The All-Outdoors Whitewater Rafting California River Blog

I just learned about a Congressional bill that has been introduced to protect 17,000 acres of riparian environment along the Sacramento River near Redding.  The area includes Salmon fisheries, Blue Oak trees, and many species of birds including the Bald Eagle (hey–if you can’t find space in this great country for our national bird what have things come to?!).  Two creeks–Battle and Paynes–that flow into this area of the Sacramento River are up for possible “Wild and Scenic Status,” and would be included in the protected area.  California already has several designated “Wild and Scenic” status rivers, and if you’ve ever rafted the Tuolumne or Merced River  canyons you know how wonderful it is to have these special areas set aside for both nature and recreation.

(Above:  A quiet morning on the Tuolumne River  gives us a chance to relax and hang out with friends in a protected nature area……)   (more…)

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Scott Armstrong is doing a radio interview with local radio station KFOK 95.1 FM on March 8th at 9pm. Along with other guests he’ll be discussing topics like how recreational industries like whitewater rafting companies in California can “go green.” What “going green” actually means can be difficult to assess–for us, it means combining a respect for the planet, finite resources, and wilderness with an ethical and sustainable business model. Or goal is to balance our bottom line with a strong commitment to both our community and nature–we depend on both equally in order to stay in business.

All-Outdoors whitewater rafting has a long history of making efforts to conserve natural resources and protect wilderess. This long-standing tradition was started by our founder, George Armstrong, who pioneered conservation efforts in the Bay Area when he was a high school teacher in the 1960s and 70s. Scott will talk about the standard his father set and his long-lasting legacy on the 8th.

If these issues interest you, tune in to our local community radio station KFOK 95.1 FM on March 8th and hear AO owner Scott A’s take on balancing these issues on California’s many whitewater river canyons.

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After a brief hiatus, river conservation and advocate group Friends of the River (FOR) is bringing back the California Rivers Festival.

This FREE event is great way to contact other whitewater enthusiasts, meet the Pros, swap gear, and learn about what’s going on in the California whitewater scene in 2008.  Highlights of the event include a swap meet for gear, films and seminars, a raffle and silent auction and a BBQ dinner and live entertainment at the end of the day.

The California Rivers Festival is March 15, 2008.  Drop off for the gear swap meet starts at 8:00 am and the raffle/auction starts at 5pm.  Come for as much or as little as you like!

Location: Waldorf School. 3750 Bannister Road, Fair (more…)

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President Bush just signed a budget proposal that included a seven million dollar study of the possible removal of O’Shaughnessy Dam and restoration of Hetch Hetchy Valley, through which used to flow the headwaters of the Toulumne River. Although the proposal may seem a bit inconsistent with some of Bush’s prior policies, it is a welcome and incredibly significant development in environmental politics. The restoration of Hetch Hetchy Valley would be the first major federal testament to the fact that perhaps some of the many dams that were built across the West were in fact a bit superfluous and are now dispensable. It would symbolize a shift in thinking, a drive towards finding alternatives and thinking more about conservation rather than finding new ways to keep taking more and more from our natural environment. It would be a powerful precedent and reference point for future conservation battles over other rivers, including the one currently ongoing over the American River and Auburn Dam. Whatever it is that is motivating our president towards this particular environmental cause, I’m all for it. Let’s hope our Congress agrees! For more details and perhaps a bit less opinion, check out this article from the Union Democrat:

Bush budget encourages Restore Hetch Hetchy group

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Last year, Doolittle decided to use (ahem…waste..ahem) 1 billion taxpayer dollars for yet another study on the proposed Auburn Dam. A dam which, if built, would drown miles of the Middle and North Forks of the American River. And for the purpose of what? Water rights that don’t exist? Power that can be achieved at a much lower cost? And of course, the supposedly needed extra flood protection which isn’t worth a darn without improvements to Folsom first anyway, and which would protect against an amount of water not likely to ever be produced by the American River (For more background information please read previous posts about the Auburn Dam, or visit www.auburndamwatch.org.) For those of us who have seen through all this faulty reasoning for some time now and have viewed the proposal as both a waste of money and a waste of two invaluable river canyons, the results of Doolittle’s cost study are sweet redemption. The dam has been estimated to cost between six and ten times the original amount that is often cited by dam supporters, ringing in at an outrageous 6 to 10 billion dollars. As a mature and fiscally responsible citizen, a fan of sensical government planning and a steward of California’s beautiful river canyons, I have only this to say about the estimates: “Naa na na naa na!” Doolittle and the Auburn Dam Authority will be hard-pressed to prove that the benefits from such a dam could ever outweigh such high costs. And he was the one to order the study in the first place! It’s beautiful really.

To read the results for yourself, download the study from this website:
http://www.usbr.gov/mp/ccao/docs/auburn_rpt/index.html.

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A few posts ago, I introduced a guide, Brooke Johnson, who spent the last seven months raising money for a non profit organization in Chile called Project Futa. The purpose of Project Futa is to try and inspire local Chileans to fight for the protection of the Futaleufu River, against a possible dam that would drown the valley for hydroelectric power. How to accomplish this? Simple- introduce locals to the river.

Before Project Futa, it was often difficult for locals to afford access to the more advanced and remote stretches of the Futaleufu, due to equipment costs, training and shuttles. And without really being exposed to the beauty and magic of the river canyon, many locals were unaware of the potential for loss if a dam were to be built. Enter Aren Rane, an American kayaker who fell in love with the Futaleufu. He saw this indifference and distance from the river within the local population, and decided to become their ambassador. He set up a free kayak school for any local kid that wanted to learn. Now, his earlier students have started guiding commercial trips for larger companies, and many are safety kayaking as well. More importantly, they have learned about the Futaleufu and are inspired to protect it. It is a beautiful plan really. But sometimes it is hard to keep funding a free school…
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Let me introduce myself. My name is Brooke and I have been working as a guide for All-Outdoors for two years. I have bright red hair, love to laugh and am always putting on sunscreen. Now that the All-Outdoors California rafting season is over, what is there to do? Go rafting, of course.

As some of you know, All-Outdoors offers a river trip deep in the heart of Patagonia on the Futaleufu River. The Futaleufu, meaning “big river” in ancient Andean, is nestled in the Andes running from Los Alerces National Park to the Chilean coastal town of Chaiten. Surrounded by snowcapped peaks and pristine wilderness, the aquamarine waters of the Rio Futaleufu are home to what many consider the greatest whitewater on earth.

Like the Middle Fork of the American, the Futaleufu is in danger of being dammed. In 1999, Endesa, an Argentine enterprise, launched a 30 billion dollar project to dam a handful of Patagonian rivers, the Rio Futaleufu among them. If this dam is built, the face of the Futaleufu Valley will change forever. Farmlands, lodges, rivers and streams will be underwater and the people, plants and animals of the Valley will loose the land they have lived on for generation. The hydroelectric power generated from this dam will be exported to Argentina and the residents of Futaleufu will never see the profits.

In an effort to fight against this dam proposal and get locals involved, Project FUTA was created by Aren and Sarah Rane as a grassroots effort promoting local involvement in the river economy. (more…)

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The Auburn Dam has officially been resurrected from the dead. The last post I wrote warned that proponents of the dam were gaining momentum in D.C…well now they’re off and running. [For some background information, read some of these recent blogs about the Auburn Dam.]

David Whitney, of the Sacramento Bee, reported on Friday that “a House hearing Thursday on protecting the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta from catastrophic levee failures turned into a mini-rally for constructing an Auburn dam on the American River.” [Click here for the full article.]
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As a result of increased Folsom Dam costs and recent flood fears ignited by Hurricane Katrina, congressional supporters of an Auburn Dam have recently been successful in obtaining funding and powerful allies on Capitol Hill that lend momentum to a renewed fight for Auburn Dam’s construction. As a result, the dam has once again become a real possibility, and those of us who recognize its faults (literally and figuratively) need to start making some serious efforts to fight back…

At this point in time last year, most people had accepted that Auburn Dam was a dead idea. The tunnel diverting the American River away from the orginal damsite was finally scheduled to be re-filled as of 2007, and the Placer County Water Agency began construction on a pumping facility designed to extract water from the river’s natural channel. Moreover, Sacramento had obtained 200 million dollars in Federal funding for much-needed Folsom Dam improvements and levee repairs for the purpose of flood control.

But then two things happened.

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An article in the Sacramento Bee last Sunday reported that a proposed Auburn Dam on the American River “could be an expensive mistake.” This article couldn’t have come at a better time, considering all the renewed momentum that dam proponents gained from fears sparked by New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina, and Rep. John Doolittle’s recent attachment to an energy and water appropriations bill calling for a new 1 million dollar dam study. (See earlier post about Katrina Drawing Ill-Founded Support For the Auburn Dam.)

The Bee article, titled ‘Tempting Fate: A Torrent of Doubts,’ pointed out some very important myths and inherent inefficiencies in the dam’s location and design with regards to its supposed purpose as a multiuse dam. Among these are the limited amount of water the dam would have available to sell, the high price that this water would cost, the structure’s dangerous location on a fault line, and the liklihood that it would decrease, rather than increase, area recreational usage.

If all of this is true, then why is the Auburn Dam still on the table? And why do Doolittle and other dam proponents still have such a large base of support? (more…)

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