by Shelton Steele

A scorching hot August afternoon can only be remedied in one way: a river trip. While most boaters tend to think of this salvation in the form of a sprayskirt, life jacket, helmet, paddle, and boat of choice, there are people in our area who consider much more of a minimalist approach.

Boaters typically seek the refreshing sensation of plunging off a drop and the momentary bliss of the river engulfing them. Skinny-dippers reward themselves with the same feeling, dropping clothes on the rocks and diving in for their own river plunge. Both parties, boaters and skinny dippers, revel in the remote river locale, where solitude is the reward for the adventuresome. But what happens when these two worlds collide? Shock, surprise and excitement are for certain, but what of the aftermath? Personal experience, urban legend, and even Native American folklore have been gathered in an attempt to explore the shock waves of the nudist/boater collision.

In the depths of our great country’s history, native tribes lived in and around water due to the nourishment it provided. These people became the first river navigators in our history. These same rivers we now use recreationally were once the life lines of Native American tribes.

There is a tale not told in the history books of one brave young Cherokee who set out on the mighty Tuckaseegee river to resettle his people. He lost track of the days, as his travels downstream took him further than any of his people had ever ventured. One long blistering afternoon the young brave turned a corner in the river and laid his eyes on a sight unlike anything he had witnessed in his travels. There on the banks of the Tuckaseegee was a naked woman soaking in the afternoon sun. The brave shut his eyes and opened them again, but the sight of the naked woman only burned brighter. Paralyzed in awe, his canoe was drifting directly towards the riverbank. In fact the closer the brave got to the woman, the more her figure seemed to burn his eyes. When his canoe touched the bank. there was only a small pile of ashes and a paddle where the brave had once knelt.

Having spent my formative summers in a Western N.C. outdoor camp laden with such lore, I never took these tales lightly. I went on countless river trips over the years, and as a youth coming of age, I always kept my eyes peeled for the chance of a glimpse of a naked woman. I can recall one trip in particular somewhere on Wolf Creek Lake, when we came around a bend in the lake to find half of our group giggling and a group of women hurryingly packing their bags. Confused and disappointed, I quickly realized what I had missed. Later that night around the campfire, I listened in heartache as the other campers described the marvel they had witnessed. I felt as though a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity had just washed by me.

Fast forward ten years, and I still get on the water as often as possible in search of those river sirens. Each river trip is a new opportunity to pursue my dream. One fateful afternoon deep in the heart of the Green River Narrows I discovered my destiny. Having just slipped through the constricting noose of the Gorilla, I felt as though nothing on this Earth could alter the euphoria I felt. However, as I popped up at the bottom of the next rapid the glistening sight of a naked river goddess changed my life. Much like the Cherokee brave, I drifted, speechless, towards the mythical gorge I had only seen in my dreams. My friend pulled me back to reality as he rhetorically asked if that was a naked woman we were seeing. I mumbled something in his general direction, unable to tear my eyes away from the radiating beauty before me. But then she said ‘hello,’ and suddenly my dream crashed head on with reality. My blissful ignorance was forever lost. Frightened like schoolboys, we took big strokes and dropped off the next rapid.

The rest of that woeful summer afternoon was something like being on the losing end of a demolition derby, as I got my ass kicked all the way down the river. My friend and I have not been paddling together since, and we vowed never to speak of that moment again. The danger of such confrontations is a reality, so prepare yourself before you get on the river because you never know when your day will come.

Shelton Steele can be reached at Shelton_Steele@hotmail.com.