Kate Wollney Interview, Oregon

July 14, 2010.

Our area manager in southern Oregon, Kate Wollney, also known as, ‘Queen of the Rogue,’ sits down with us to answer a few questions about herself and why she’s chosen to work for O.A.R.S. Over the past 18 years, Wollney has also guided in California, the Grand Canyon and Idaho. She is from Eugene, Oregon but currently resides in Driggs, Idaho during the winter months. Her favorite food is flourless chocolate cake, she loves to ski and enjoys listening to rapids more than any other sound or musical beat. Oh, and her fleece skirts are a must-have for any cold-weather river rat!

1. How long have you been a river guide?

I have been river guiding for 18 seasons and most of it’s been here on the Rogue, but at the beginning of my career I came up with a list of rivers I’d like to do and I’m happy to say that I have most of them crossed off so I’m lucky to have been a lot of other places as well as here on the Rogue.

2. Describe your passion for rafting?

There are a lot of things that are easy to love about rafting, many of those have to do with balance. There’s many aspects that include spirituality, physical activity, communication and connection with other people. I love rafting because it has all of those things, and the whitewater’s pretty fun too.

3. What makes the Rogue so special?

The Rogue really has it all, the Rogue is a great balance of wildlife and beautiful scenery, waterfalls, fun whitewater, easy access – it’s a great place to be.

4. What do you bring to the rafting experience for O.A.R.S. travelers?

I’d have to say I’m pretty well-known for painting toenails [see my plaid on my toenails?] What we’ll do is, often times on our 5-day trips we’ll have a layover day and part of that is swimming and going down the Rogue’s natural water-slide, but also we’ll often sit down and do some artistic toenails which is a lot of fun, especially with kids.

5. What is your most memorable guiding experience?

I think my most memorable guiding experience was this one time on the Lower Salmon where I made a series of really bad decisions in a row. Fortunately no one got hurt in any way, shape or form and we only lost a little bit of equipment. We had decided to swim a rapid from camp, and as it turned out, some of the people swimming didn’t make it all the way to shore so they swam further downstream. So we decided that we’d go on down stream with the boat to get them and then get the boat back upstream. When we tried to Z-drag the boat back upstream, and in the process the boat itself submerged under the water like a whale diving, and since we had been at camp we didn’t have a lot of things strapped in, so a bunch of things got washed down stream including the oars so then we couldn’t even row it. However, the next day and a series of days in the future, all of the things we lost – except for a couple – we then found them again. It was really an important learning lesson about slowing down and making good decisions in the first place instead of panicking and making decisions too quickly.

6. What’s your favorite meal to prepare/serve on the river?

The night we do chicken enchilada pie, the reason is we serve it with jicama and fresh lime squeezed on top, and a lot of people don’t know what jicama is, so this conversation ensues about what does jicama taste like? And it’s pretty funny because instead of each person saying, ‘Oh, I don’t know what jicama taste like, I think I’ll try one,’ they’re like, ‘Well, what is it, what does it taste like?’ So then people are like, ‘Well it’s kind of like an apple, mixed with a potato, and they talk about it and talk about it until someone finally says, ‘Why don’t you try one?’ So that part’s pretty fun and the enchilada pie itself is layering with enchilada ingredients like: chicken, veggies, and the top is a layer of cornbread with melted cheese and people are like, ‘Wow!’ when it comes out of the Dutch oven.

7. What’s the longest river trip you’ve ever been on and where?

My longest trips are tied. I’ve done a 17-day long Grand Canyon trip with O.A.R.S. and it was fabulous, I’ve been on a few of those. The other one was also 17-days and it was in Alaska (Source to Sea) where we started on the Upper Nizina River, floated down until it met with the Chitina, then floated down that until it met with the Copper, and then until it met with the ocean.

8. If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would it be and why?

Well if you had asked me that question ten years ago, the answer would have been Chile to do the Futaleufu, but I went there and in fact that’s how I got connected with O.A.R.S. and met some O.A.R.S.’ guides while I was there which led to my job here at O.A.R.S., but now I think it’s a safari in Africa because I’d really love to see those animals.

9. What’s made you stick with O.A.R.S.? How does it differ from other companies?

I just really like that there are so many places to go with O.A.R.S., for each of us we work in a specific area, but there are opportunities to go other places too so you can see a lot of different rivers. I chose to work for O.A.R.S. because of the quality of their trips. At O.A.R.S. the focus and money spending is on the things that I think matter so if you go to the O.A.R.S. world headquarters you won’t find fancy leather couches and glossy offices, instead, all the money that gets spent in investment is spend on things that happen on the river and on our trips, and I think that’s important. So it’s really high-quality rafts, and there’s a lot of safety focus, focusing on things that work, safe equipment, safe vehicles, and all of those things make a very professional environment and a trip that I feel like I can be proud of be a part of.

10. We understand you have a knack for sewing, what types of items are you known to create with your talent?

I’ve sewn a lot of outdoor equipment and I have a small business selling fleece skirts, which I made for myself first because I just wanted to stay warm. This t-shirt, this tank top, that I’m modeling [shows front and back], was two O.A.R.S. t-shirts, a brown one and a white one, that I turned into a tank top. I’m very happy with it. And I’ve sewn my rain fly for my tent, I’ve sewn the big yellow rain tarp that we use over the guest seating area on trips, I’ve recovered my couches, I do a lot of sewing, I like it a lot.

Below is a video version of the interview: