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Enjoying the Long Way Home by Jim Snyder

I had been planning and waiting for this opportunity for several years- and now it appeared I would have to be patient a while longer.  Oh I was on the water all right- mostly. But I was surrounded by thousands of "invisible rocks" who seemed to vie for my attention. Yes-invisible rocks cluttered my route.  Maybe the time WASN'T right.  Maybe when the gage read 6" lower than my selected "lowest possible level" cut off- it meant something. Maybe it was less than vaguely possible.  But I had 140 miles of the Shavers Fork and Cheat River proper ahead of me and all this "momentum" which was sooo hard to curtail.  So I crashed, scraped, pushed, jerked, wiggled and scrounged for hours.  I had even designed a boat for this trip- the Cheta- and had one made up with a special (and expensive) strong light lay-up by the finest custom kayak manufacturer in the United States- my friend Paul Schreiner.  And now I was slowly trying to abrade it to death.  I had also groomed my "kit" to the lightest possible load. A tarp and bivvy sack, sleeping bag and pad, cold food and drink, a water filter and first aid kit- all combined to a minimalistic 11.5 pounds.  Still with the weight of the boat, paddling gear, and my massive abs, I represented almost 300 pounds of blind Rockcrusher.

"Undaunted" isn't the word.  "Maniacal" would have been closer to the truth- there was no reasoning behind any of this.   It's just something I wanted to do. And now I had to do it very very slowly- maybe 2 miles an hour at best.  "Let's see..... 140 miles at 2 mph..." the math came hard at this hour of the morning and I didn't want to know the answer really anyways. I was committed. At some point I would pass my house- waaay downstream just above the final Canyon section of the river.   And then I would find my friend, Ralph Teter, patiently waiting for my late arrival at Cheat Lake just before the Cheat combines to become the Monongahela River  and proceed to Pittsburgh, becoming the Ohio and then the Mississippi before threading into the Gulf of Mexico. I would be connected to a line of water molecules parading through America the whole time. I would be riding the longest uncontrolled river in the eastern United States.   The best guide book on this section of river, written by Walter Burmeister in 1978, says, "While few paddlers will have the opportunity, endurance ,and inclination to challenge the entire race in one all embracing swoop, the exceptional potentialities of the fabulous course should be pointed out".  That simple sentence had fired my imagination.

I wonder what the trucker thought when he drove by me at the put in at 2:30 in the morning. I know he saw my boat. But I soon disappeared over the hill to the river's edge and made it a non-issue.  Finally!  After all this waiting! It was a sublime moment when I took the first strokes.  Reality sank in a second later when I ran aground on grassy sand.    Hmm.... No problem.  I stuck my paddle in the ground and tried to press through. I pushed for a few minutes and found it getting SHALLOWER! This is weird. I was in the MIDDLE of the river.  No problem. I backed up to where I had 5" of water again and tried to search out a water route to the rest of the river. None such. OK......   Back to the mid-river beach and out of the boat and let's start wandering around in the middle of the river in the middle of the night and try to find another patch of 5" deep water.  It wasn't supposed to be like this. The full moon was modestly hiding behind thick clouds and the riverside pines created wandering shadows. Way on the other side of the river I found the "real" river and climbed back into the Cheta.  Now I was really on my way.

I ran smack into a rock the size of a stove. I'd have to get better at this.  I had about 3 hours till dawn and I wanted to get into a flow to preserve my energy. But every minute or so I'd beach myself on a number of "invisible" rocks and have to beg for passage. A real turning point came when I passed a fisherman's camp with a light on an hour later or so.  I didn't know if he had a dog or not-   but I expect I would be an alarming intrusion at 4 in the morning no matter what. And a dog could easily access me anywhere. So mum was the word. No scraping allowed. No whackin rocks with the paddle.  So I slowed even more- and this turned out to be progress. Then I wouldn't beach so bad and wouldn't spend so long wiggling free.  Several times I had to stop and go way over there, but it worked. A certain serenity started to flavor the experience. I WAS going to make it.  The trip was on.  An hour or so later I saw glints of bright light coming off the shaft of my paddle.  Ah... dawn at last. And then I could see and do much better- I assured myself.  After a while I stopped to admire "my" sunrise and turned back upstream to watch it. It turned out to be the bright setting moon- beautiful non-the-less. Of course, after the moon left it got pretty dark, but I had the technique now.

Real dawn came not long after and I found myself still getting stranded in the shallows.  I was REALLY glad I was solo at this point.  I was already hot and tired from the hours of hard effort. It was a rude and difficult detour to deal with the endless obstacles and to have anyone else blaming me for the delay would have been unbearable.   I was really wondering where McGee Run was. I thought I saw it a while before but it didn't look like what I remembered from winter trips. At 12.4 miles in, it was my first opportunity to find what my real pace had been through the torturous shallows.  I took a break on an island and checked the map.  I had to have passed it. It was after 8 in the morning and I had been on the water for five and a half long hours. I figured maybe I was at Stalnaker Run- 19 miles in. I stood up to get back on the water and wwwoah!  I was next to a discreet camp on shore and the fishermen were just returning from their morning sport. They confirmed my location and asked if I was "one of those nuts".  I didn't really have a good answer. The fishing was awesome.   One had been there for a week and had caught over 40 big fat trout.  We seemed to share a certain glow fostered by this gentle wilderness. And then I was gone.

The Falls section was my first real challenge. It involved a couple portages and some careful navigation of a few miles of serious whitewater.  If I was going to have trouble this would be my best opportunity- but it was not to be. I silently slipped through this familiar section unscathed. The High Falls of the Cheat were luminous from the brilliant morning light.  "Wow- people should see this" I thought.   Everyone should take a break and come see these Falls. Just leave their cars on the highway in the rush hour traffic jams and come see this. It's telling us something. It's pure and joyful. We need that.

The water was with me now and I was focused on getting to camp past Parsons- the halfway point of the river.    Just before lunchtime I stopped in Bemis to let Doris know I had safely navigated the Falls section.   "It's a LOT lower than I thought it would be. It's going really slow" I said tiredly.  "So you're quitting?" she asked. "NO WAY! I'm having a ball. It just might take longer than I thought". So I got back to business.  I passed Bowden a bit past 1:00 in the afternoon. Almost 11 hours. into the trip and I was feeling the effects of the dark punishments I had suffered in the wee hours of the morning.  But I had 100 miles to go and I was enthused beyond words.   Around 2, I got to this cool store next to the river by the old Rt.33 bridge and ate a lot of their food- including a fat deli sandwich and some ice cream.   Hmmm... niiice.  But no beer please- this was serious work.

The next section to Parsons seemed to go by quickly. I made it to this critical way station by 8pm.  I would go another hour before I made camp. It stays light till 10 this time of year so I would have time to make camp in the light.  I wanted to stay on an island so I wouldn't offend any landowners on this section of river. Just after 9, I came to the first island, but it was very dark. A  powerful storm blew in just then and the lightning was blinding me as is cracked all around every minute or so.  I pulled in to the top of the island to find a good spot but it was terrible.  I was so groggy and it was so dark and tough going that I kept falling over logs and couldn't find ANY spot big enough to lie down on. I thought of how my friend Chipper had said maybe I would go until I couldn't and then just curl up under a bush somewhere. That was starting to sound like a good plan.   I thought there might be a patch of sand on the downstream side of the island so I went back to my boat to make the trip down there.  It was shallow and the rocks were slippery so I fell a lot, but I finally got to where I felt I could launch the boat.  Climbing in, I fell over. Lightning cracked, rain pounded down with a vengeance, and my boat filled to the brim with river water. This won't do. I laughed and tipped the boat to get as much water out as I could but it was still holding too much for me to navigate the shallow riffle next to the island- in the DARK again.   AARRGH! So I got out my cute little sponge and did this funny routine for the next 15 minutes where I tried to keep up with the pouring rain. It was getting darker the whole time so I had to make a go of it at some point. On the downsteam end of the island I did find a flat patch of sand about half the size of my body. Beautiful! Up with the tarp and then I collected a handful of pencil size dead twigs from the underside of a tree and started a small fire about the size of my hand- for ambiance.  Then throw out the bivvy sack and my sleeping bag (they had survived the drenching).  I had to get naked because "shore clothes" were too much of a heavy luxury for this adventure.  (Hey I was glad to be solo again)  Into the bags and a snack later I was seriously thinkin about a nap. It was 10:20.  I had gone about 70 miles in a little over 18 hours..  I was tired - but not sore. No blisters. I paused to wonder if the storm would have any effect ( I was maybe two feet higher than the river level). The Cheat is famous for coming up several feet in an hour at times.

Soon I heard a clacking sound maybe 10-15 feet from my camp. Something hard was disturbing the river rocks REAL close to me. I was too tired to figure it out but armed myself with a tiny flashlight so I could scare away any predators with my powerful magic - and scary grunts- if I had too. A minute later it happened again- even closer. I reacted by making this kinda lame duck noise that sounded pretty bothersome.  Whatever it was bolted. Then I thought, "Doh! predator.... lame duck....   bad combo..."   Minutes later it was back.  Then I heard the familiar snort of an irate deer.  Turns out deer like to cross rivers on the downstream side of islands and I was on a major thoroughfare. They didn't like it, so my sleep was punctuated with angry snorts all through the night.  I was stinky and in the way and just had to live with it.

Dawn arrived gently and I found I wasn't sore at all at 6:30.  A short snack and some gear sorting and I was on the water by 7.   Clean moving water. Plenty of it.  It was maybe knee deep the whole way- but it was moving nicely and I could glide through long riffle sections and take in the magnificent relaxed pastoral scenery. I could easily see fat fish darting everywhere.  Hardly any homes encroached on the view and it was Serene.  Almost too serene.  A vague grogginess revisited me and I found when I got to shore for breaks I could hardly walk or stay awake.  So I just laid on the warm rocks in the morning sun and enjoyed it immensely.  I made it to Rowlesburg around 2:30 and dropped off my wet camping gear where Doris works- just a few hundred feet from the river. I was in the home stretch now and wanted to be light and on my toes. The Narrows and Canyon would test my ability to concentrate.  Three hours later I came to my home.  I waved to Nate,  said "Hi" to Milly, and called Ralph to set up a pick up time. We promised each other we'd be there.  The Canyon run was awesome.   I was fast and clean and enjoyed it as much as any run I've ever done in my 37 years + of boating.  The river was now tainted with the irreversible stain of acid mine drainage. The tea-like tinting would be with me the rest of the way.  Bad to taste... burning the eyes.  Someone else's fortune had become the river's misfortune- and now mine in a way.  I had just over 2' on the Albright gage going through the Canyon.  The Cheat's purity I had enjoyed for so many hours was now gone forever- but not forgotten. The Friends of the Cheat's efforts seemed REALLY worthwhile at this point- giving a noble river its due. We MUST persist. We can make things right.

The Canyon's take out- Jenkinsburg- passed by around 7:00 and the Big Sandy brought in the last good load of pure water the Cheat would see. I finally got to the top of the Lake and went to nearly 9:00 before I saw Ralph waving to me.   I was almost an hour late and I hate to make him worry so I had paddled hard that last hour of flatwater.   But it was refreshing and washed all the lactic acid from my muscles.   I ended the trip invigorated and enthused- but I couldn't really say why. It was like my own private joy- unexplainable.   I intend to do this trip many times more.  Someday I want to put in at the highest possible point- at Snowshoe ski resort- and go to the lowest possible point- at the junction with the Monongahela. This will add maybe 23 miles to the trip.    Hmmm..  more good stuff.  I like that.

Later I checked the gages and found out the storm I slept through had gone up the Shavers Fork and made it rise 4 feet over what I had.  This surge of water followed me down the river- maybe two hours behind me the entire second day.  Kinda funny. I guess I would have lost a few hours of this beautiful trip if I had been going faster somehow.  Not sure how I feel about that. My Cheta had held up beautifully and I wasn't sore or tired the next day- so hey! It was good the way it was and I look forward to sharing this with friends in future years.   Maybe someday I'll enjoy doing it all in one bolt with no sleep.

You know... answering Nature's Call can be truly rewarding.    It keeps ME listening. How about you? Can you hear that?   Might wanna check it out.   Once again... I find myself REALLY impressed with my backyard. And Grateful- once again....

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