[Seahawk]

I remember it like it was yesterday:

The first time I ran the Stanislaus River as a guide was in 1976. I was 19. This was pre-New Melones Dam and the last mile of the Stani in those days was a nude park that had business on both banks of the river. The river was flat in this last stretch but was swift.

Since I was a new guide, I was in the last raft before the baggage boat...we rounded a sweeper and there, on a large rock splitting the river was absolutely the most beautiful woman I had every seen, wonderfully nude and so completely confident in herself it was hard to look away: so I didn't.

We finished saying good-bye to the customers, packed our trucks and my buddy Tim and I, who saw the same vision I did, asked the Head Boatman if we could stay awhile and drive our truck back to Sacramento later in the day. Since it was Sunday and we didn't have to pack for the next trip until Monday afternoon, he agreed.

Off we went in search for the Lady of the Rock.

It was late afternoon so we were clothed salmon swimming up a stream of nude effulgence, varied in shape and size and beauty, like bare snow flakes, no two alike, all walking back to their cars.

I noticed that there was every kind of girl: "there was black ones, round ones, big ones, crazy ones"...but no sight of the vision.

I ran that river for the next three years, came to love the nude park but never saw the woman again.

I did learn that nudity and beauty can be synonymous if you're willing to handicap.