Got asked some questions about hiking Hells Canyon the other day, so let’s do a quick round of Frequently and Hardly-Ever Asked Questions about Hells Canyon. First question: Is there a time when rattlesnakes and poison ivy aren’t a problem? Yes. Just buy the lower legs from a suit of armor and hike in those. That will solve your snake worries.

Poison ivy is more complicated. I’m told it’s a native plant so we can’t spray it on public land. Now, I’m no botanist, but I do know people who swear global warming is fake and they say right up front they’re not scientists — so clearly you don’t need science training to know what you’re talking about. Or talk, anyway. Now that we’ve established my credentials of having an opinion, can we please just spray trails and campgrounds to knock back the poison ivy? I mean, c’mon. There’s a formerly sweet campsite in the upper canyon I watched get overtaken by poison ivy to the point you can’t go ashore there unless you have a retardant plane standing by to drop a load of calamine lotion. I appreciate the notion of protecting native plants but as long as we’re spraying other plants we’ll never entirely be rid of, let’s squirt some PI. Leaves of three, leave us be.

The other question this hiker asked was how to get across the river from Oregon to Idaho. Easy. Drive to Hells Canyon Dam and start there if you want to be on the Idaho side. Except that wasn’t really the question. Most people hike the canyon up or down one side or the other. This brilliant feller is entertaining a bisect maneuver by going from Hat Point on our side, down to and across the Snake, then up the other side to the summit of He Devil over in Idaho. For those not familiar, Hat Point and He Devil are the high points where they stretched the tape measure from to figure out Hells Canyon is North America’s deepest river gorge. What a hiking sojourn that would be. I expect the misery level would be high and if you pulled it off there’s the added risk of ending up in an arm cast from getting so many high fives.

So we need to get this hiker across the Snake. Bear Grylls did a Man vs. Wild TV episode in Hells Canyon where he crossed the Snake River using nothing but an inflated dry bag and ego, a jet boat right next to him with a camera crew and support staff and possibly a miniature submarine holding him up from underwater. That was the only episode I’ve seen of the program but I thought it was an excellent source of terrible ideas. Like pole vaulting down a steep scree field. I assume that portion of the show was sponsored by Life Flight and the broken ankle surgeons of America.

I happen to know this local hiker we’re talking about does not have a TV crew to get him across. For my plan all he needs is a Sharpie marker. I am 109% sure if you take a Sharpie and write IDAHO in big block letters on your sleeping pad to make a hitchhiking sign and you’re standing on the Oregon bank with your backpack where a boat can get in, somebody is going to ferry you across in a jetboat or a raft. Normally I wouldn’t be so confident in human kindness, but some boater is going to see what you’re up to and help a guy out. If I’m wrong just hike back out, give me a call and I’ll help you get a TV show so you can do it Bear Grylls-style.

Jon Rombach is a local columnist and wilderness hitchhiking advisor for the Chieftain.