At first just once, but then again and again. The boat is lifted out of the water and skates for several hundred meters like a human-powered hydrofoil. This is the Zen-like condition for which all rowers strive. It's very hard to describe to someone who hasn't rowed before, but if it looks like we're moving gracefully and without any effort, then we're doing what we're supposed to. That's when we're working our hardest and moving together as a team.
Practice ends as the moon rises above the canyon's rim.
Rowing back to the dock, located at Wawawai Landing, which is upstream of Lower Granite Dam and about 20 miles southwest of Pullman, Snook says she often finds herself taken aback by her physical surroundings. It is unique to train on a clean, calm river alongside of salmon, hawks, coyotes and in extremely rare cases, a real-live mountain lion whose name is not Butch. Especially considering that most established rowing programs compete in smog-choked urban waterways like the Montlake Cut and Hudson River or in mercurial tidewaters like the Chesapeake and San Diego bays. It's just astounding sometimes. The pastoral setting of the Cougars' competition and practice site is just one of many unconventional facts about the WSU rowing team.