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Interesting....
I grew up on a farm in Eastern Washington.  Hunting season would bring throngs of armed out-of-towners who thought because they enjoyed hunting, they were entitled to march around wherever they wanted without permission and without regard to the damage they were causing.  The fact they were tearing up the crops (a.k.a. my family's paycheck) was irrelevant to them.. because they were recreating!!  Many were less respectful leaving trash vehicle damage.

When my father would confront them (the folks from the "city" were usually the problem), he would usually ask if they thought it would be OK for us to come drive up on their lawn in Seattle, have a picnic in their yard and leave the trash... maybe take a dump on the porch?

On the other hand, I don't remember him ever saying "no" to someone who showed the courtesy of stopping to ask and checking where they could go without causing a problem before they assumed it was fine to use his land.

Point is, as others have said, a little human courtesy goes a long way.  Ask first if you can, explain what you are doing, and try to abide by the landowner's wishes.  If you unexpectedly have to trespass to portage and get caught, don't be an a-hole.  Explain the situation and apologize.

Be proactive by picking up some trash so that landowners don't see kayakers as part of the problem.  Maybe you are not the problem, but I’m sure between the tweakers, the poachers, the party and trash crowd, etc… most landowners are are fed up with the ones that are.

The mess at some of the public assess sites is sad.  Even if it’s not private land, it really doesn’t hurt to stay on the good side of the locals.  It might just protect the next “sunset falls”.

I like your conversations JP!  You are on eof the few who isn't afraid to say what you mean!

Ive had my land tresspassed upon to when I was a kid.  My land did not border a popular river stretch or a golf course but we had some game that people thought they could come after.

One time the neighbor who always posted his land was caught on our farmer friend's land hunting.  He would post his own land and not give anyone permission to hunt there and then he'd hunt with no permission on the farmer's land.

I understand that there are jerks from every corner of the world.  My point I was trying to make that got glossed over is the attitude of "suck it up and run it".  I want to boat with people who support me whether I'm up for a drop or not.  I hate boating with people who think stepping up your game needs to be getting trashed.  Fish is a perfect example of of the people's I like to boat with.  He pushes me to up my game but if I'm not up for something he's cool with that too.  Example:  Big Brother.  I chickened out with him on our first run down the Truss but he didn't try to make me feel like a pussy for it. 

This guy was implying that you're being a wimp if your not running the Final 5.  Any number of circumstances could force the BEST kayakers to get to that drop and want to portage.  If they feel they can't make a quick portage because they might be imposing on someone's land and they run the said drop and get hurt then who's to blame?  No one I guess but you see the whole situation could have been avoided had the LAND OWNER realized that there are good and asshole kayakers just like anywhere with any group (ie golfers) and that in this case letting one bad guy ruin it for the rest of em could result in someone's getting hurt bad.   Again, the landowner knows that he lives near a dangerous drop and should expect certain things. 

Maybe an olive branch could be extended by the landowner beings that he should expect kayakers trying to portage using his land while the kayakers shouldn't expect that they will be tresspassing when they are doing so just to portage a dangerous drop.

IN ANY CASE IT IS ALWAYS OK TO PORTAGE A DROP THAT YOU ARE NOT READY TO RUN EVEN IF YOU HAVE TO TRESSPASS...JUST TRY TO BE A GOOD KAYAKER WHEN YOU DO IT!  MAYBE YOU'LL MEET A GOOD LAND OWNER WHO WON'T MIND THAT YOU MIGHT HAVE JUST AVOIDED A CATASTROPHE!!


I'm sorry that my view on this is warped having seen a murder over property lines and rights next to a river......