A Close Call on the Salmon River

On a six-day Scout trip down Idaho’s Main Salmon River, we had three rafts and a simple idea about whitewater: find the highest, wildest water, and that was where the adventure would be.

One rapid changed our thinking.

Dee was rowing, Duane was calling directions, and I was in the back of the raft.

“A little more to the right, Dee.”

Dee aimed us toward the high whitewater. He hit his target.

As we crested the wave, the bottom of the hole seemed impossibly far below us. We dropped so steeply that I thought the raft would flip. Instead, the rapid caught us and held us there, spinning and battering the boat as water poured over the sides.

One boy was thrown clear. Another hung partly over the bow, struggling to stay aboard. Dee fought the oars, but the current tore them from their pins. One bent, and he suffered a broken finger.

Duane was shouting something I couldn’t hear over the roar.

I thought it was, “Abandon ship!”

But he wasn’t abandoning ship, so I wasn’t about to.

What he was actually shouting was, “Get to the high side!”

I learned afterward that the raft ahead had rescued the boy who went overboard. Meanwhile, our third raft was approaching. If it entered the same hole, it looked as though it could land directly on Dee.

They moved to the right and passed so close that a paddle went just above my head. One of the men caught our rope as they passed. We thought that might have helped pull us free. There were several quick prayers, too.

We were trapped for perhaps thirty to forty-five seconds. It felt much longer. Our enthusiasm for finding the biggest whitewater had diminished considerably.

Another memory from that trip stayed with me for a different reason.

During a lunch stop, several of us followed a secluded trail about three miles from the river. We rounded a bend and found a cabin in a small meadow.

After traveling through such isolated country, the last thing I expected was someone’s home. We approached and met a couple of people I called “river characters,” who had established a small ranch there.

I remember the surprise of finding that meadow more clearly than the cabin’s exact appearance. Years later, that discovery helped inspire the cabin in The Weight of a Second.