Origin of Overland Canoe

Regarding his introduction to his world of adventure Bryce writes, “My first idea for a major adventure came following graduation from high school after completing an 11-day backpack in the southern Sierra.  I recall sitting around a campfire with my cousin Tom Crain and my neighborhood friend and schoolmate, Ron Ramus, and visiting with an older couple who were trailer camping.  Listening to their tales of fishing and boating on the Madison River in southern Montana and how one could take the river all the way to New Orleans got me to thinking.  Returning home I looked it all up on a map with Ron.  We noticed that with just a little bit more of an undertaking, we could actually connect from the West Coast to the Upper Missouri and thence to New Orleans.  This was exciting.  But then we noticed further that by connecting rivers we could travel all the way across the country almost totally by water. 

 We read up on the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1804-1806 and decided that if their troupe could trek all the way from Saint Louis, Missouri, to the west coast and back, then surely considering all the advantages of the day that we had we could repeat their feat eastward, and then some.  That summer of 1964 we made our plans to canoe and backpack across the U.S. We planned the actual journey, however, for 1972 which was when we figured we would be through with college and the military draft.  Over the years Ron and I talked about the adventure; no one believed we would do it, but in 1972 we were on our way just as we had planned. 

Following that first adventure across the U.S., I continued to plan other undertakings with a desire to experience and document what it was like to travel long distances through the remaining wild places of North America.“