Stay tuned after the episode to hear our latest edition of And Then What.

We call her Marge, large and in charge.

Folks instinctively comment, no, that's a big boat.

When they first lay eyes on the 23-foot-long raft.

At the launch, Marge's tubes inflate to stand nearly chest high on my 5 foot 5 stature.

It takes three guides to lift her metal frame and cinch it to her bodacious body.

She simply dwarfs the other oarboats, gently bobbing in an eddy on the middle fork of the salmon river.

As one of the most revered free-flowing rivers in the U.S., this wild and scenic river

cuts through the Frank Church wilderness with such a steep gradient that the current in rapids seemingly never stop.

During the mining boom of the late 1800s, miners in this corridor

began building scows to transport equipment and lumber. These large wooden scows evolved into

inflatable rubber rafts, called sweetboats. Nowadays, river guides drive these massive rafts,

laden with camping gear, through the Middle Fork's

technical rapids on multi-day commercial river trips. With the weight of the gear and the river's

relentless current, Marge builds momentum, cruising or careening downstream. Driving her requires a guide to harness that momentum,

using two massive oars called sweep arms,

which extend over her bow and stern.

A large plank of wood called the blade floats atop the water's surface.

Blades are fastened to steel rods that teeter totter over metal saddles strapped to

Marge's bow and stern. Spray-painted rainbow stripes decorate the arms, but the wooden handles are left

bare, weathered smooth from the calloused hands of river guides. The handles hover at chest tight

over a platform in the middle of the raft, known as

...