
2. Common Pool
I think this is a cockamannie idea for the following reason: The
common pool will put Helms and Weld on the same trip. Yikes and worse.
Maybe this is a perversely effective way to shorten the list from "oh
lordy, how long?" to "see you at the put in next year"? [Pardon the
sarcasm. I couldn't resist.]
Folks with commercial experience ruefully recall keeping the
incompatibles from ripping each other's eyes out on long trips. The
eruption typically comes on the fifth day when everyone has passed their
"long weekend" (4-day) training for social compatibility. Things get
yeasty when that threshold passes. For that reason alone I think that the
lucky stiff that gets a launch MUST be able to select the list of fellow
travelers. For crying out loud, we cannot get paid for tending strangers'
tender psyches. I've been under paid for those services before. No way I'll
do it for nothing.
3. Repeat Runners
This connects with point 2, above because on any trip I take on any
river I run I want every person on the oars to know what's going on. In
Cat, Grand, the Middle Fork, and at Warm Spring [if you know me you know
why], I want at least one hand with CURRENT KNOWLEDGE. [I'm not talking
about reading water here.] My children or spouse may be in any boat on any
trip I take. I must be willing to ride in that boat myself. That imposes a
standard that the common pool proposal has no chance of meeting. I haven't
had the privelige of running the Grand since 1969. There is no way I'll
take my family down there without someone along who's up to date. Q.E.D.
4. That unseemly description of commercial passengers and most of my
middle-aged friends of diverse girths.
Cf: the dignified ladies' third admonition above.
I cannot make the meeting in Phoenix. Sorry. Clio beckons.
See you on the water,
Al
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