Life is full of difficult decisions, but 11-year-old Caelan Devine Ryan knows not to turn down the opportunity to go on a river trip with his dad on the Rio Grande.

His father, Michael Ryan, is the chief river ranger for Big Bend National Park. He grew up in Marfa, about an hour and half north of the park. He has more than two decades of experience guiding and taking care of visitors on the river.

For Caelan, that means the canoe ride will be so smooth that he can do his homework in the 20-foot canoe while his dad and family friend, Jeff Renfrow, paddle. He can also ask the adults any questions he wants to help him get through the social studies and science packets he has brought along.

When the paddling is done for the day, Caelan puts away his books and gets to work building miniature bunkers in the sandy banks of the river.

The reason a lot of sandy banks are accessible now is because of the work people like Ryan and Renfrow are doing. They are burning and spraying the invasive giant cane that has taken over much of the banks on both sides of the river. Ryan does the work as part of his official capacity to protect visitors and resources. Renfrow works as a contractor to provide the manpower and equipment to get the work done. The work is funded through a host of grants, largely coming from the World Wildlife Foundation and Coca-Cola.

The section we just paddled from Rio Grande Village to the La Linda Bridge has had the most extensive work. Along the edges, you can see the burned tips of cane and slabs of sand that have slid off the bank as the network of roots has weakened and died.

The work is all part of a big experiment to see if removing the cane, which traps sediment, will help the river remove the 10- to 15-foot deep layers of mud and sand on the river banks.

“You just get bombarded with negative images of the border,” Renfrow said. “This is one of bright spots. … It’s not just this never ending story of doom.”

Specifically what Renfrow is talking about is the work being done by the Park Service in cooperation with Mexico to remove the cane and study the impacts. It is one of the few places the two countries are working together on ecological issues on the Rio Grande.

For Ryan, the bright spot is the river itself. After years of being the river ranger, he knows many of the folks who run the river. He has seen their kids grow up and then lead trips of their own.

He has seen monks from San Antonio and students from all parts of Texas take river trips. For the lower canyons, which we are running now, he gave us a boost of confidence. The rapids are not too difficult. Some of them are a bit “boney,” meaning they have a lot of shallow rocks. But those can be easily portaged or boats can be guided through with lines.

“A little common sense will get you through the lower canyons,” Ryan said.

The same is true for dealing with the border. Stopping in Mexico for safety reasons, like scouting rapids or bailing out a swamped boat, is acceptable and not considered willful entry.

And for his son, there is probably no better place for him to be. The sand banks on both sides of the river provide excellent construction material for all kinds of forts, bunkers, castles and anything else Caelan can dream up.

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