"Brothers on the Bashkaus" by Eugene Buchanan

Join Eugene Buchanan, former publisher and editor-in-chief of Paddler magazine and author of Comrades on the Colca, as he wins the first-ever river-oriented Shipton-Tilman Grant from W.L. Gore & Assoc.'s only to end up on a hair-raising 28-day decent of the Bashkaus, one of the hardest rivers in all Siberia. Sidetracked by Latvia's Team Konkas, they paddle rafts made from germ warfare suits, don lifejackets made from soccer balls and wine bladders, trade vodka to gun-toting horseman for freshly butchered sheep, and language and cultural barriers aside to bond as brothers in one of paddling literature's wildest rides.