[FRD]

Kevin, I don't think there was too much control to it, once pointed downstream you were at the mercy of the currents, perhaps small incremental changes in course could be made at that speed but I think that once you started you were pretty much committed.


The reason they always state that it was a, "mile a minute" is because the upper cascades were about a mile long from the "Upper Landing" near Cascade Locks Oregon to the "Lower Landing" near the present day Bonneville Oregon/Washington, they basically noted the time it took from the upper landing to the lower landing, the two "safe points" that the ship could dock in route.


All of the ships that transited the rapids did so before the turn of the 19th century when the Cascade Locks were built to circumnavigate the rapids, prior to the locks being built and the town renamed, it used to be known prior as, "Whiskey Flats" or simply, "The Cascades"


The Upper and Lower Landings were actually on the North bank of the river in what is now Washington State, the upper landing near Stevenson Washington and the Lower landing near the present day Bonneville Washington with the upper cascades rapids between the two.


There were actually three sets of rapids that comprised the Cascades, the lower cascades, middle cascades and the most treacherous, the upper cascades, all within a five mile stretch of river, primarily from Dodson Oregon to Cascade Locks Oregon.


This is also the five mile stretch that was portaged by the Oregon Pony locomotive, it was definitely a "frontier" in the settlement of the Oregon Territory.


So far the three ships that I have done have all, "shot the rapids", I anticipate that all six of this series will fit into that category.