An Oil Boom in North Dakota

"These waves are a bit disorganized," Greg commented. To which I replied, "Yeah, they really ought to get their shit together."  We were in the middle of an open water crossing on Lake Sakakawea when the winds increased in strength followed by the waves. We were trying to get around a rocky point beyond which the lake turned from the north back to the east and we would have the wind at our backs. Presently, however, we were at the mercy of an ever increasing side wind kicking up 4 foot high choppy waves that were hitting us broadside and the Betty B tossed about dangerously. Taking a wave over the side would most likely drown the canoe.

Greg shouted that if we took a wave over the side he'd turn us directly to shore. It would then be an expect the worst but paddle like hell to attain the best situation. Fortunately we rounded the point without incident and continued eastward towards the Garrison Dam. By the end of the day we had put 36 miles behind us, paddling for 9.5 hours.

We were restless and determined to cover ground after having spent 44 hours pinned down, hunkered against a high mud bank as the wind howled from the east at 20 MPH. Our rhythm had been interrupted and we were desperate to get it back. The rhythm of life on the water dominated by 7-10 hours of paddling every day had been brought to a halt and for 44 hours we sat, we paced, we stared out at the water as if willing the wind to die.

In the distance on the far shore, a constant reminder of our maddening lack of motion burning with a taunting arrogance was the off gassing flame of an oil derrick. The countryside around the lake has been experiencing an oil boom the last 3-5 years and for days now we have constantly been in sight of at least a few oil derricks. The day before the wind hit I counted 13 in view while paddling and then camped on shore as evening darkened I could see 13 flames on just the opposite shore and behind us within a quarter mile were four more.

Just inside North Dakota we caught a ride 22 miles into town with a local who took us shopping and then drove us 22 miles back to the river. On the drive our gracious host told us about the boom. When I asked how it affected the locals, if it was seen as good or bad he replied, "Oh, little of both, But more and more we're seeing more of the bad."

The oil boom has driven up the price of real estate and there's an oil company trying to force him to sell out at less than market value. Crime has skyrocketed and there isn't the housing to room the workers. Then there's the oil companies tendency to to do their best to take all the money and leave as little as possible to the locals.

Most often the landowner is not the owner of the mineral rights in North Dakota. These were often separated generations back. So the owner of the mineral rights can lease the rights to minerals underneath another person's property. Once the oil company has the lease to the minerals they are not bound by law to notify the landowner. So, a property owner may very well just look out their window one morning to find fence being ripped out and heavy equipment dozing a pad for the upcoming derrick.

For those that own the mineral rights it is required by law for a broker to be involved as a middle man. The law also requires the oil companies to pay out 20% of the rig to the leaseholder and the broker. For years no one told the leaseholders this so the brokers were signing them to 5% and keeping 15% of each rig for themselves. Recently the locals have wizened to this, and the brokers are having to settle for 5% on new leases.

If fought on an individual basis the oil companies will be required to pay damages to the landowner and perhaps even lease the land they're using but it seems they do their damnedest to not let that happen. The situation reminds me of a line from the Tom Russell song called "Who's Gonna Build Your Wall" that goes something like "As I travel around this land of ours the man that I most fear is the man in a golf shirt with a cell phone in his ear."

The dams and the derricks, the flames on the horizon and the sprawling unnatural lakes are enough to get a man low but my faith in humanity is strengthened by the everday folks we meet on the river with an immediate, unasked for willingness to do what they can to help us on our way, a selfless desire to help another human. Whether they be shopowners in Oregon, bus drivers in North Dakota, or villagers in Alaska I feel better about this world because they are in it.

People is People

I am not a fan of guidebooks. Generally speaking I feel they lack the information I desire and are chock full of shit I don't need. In Fort Benton, Montana Greg and I bought a guidebook. "The Complete Paddler" by David Miller. We needed the maps. Maps on the upper Missouri are difficult to come by and state road maps just don't cut it when it comes to knowing where you are on a river. Other than the maps and the fact that he gives the reader ample opportunity to ridicule him, there isn't much use to the book. He spends way too much time describing the river channel in a bend by bend play by play which is useless considering it is a dynamic, ever changing, body of flowing water, but that is not the topic here. I have one main problem with Miller.

The problem began with Wolf Point, Montana but it continues across into North Dakota. When describing Wolf Point Miller goes into great detail regarding his experience passing by town in which a drunk with a handgun fired several rounds in his direction. He didn't know whether the drunk was firing at him or not but felt the rounds came too close. This could happen on any river near any town in this fair country of ours but it happened to Miller in Wolf Point. It would be fine in a guide if you were including it as a bit of colorful narrativebut Miller takes it way too far including that 10 years ago someone of the river was beaten up and that a paddler should go nowhere near the town. Not only that but while paddling by stay as close to the opposite bank as possible and paddle as fast as you can.

The ridiculousness of this tickles my sense of humor but it offends my sense of ethics as well. In describing Wolf Point in such demonizing terms he fails not only Wolf Point whose reputation is soured by this guidebook but the paddler as well who has been cheated of their right to approach that town with the same anxious nervousness they approach every other town with. A certain fear of the unknown but also an excitement about what may happen. And overwhelmingly what happens is a beautiful experience involving the kindness of strangers, such as when we pulled in to Wolf Point's boat ramp (Miller describes as an obvious party spot and to be avoided). It was neat and clean when we got there, we dumped our trash and looked around for some water. We didn't find any and were about to disembark when an old fella with a dog pulled up in a pickup, "You fellas looking for water? Won't find any here. But if you jump in I can drive you to the bar down the road and get some." Not only did we fill our water jugs but we also had another wonderful experience in a river town, something Miller may have experienced had he had the balls to get out and say hello.

Instead Miller spent the rest of his time running scared through the Fort Peck Indian Reservation terrified to meet anyone, hiding his camp in the willow bushes and keeping his head low. Even down into North Dakota at the reservation there he describes the campground as nice but not a place to leave your boat untended. It became clear that Miller is afraid. He's afraid those whisky drinkin Injuns are gonna steal his boat, take his scalp, and leave him for dead. What he needs to learn is that the Greek deli owner in Muppets Take Manhattan was right, "People is People".

As for our part, later on after getting water at Wolf Point we were camped on a sandbar looking across at the reservation when a pickup truck drove down to the river and a few guys got out, saw us, and jumped back in the truck. They drove back up river a couple hundred yards and let out a mighty barrrage of gunfire into the river that lasted 20 minutes or more.

People is People and no matter where you go in this fair country of ours wherever there's a river sooner or later there's gonna be a truckload of whisky drinkin rednecks of one race or another lettin of a maelstrom of bullets into the belly of that river. Why? Cause that's God damned good fun right there. And as a paddler all you can hope for is that they have the courtesy to move upstream a couple hundred yards before letting off that first barrage of gunfire in the direction of your simmering pot of beans.

The Shadow of The Missouri

Stubborness? Definitely has something to do with why we're out here, beating our heads against an unrelenting headwind, driving through crashing waves. Sure, stubborness is part of it. An unwillingness to give, a refusal to relent, an indomitable desire to beat the wind, to be stronger than the wind. But there's more to it than that. There's the urge for going, the natural urge for a river to flow and our desire to be a part of it. And the desire to put beyond us the barrier between us and the natural flow. To get beyond the dam. There's also the practical side of things. Wind on a water this big can blow for days, a week or more maybe, and at some point action is a necessity to life.

We rode a tailwind the first day on the lake. Set up a campchair for a sail and skipped along at 5 MPH, surfing three foot waves and crashing through a maze of half submerged junipers on the strength of the wind. It's been five days across the lake, defined by paddling from point to point, often across big, open water, sometimes flat, often not, churned up by wind driven waves.

We steadily paddle passed fisherman in small boats, most of whom offer a slight wave of the hand, some a bit of conversation. Those that speak, that ask how far we're going offer the inevitable, "Have fun!" We awkwardly answer in some vague affirmative, not having the time or the inclination or the energy perhaps to explain... very little of this is fun.

Paddling into a driving wind, grueling out 2 miles an hour is not fun, crossing an open bay fighting a cross channel side wind taking huge waves against the side of the canoe the closest shore over a mile distant is not fun. Watching the channel disappear into a windrow of half submerged trees, picking a gap beyond which water can be seen and relying on the wind to send you crashing through is both exhilirating and terrifying but it's only fun in the recollecting once you are safely drinking a Keystone Light on shore.

We aren't out here for a pleasure cruise. We're out here to join the river on it's seaward path. To take our part in a conversation that spans millenia. It is rewarding and it is humbling. And every evening we sit back and reflect on accomplishments attained through physical labor and mental strength. Reflections made in the shadow of the might of the Missouri.

Landscape

The first week of paddling has been defined by slow water inhibited by dams and portages. 5 dams in 4 days and in between each a long paddle through slack water. At each dam we begin the slow process of portage, the loading up of gear on backs and in arms to carry as much as can be managed each trip but never have we gone far. Out of nowhere a sunbeaten face leans out of a pickup truck window to ask "You fellas need some help? Throw that gear in the back and we'll go load up the rest." Information pours out along the ride and within an hour we've finished a portage that should have taken several. Back on the water with a handsake and a good luck.

Between the dams the Montana landscape changes instantly and dramatically. One moment paddling across a wide open lake we suddenly plunge into the Gates of the Mountains defined by towering rock faces looming over a narrow channel as if challenging all intruders. Then suddenly after only a few miles of imposing rock the canoe glides around a bend and the rocky cliffs disappear to be replaced by rolling fields of wheat continuing on for several days. Outside of Great Falls the rolling fields morphed into rough and rumpled hills like tousled bedsheets hiding, perhaps, a left and lonely lover.

We are in Fort Benton now leaving tomorrow for a 300 mile stretch until the next legitimate town of Fort Peck. Ahead of us lies 150 miles of river followed by 150 miles of lake. Looking forward to what the morphing landscape of Montana will reveal in the days ahead.

Bachelor party, Keystone, and Crickets

It was sometime after midnight that Wilson, Hogan and I stood poolside in McKinney's backyard. Everyone else had gone to bed and we were heading that way soon, just wrapping up a piece of forgotten conversation.

For some time I had been tuned in to a conversation between crickets and cicadas and I couldn't leave the outcome unknown. I climbed into my sleeping bag at the side of the pool and watched the clouds swallow the stars as I eavesdropped on the crickets and drifted off to sleep to a symphony of insects.

I woke up at around 5 am soaking wet with rain coming down hard and only getting harder. My clothes layed out neatly by the pool were in a puddle of water and my sleeping bag was soaked through. I retreated to the comfort of home.

Breakfast was at Waffle House with Regan and Wilson. First visit to a Waffle House since January of 2009 when I seized on a Houston sidewalk 30 minutes later. Apparently Waffle House is not directly related to epilepsy, only deliciousness.

The bachelor party started that day at noon and finished at 11 when most of the participants were passed out or off to the bars. We spent the day lounging by the pool drinking copious amounts of Keystone Light, Coors, and sipping whisky.  By the end, Tex was racked out on his couch, a frozen pizza slowly charring into a blackened husk to be found in the morning while Regan and I awaited Pizza Hut to deliver our salvation contained in a greasy, doughy pie containing the secret to late night sobriety, and some chicken wings. Over lots of water and pizza and wings, we waxed philosophically, defining the night with good conversation and somehow went to bed sober.

Regardless of who remembers how much or how little it was a successful reunion of old friends brought together by a future union of two people meant to be together. We sent McKinney off in proper fashion with the drunken toasts of well meaning and unintelligable friends, stories of long ago, and in anticipation of stories to come.

Ink Stamped On Paper

I am in love with the written word, the way it can make the heart flutter, cause the stomach to drop, or the soul to soar through clouds above mountain tops only to dive down and mingle with the dry sands of the desert, how a sentence can slake the thirst with but a few words in regards to clear rocky streams.

I am in love with ink stamped on paper, the musty smell, the crisp shuffle of pages flipping through fingertips, the comfort of books on shelves waiting to be discovered, beckoning forth the curious eyes of man and woman.  

I am in love with words stamped on paper.

A Fisherman's Advice

"I wish I had figured it out when I was your age instead of in my 60's," said Forest.  He was sitting on the tube of the 20 foot raft, pole in one hand, looking upstream to the clear running waters of the Chena River.  Rudy and I were standing on the gravel bar, while Kathy, Forest's wife, fished from the bank.  They're traveling through Alaska and today was their day to fish.  On their bucket list is a mission to catch fish in each and every state.  To succeed they each have to catch a freshwater fish.  We'd been hitting the Arctic Grayling and they each had caught upwards of 10 fish.  Nothing spectacular on the Chena but the water was a bit cloudy due to recent rains and they were happy as soon as they each had their first.  Alaska was the 36th state crossed off the list. 

Forest had already been raving about the day.  Fish, sun, and fellowship on the river.  The three things he was looking for in a day of fishing and Rudy and I had provided all three.  The water was swift, the fishing stress free, and the conversation flowed.  Early on Forest was having a difficult time bringing in the grayling due to his aggressive reeling once they were on the line.  Rudy was eventually able to instruct him to not "Bass" the grayling, referring to the speed and aggressiveness with which Bass are generally reeled in.  Grayling require a more delicate touch.  A fisherman will have best luck if one plays the Grayling in to the boat. 

There were clouds in the sky, keeping the heat of the day down to a mild 70 degrees, a slight breeze to keep the mosquitos at bay and between Rudy rigging the lines and myself handling the raft we drifted through a near perfect day on the upper Chena River. 

Stretching our legs on the bank, Forest turned the conversation to our work.  "You may not get rich but you've got it figured out.  Just keep doing what you're doing.  Wish I had figured it out when I was your age.  Just don't make the mistake I made.  Don't go corporate.  Keep doing what you're doing.  I thought I needed to work my way up, become the CEO of Sears.  What a mistake I made...."

We looked past each other, eyes wandering across gravel bar, spruce and birch forest, to settle on current, watching the slightly swollen river waters flow by searching the surface for the rise of a Grayling.  A Raven's call pierced the afternoon's stillness, the fishing had slowed in the heat of the day, and we were left with nothing but the company of each other, the Raven, and the cool, swiftness of flowing water. 

We climbed back into the raft, drifting through the remainder of a beautiful day on the river, content in having it all figured out.