Hells Canyon

The Geiser Grand is a 30-minute drive from the Anthony Lakes ski area to the north and about 84 miles west of the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area, which is where we spent the day boating on the Snake River before heading to the Geiser.

When we chatted in late February, she’d come straight from rehearsal for “The Bed Trick” at Seattle Shakespeare Company and was headed to the airport, hustling to the opening night of her horror-comedy “Hells Canyon” at Theater Mu in Minneapolis.

The construction of dams on the Snake, beginning with Swan Falls in 1901 and continuing with the Hells Canyon Complex in the 1950s and the Lower Snake dams in the 1960s and 1970s, eliminated or severely degraded 530 miles or 80% of the historical habitat for Chinook in the river.

The debate frustrates Hauser, who says there’s never been serious talk about dismantling the Hells Canyon dams so harmful to the tribes he represents.

As many as 1.7 million chinook salmon and steelhead once returned from the Pacific each year to spawn upstream of where Hells Canyon now interrupts the Snake.