Dawn was generous enough to let me post some of the shots she got on the Salmon while my telephone/camera was scuba diving. And this amazing shot from the Grande Ronde. Beauty. We put in on the Salmon the next day at Spring Creek, well above the “normal people.” We [...]

In early June Dawn and I took our doryaks north. RJ joined us with his doryak in Nevada and we headed for the Snake River basin. We launched on the Wallowa and headed down toward the Grande Ronde. Fast and beautiful. A sheltered camp for the storm. A groovy groover [...]

Shaman's Gallery's 2-year clean streak ended in April with a bang. So our casual time-out between river trips got a lot less casual. Roy did much of the repair while I was on the river, and I finished her off. Dawn and I did a photo shoot trip for Canyon [...]

Back in the boatshop we turned things up to eleven. Bears Ears needed a fair amount of work before going to her new owner, but first she needed a good drying out. So up the ceiling with her while we did last details on the Doryak triplets. Joe came back [...]

I’ve roamed and I’ve rambled And I followed my footsteps To the sparkling sands Of her diamond deserts… Woody Guthrie This Land was Made for You and Me Brin picked a name for the boat and it's a fine one. Diamond Desert. He had to go back to work, poor [...]

The doryaks are taking a short vacation while we bang out an all new boat. It's basically a Briggs Grand Canyon Dory, but about a foot-and-a-half shorter and nearly a foot wider. Why? Well, over the past few decades so many gravity sports have gone shorter and wider: Skis, surfboards, [...]

Here it is mid-February and I haven't gotten caught up on shop doings in nearly two months. Bad blog boy. Apologies. Okay, here we are preparing to put the bottom on the doryak triplets. We came up with this process a couple years ago. The traditional wooden inner chine is [...]

Each year a gang of eccentric old dory boatmen, myself included, try to orchestrate an eccentric river trip for our eccentric clientele. We look for a classic river trip, then add several more days and upstream or downstream miles. This year we are planning an extensive trip in the upper [...]