8:20) Hope O'Keeffe 07-OCT-97 12:40

On the high cliffs beside the falls, watching the kayakers swept downstream, rolled over, battered against rocks, muscling again and again through the swirling white. The park ranger explains to the gawkers that the idea is to catch a standing wave, balance on it long enough to inch upstream, circling one eddy after the next, eighteen inches forward for each foot back. Why? From the high rocks, we can only imagine: the stretch of muscle and wits. The adrenaline. Dancing with the river gods, and with the half dozen ghosts reborn in this gorge every year.

And, of course, feeling superior to the rock people, who will turn away, soon enough, to the tug of a small hand: "Can we go now?"

"Soon, soon."