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The INDEPENDENT, May 17, 2000
Tho
INDEPENDENT
Serving the upper Nehalem River valley. Published twice
monthly, on the first and third Wednesdays of each
month, by Public Opinion Laboratory Ltd., 725 Bridge
Street, Vernonia, OR 97064, as a free newspaper. Edi
tors and Publishers, Dirk & Noni Andersen. Phone/Fax:
(503) 429-9410.
Opinion
Trees are renewable
but not very quickly
It appears that trees are being cut down within the
City of Vernonia at a much faster rate than they are
being planted. Part of that perception may be because
of the size of the trees being removed. Generally, they
are older, big trees, so their absence is all too notice
able.
Fortunately, the city has planted a fairly large num
ber of trees on Bridge Street, as part of the
streetscape program, and around the new municipal
buildings. Some of the trees planted are replacements
for trees that had to be removed when the water dis
tribution system was rehabbed.
Unfortunately, the Vernonia Rural Fire Protection
District has no plans, at least at this time, to replace
the trees they have removed for a parking lot. The dis
trict needs more parking space, that isn’t arguable, but
large trees absorb more water and pollutants than lit
tle trees. They also give off more oxygen than small
trees, the same element that is regularly polluted by
emissions from the vehicles that will use the parking
lot. A plan for planting replacement trees in a location
that wouldn’t impair parking would be greatly appreci
ated.
In the overall scheme, however, the city must take
the lead, not just for municipal property, but for private
property, as well. Other cities have managed to devel
op workable programs that allow nuisance trees to be
removed without doing damage to either the appear
ance or the health of the community. True, it is still a
strange concept to many, but there is value in the nat
ural beauty of trees.
Vandalism is a cowardly
offense needing darkness
Vandalism is an offense committed against an entire
community. Destroying, defacing or stealing public
property harms everyone in the community by wasting
the taxpayers’ investment of money and time. When
public employees must use their time cleaning up af
ter vandalism, it hurts the people who are paying them
to do a different job - the taxpayers.
There is a standing reward offered by the Vernonia
Chamber of Commerce and Vernonia Pride for infor
mation leading to the conviction of vandals. This re
ward has worked more than once and every time the
money has been spent, the two organizations replace
it. That will continue, because vandalism will not be
accepted here as harmless mischief.
— NOTICE —
The INDEPENDENT is published on the first and
third Wednesdays of each month. There are five
Wednesdays in May, so there will three weeks be
tween this issue and the first issue in June.
Deadlines for the June 7 issue will be June 2, for
both news items and display advertising, and June 5
for classified ads.
IFUL
Iko Says. . .
By Dale Webb, member
Izaak Walton League, Nehalem
Valley Chapter
The morning dawned with
the clouds pouring their con
tents to earth. “Looks kind of
wet,” I muttered to myself as I
picked up the phone to call
Troy Horton, my kayaking part
ner. We soon decided that wet
is a relative term when you’re
talking about the sport of
kayaking, and we would go re
gardless of the weather.
Meeting at 1:30 in the after
noon, we were surprised by
bright sunlight that greeted us
at our put-in location. Troy said
he had found a better place to
put-in than at the bridge that
crosses the Nehalem River just
before the Jewell junction with
highway 202. Soon we were
sliding our kayaks into Fish-
hawk Creek just above its junc
tion with Beneke Creek. These
are both small creeks at this
time of year, but joined togeth
er they had enough water to
propel us swiftly along. We
thoroughly enjoyed the small
rapids and wood obstacles as
we traveled towards the mouth
of the river. I did have one mo
ment while maneuvering my
14+ foot sea kayak around an
upturned root wad. Having a
longer boat in such a creek can
limit your ability to turn, and I
thought I was going to plow into
the root wad until the boat final
ly swung its bow around just
enough to avoid a head-on col
lision, though I had to grab the
root wad to prevent a hit to my
ribs. I easily shoved my boat
around the obstacle and was
again on my way. A kayaker
can get seriously hurt in situa
tions like this and they should
be avoided in higher flow situa
tions.
Soon, we burst into the Ne
halem river and settled into our
paced paddling strokes for long
flat water. Troy and I both sa
vored the excitement of the
small creek environment as we
felt the more powerful Nehalem
under our boats. Having looked
at my river map before this trip,
I had noted a named rapids,
Grand Rapids, and I felt a little
concern as to what this un
known rapids had in store for
us. On our last trip in the river
section above this one, we ex
perienced the power of the riv
er when we both took dunkings
while playing on the only good
rapids of the trip. We both lost
our kayaks into a strainer (low
tree hanging over the river that
grabs boats or kayakers) which
took us considerable time and
effort to free them. We remem
bered the experience and knew
this seemingly tame river had a
few tricks up its sleeve. The
dunking experience was Troy’s
first and I could see that he was
relieved that the experience
was in some small ways, al
most fun.
The sound of rushing water
was soon heard from down riv
er and I thought we had found
Grand Rapids. We flew down
into the wide rapids and over a
small diagonal drop, then
swung into a side eddy and
beached our kayaks. The sun
was shining so warmly that we
had to shed some thermal tops.
Gliding back into the river, we
paddled back up under the di
agonal drop and played. Troy
decided to see what happened
when he got parallel to the
falling water: I could see what
was coming, but was amazed
when he saved his kayak from
flipping over when he put his
hand down into the water and
pushed back upright off the
ledge. Troy’s eyes were a bit
wider when I looked at him! We
turned downstream and silently
glided over the water as ducks
flushed out in front of us from
the sides of the river. Salmon
smolts dotted the water’s sur
face like a light shower of rain
as we continued through the
slack water.
Suddenly the deep water
was replaced by an object fly
ing up at us from the depths. It
was the river bottom, and it was
almost spooky to see the rock
formations shoot up at the sur
face as we descended the riv
er. Once again, as we ap
proached a curve in the river,
we could hear rushing water.
Troy and I both had started to
recognize
that most good
rapids seem to start at a curve.
As we rounded the corner, we
realized we had found the
Grand Rapids. The river chan
nel was braided with many dif
ferent routes and we tried to
pick the most challenging one.
The water was shallow and we
bumped off rocks as we ran the
rapids, then tucked into eddies
behind rocks to scout the next
rapids below us. The last de
scent was all white water, with
a boulder in the middle, yet our
kayaks easily handled the wa
ter as it crashed over our bows
and onto our paddle jackets.
We spent some moments play
ing in the tricky currents behind
the boulder, then continued
down the now faster flowing riv
er. Small riffles and rapids be
came more constant and we
played on a few standing
waves as we continued to learn
what we could do in these plas
tic boats.
Eventually we spotted a sec
tion in the river that we had
scouted from the road when
shuttling our pickup rig down
stream. The river was divided
into three channels by an old
lava formation that had formed
two islands. We beached our
kayaks and stretched our legs
while scouting the small rapids
next to the highway. When we
turned, I noticed Troy’s kayak
Please see page 10