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"Now there’s something I’d like to talk to you about at this particular moment, and that’s about the one thing that we won’t be able to do together unless we all become as one. And if we all become as one, then we can walk (raft) through it together…" Black Oak, Arkansas.
Guiding Gone Wrong
In a nut shell, it’s two words, "industry standard." You can chalk that one up to a sue happy populace, and capitalistic lawyers, who think it’s lucrative to spend all day trying to figure out new interpretations of "negligence."
In days prior, the two words were "guide discretion."
Personally, I’ve been a migrant wave farmer long enough to have heard everything at McKay Station from "where’s the seat belts?" to "Is it okay if we swim this one?".
I’ve had crews of 50-60 year old women, who have never rafted before, on the Upper Gulley who ask "what’s Box Canyon?" to crews of 25 years old, junked out on testosterone, South Boston guys on a bachelor party trip, who want to know if they can "surf the raft line" at Nesowadnehunk. Now which do you do as a "discretionary guide"?
According to "industry standard"; you do neither.
Thus, this whole "industry standard" idea IS Guiding Gone Wrong!
The man, the myth, the legend
Super Quad Bob
Bob Maller
Carrabassett Valley via Machias
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