T h e R a n g e L i f e

Apres Robe Race Festivites

2011-05-05T21:09:00.004-07:00

Batch Two. Beer Drinkin' and Award Announcin'

Whatcha all doin' this weekend?

Hey, who shrunk Rado?

The Robe Gnome looking for his next home.

A previous Robe winner and a previous Robe loser.

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. When you find a deck under a bridge, throw a deck party.

The party goers.

The pooches - Rado.

Jackson

Luna

Canadians

Bellinghamsters

Time for the awards

The envelope, please.

The handing over of the robes.

Tao's stand in for the podium.

Gnome headed north.

Um .... the ... yeah. Be sure you don't miss the zany antics next year.

Until then ....

Robe Race Imagery

2011-05-03T20:48:00.004-07:00

Thanks Todd for another great race day on The Robe. Thanks everyone for showing up, twas good to see and meet many of you (some of whom I haven't seen since last Robe Race). Hope to see you again before Robe Race '12.

I don't have much else to add, but here's batch one of my photos. Hope you enjoy.

Calling all boaters. A good turnout for Robe Race '11.

The three B's: Beer, Blondes, and Brock.

Racer's Meeting.

The coveted Robe.

The possibly more coveted Leif ... er, Gnome.

Time for some racing. Brian Fletcher - Hole in the Wall.

The Robe Race: Lost in the Rapids, Won in the flats. AJ and BF.

Repeat after me: Lost in the Rapids, Won in the flats. Rob and Ben cranking.

Rob and Ben trying to reclaim the robes.

Louis Geltman & Andrew McEwan coming into Hotel California.

Textbook drafting.

Little D, leading his team through Hotel California.

Fred Mercury Norquist & Jure Poberaj

Lane Jacobs. Despite lower water than last year, times were fast and competitive.

Jamie Wright @ Glory Boof #3.

Barton and Totten.

Jonathan Ehlinger & Scott Waidelich

Jon Dufay

JP and Jon

Team Canadia. Steve and Matt.

Chris Tretwold.

Leif.

The Safety Boaters. Thanks Team!

The Fans.

Stay Tuned for the after party pics. Coming soon ...

2011 Robe Race Results

2011-05-01T19:49:00.004-07:00

Very thankful for all the participation in the Robe Race this year, grateful for all the volunteer support, & happy to report that the whole thing went off without a hitch! A chilly wet start to the day gave way to a mostly sunny finish & thankfully the localized precip helped stabilize the flow early in the week .. I never stressed a bit about water levels, as our pre-race weather was keeping things in the sweet spot. Would have been nice to see it at 5.5, but 5.3 is a great race level. Not a single swim was reported all day (not even in the safety crew!) Pretty sure that everyone who raced or volunteered got at least one sandwich .. I made like 20 lbs of sandwiches for the afterparty. And i know everyone got their share of beer .. we went through an astounding number of cases when it was all said & done. And how 'bout that afterparty patio scene??? Best one yet, by far. Seemed like everyone had a good time & felt reasonably safe while on the course.

The top end was very competitive this year .. fast times given the flow. Here are the results:

1. ROBES: Darren Albright & Tao Berman (28:34)
2. Louis Geltman & Andrew McEwan (29:02)
3. Brian Fletcher & Aaron Johnson (30:15)
4. Ben Hawthorne & Rob McKibbon (30:48)
5. Lane Jacobs & Jamie Wright (31:05)
6. Fred Norquist & Jure Poberaj (32:13)
7. Jonathan Ehlinger & Scott Waidelich (32:32)
8. Leif Embertson & Chris Tretwold (34:05)
9. Brett Barton & Chris Totten (34:31)
10. Mike & Joe Howard (35:28)
11. Jon Dufay & Jon Prentice (37:06)
12. GNOME: Steve Arns & Matt Kompass (38:30)

I got a handful of good photos from the start line that i haven't uploaded yet, & I know Shane probably has a bunch more. We'll try to get some of those posted by the end of the year ...

Thanks again, everyone, for coming out & celebrating Robe Canyon , for making race day 2011 an awesome time, & for reigniting my stoke for paddling!

2011 Robe Race Announcement

2011-03-23T23:22:00.003-07:00

Calling all racers & volunteers & shit-tawkers. Race date tentatively scheduled for the weekend of 4/30 - 5/1. Comments are open: please respond with your team (of 2), or your willingness to participate as a volunteer (specify how), or your predictions of who will dominate vs who will be dominated upon (please don't be douchey).

Kamchatka Project :: Field Report

2010-07-15T21:35:00.012-07:00

In the weeks preceding departure to the Kamchatka Peninsula for a project Bryan and I had been working on for almost two years, many of my close paddling friends kept asking about what kind of whitewater we expected to find. And the truth was, with so much of our planning and prep time focused on the salmon, the conservation aspects of our trip, and the general logistics, that we had no idea what to expect in terms of whitewater.

I don’t mean to say that we hadn’t looked into it. At it’s heart this project was born out of kayakers wanting to go explore rivers in an unknown corner of the world. But this region has seen so little interest in whitewater that there was virtually no whitewater beta. We spoke to flyfishing guides who pointed us in some directions and other tourism guides that had insights into other drainages; although, when we looked at these rivers on maps, they just didn’t give us – as kayakers – the confidence we wanted that they would pan out into good whitewater. So a week before our departure, we called an audible.

The Semilayach River had the best Google Earth imagery on the peninsula and there was definitely a pool drop character to the river. Whether it would have the right amount of flow at the time we would be there or whether the drops would be clean and runnable or a junk pile of boulders was anyone’s guess. But we decided it was our best option, and as Daniel DeLaVergne once said, ‘sometime’s you gotta just drop in and figure it out.’ We did, and we found some good whitewater and some excellent rapids. And on the heli flight into the Semilayach, we flew over the Karimsky river, which looked even better from the air, and it too proved to be excellent on the river.

The Range Life hasn’t really been our outlet for this project, but we wanted to share some pics with our loyal readers and point you to our facebook page for more updates and sources of media that are starting to filter out now. Also, check out Outdoor Research’s Verticulture site for some sat phone podcasts. We have more than 2 weeks left over here, so stay tuned for more updates and enjoy the images …

international expeditions always mean a load of gear and airports. This one included two transfers and an unexpected layover in Moscow. photo by bryan smith

Bryan, Ethan, Jay, Jeff, Rob & Shane. photo by ethan smith

our soviet era shuttle. photo by shane robinson

thar's whitewater down thar. photo by ethan

ethan hitting one of the first boof's on the trip. photo by shane

rob cruising through a nice series on the semilchik. photo by ethan

bryan stoked to find some quality russian whitewater. photo by shane

source to sea means flatwater - bryan getting back to his roots. photo by shane

hard to beat smoked salmon, hot springs and an erupting volcano to start a river trip. photo by ethan

before there was the brown, there was the shit, and ethan fired up the shit! photo by bryan

where are we? In the middle of nowhere. photo by ethan

jeff collecting some data. photo by ethan

a rudimentary but effective flow measurement. photo by ethan

lots of fun mini gorges on the Karymskaya. photo by ethan

ethan running one of the team's favorite drops. photo by shane

our camp at the beach. photo by bryan

maybe the most dangerous part of our trip - the petropavolovsk yacht club. photo by shane

and a sign off by our friend smokey. photo by shane

Raffuse Creek. Exploring the obvious ..

2010-06-16T20:53:00.007-07:00

I suppose you could file this entry under "Leaving no stone unturned" or, alternately, "Just another thing to do in Squamish" ..

For as long as I've been around here, Raffuse has been one of those "We oughtta check that one out someday" kind of projects. If you've ever run Skookum Creek, you've driven right over Raffuse on the way there. Maybe you did a double-take as you caught a quick glimpse of the junky rapid upstream of the bridge. Knowing what we do about everything else in the region, it's rarely surprising that even the smallest streams would have at least something worth whitewater paddleboating on. And this one, even with the mank visible from the bridge, seemed plausible. Anyway, it was always intriguing to Shane, so it was more or less on the project list for our whole group for the last 5 or so years. The problem has always been that the logging road which accesses the upper reaches of the creek was gated, & that deterred any serious scouting. Bryan actually poked around on river-left a year or two ago, but didn't see much of the creek. He talked to the usual suspects around town but no one had any useful beta or knowledge of it ever having been explored.

About a month ago, Shane, Utah, & I were up for an Ashlu release weekend with Bryan, & decided to get up early on Sunday morning to head up the Mamquam valley to see what was going on that way; maybe Skookum would be in. Turned out the gate for the Raffuse logging road was swung wide open, so naturally we headed in. Within a mile, we stopped at an obvious spot & began hiking a spur which was an old road grade paralleling the creek.

Shane & Johnny U. assessing the situation

Raffuse is the drainage in the bottom-right of the map page, not where Shane is pointing ..

Several times we dropped waaaay down into the canyon & bushwhacked our way around the surprisingly easy-to-negotiate canyon walls. And what we found was -- no surprise -- very enticing: a small stream hemmed-in by dark granite walls, plunging over ledges & slides & waterfalls. Apart from one super-steep series of drops which ended in a sketchy 30-footer, & an abundance of wood throughout the creek, Raffuse didn't seem to have too much terror-inducing gnar. Just lots of steep boogie water in a well channelized low-volume gorge.

Oh, and also there was this one absolutely perfect 20-footer that dropped into a beautifully carved-out teacup room. That alone, in my mind anyway, made the prospect of running (or dealing with) the rest of the creek worthy.

We returned the following weekend with Tretwold & Fred on the heels of a strong cold front that had moved into coastal BC & had dropped all of the rivers in the area. Not at all what we'd hoped for on this already tiny creek, but Bryan felt confident that the level would hold at a boatable flow. And besides, what were we gonna do? Not run it?

The cool thing about Raffuse is its proximity to downtown Squamish. We were able to get a good night's sleep, & then get coffee & burritos in town before heading out for a good ol' fashioned BC exploratory. We reckoned it would only take us a couple hours to fly through what we'd already scouted, even with some extra dealing in the waterfall gorge. We hiked with our boats along the old logging road grade well past the most upstream point we'd scouted the previous weekend. River-level access was "supposed" to get easier upstream, but we found ourselves further & further off the deck. We did one of those things where the road grade goes way up & away from the river before coming back toward it, you know, the kind of thing where it would usually indicate a steep gorge on the creek.

Upon making to the creek, we were a little disgruntled to discover that our first "move" would be a portage around a nasty log across an otherwise fun rapid. Also, the creek was really, really tiny.

Immediately below our put-in, we portaged -- you can see why -- & then we got our first little ledge of the morning. There was plenty of this kind of stuff in the upper stretch; well channelized & surprisingly fun for the size of the riverbed.

We stopped infrequently & routed through lots of boogie water until we reached a point of obvious concern. You could see mist rising against a dark black headwall downstream. It didn't seem likely that we could already be at the waterfall gorge we'd scouted. We were still well upstream of that & were looking at another series of drops that we hadn't known about; a sweet little double into a tight, sheer walled gorge.

Fred Norquist dropping into the gorge. Photo sequence: TG

Chris's perspective of Fred on the first series

& Fred again, shot by Bryan

Chris probed the double with his WAC-sponsored boat. Sequence: TG

Lots of fun, ledgey boogie water downstream of the first waterfalls. Photo: TG

Photo: TG
The creek was very "intimate", if that makes any sense .. small & surprisingly clean. Don't get me wrong, there was some mank, but with more water, it would clean up even more. Above is a series of fun ledges leading into the second waterfall gorge. Chris did some hero shit & climbed across the big log downstream in this shot, from river-left to river-right, & sawed out a substantial piece of wood that completely shut down navigability .. I should've been shooting during those moments ..

Here I am running the upstream-most ledge in the previous shot. Photo: BS

The eddy below the sketchy wood & right above the perfect 20-footer. Photo: BS

A big reason why I was on this creek in the first place .. the perfect 20. Photo: BS

Bryan on the 20. Photo: TG

Bryan appreciating the view & waiting for Fred's descent. Photo: TG

Fred & Bryan chillin in the eddy, shot from way above by Chris Tretwold

Our scouts from upstream, which were way above river-level, had us concerned about dropping into the waterfall gorge without a more thorough scout of the drop right below the waterfall. From way up high, it looked kind of sketchy .. a tall ledge into a super-tight bottleneck with a plucky hole, walled-in on both sides. We were pretty sure that we would not be able to get out of the creek after the waterfall to scout or set safety for the next drop. But really, how bad could it really be? It's only a couple hundred cfs. Hmmm.. this line of thinking has gotten me into trouble in the past ..

Here's Freddy Mercury dropping into "Colombian Necktie" .. no sweat .. Photo: CT

another angle of Fred running "Colombian Necktie" .. like I said, no sweat. Photo: TG

Bryan in the exit of the drop .. Photo: TG

Shane in the same rapid, from downstream, shot by Bryan

Me .. stoked. Photo: BS

Right below Colombian Necktie, there's a truly shitty rapid that no one ran. And right below that is the sketchy 30-footer I mentioned early on. With the lower flow than when we'd first scouted, & from river-left where we hadn't scouted before, the waterfall looked even more marginal than before. It was tighter & more twisting than it had looked. The lip was not much more than a boat-width wide, & I couldn't figure out if you wanted to go left-to-right, right-to-left, straight-on, or if it even mattered .. but, strangely, it still looked doable. You might just have to take a huge wall hit, & likely would get stuffed under the left cave-wall at the bottom. I tried to talk Fred into it, but he wasn't feeling it. I was relieved about that because if he did it, I would probably have to do it too.

Chris & me scouting the 30-footer. Photo: BS

Awesome shot of Shane scouting the 30. Photo: BS

We all portaged the last waterfall high on the left .. wasn't too bad of a portage. We got back in & faced a handful of fun ledges & boulder-choked rapids before having to portage high-right around wood. One more big glory boof & we were at the bridge. The shuttle is easily bikeable.

Ultimately, this run will never be a Squamish classic on par with Tatlow or Callaghan. But it is decent & is something that I definitely want to go back & do again. People do Brittania waterfalls all the time & that's just 2 low-volume drops & you're done. This is definitely a better, or more pure, kayaking experience than that. We only stopped to take pictures at a couple spots, but there are a lot more rapids than we showed. With more water it would be a lot of fun, & with a lot more water it would probably be terrifying.

Fred put together a great little video piece on our Raffuse day. Watch it below, or go to Vimeo for full resolution ..

Raffuse Creek Exploration from Fred Norquist on Vimeo.

My comments at the end, that's just the exhaustion speaking. Even a day later, my perspective had changed & my thoughts about the creek were way more positive.. I'd definitely go back & do it again!

Robe Race 2010 (anyone still read this thing??)

2010-06-13T23:59:00.000-07:00

It's been like 2 months since the 2010 Robe Race went down. Being that I organized the thing, you'd think I'd have a bit more sense of urgency in sharing a recap, photos, &/or at least just the news that, miraculously, the event went incredibly smoothly. Hmm .. better late than never, I guess.

BTW, I'd really love to keep TRL somewhere a bit closer to the front burner, like we used to do .. but the sad truth is, just like the mighty cheetah captures the swift, graceful gazelle, the other parts of my adult life have chased down, subdued, & more or less devoured this part. I'm not necessarily complaining. Those "other parts" are generally pretty great too, they're just inherently at odds with my old school bloggin' style -- this ain't Twitter or a Facebook status update, after all. I have two bosses -- one that sends me paychecks, & another one that I live with who's way prettier -- and neither one of them keep me around for my mega-slow file uploads, endless tinkering with digital photos, or crippling bouts of late night writer's block. This shit takes a lot of time, & that's not even considering the actual kayaking & travel parts.

In reality I (we) are still getting out, getting after it, & painting the canyons around the PNW & BC red (errr, maybe "brown" would be more accurate?). As for the bloggins, I'll get around to monkeying around with photos & telling tall tales when I can. In the case of the Robe Race, "when I can" happens to be 8 weeks later. Oh, & of that new, possible-2nd-but-pretty-effin'-complete-descent, well, I'll get to that soon too.

Here are a bunch of photos of the Robe Race that a couple friends were kind enough to share.

((The following gorgeous images are courtesy of Michael Hanson. Do yourself a favor & check out Michael's work by following this link!))

At 9:00a.m., we had high water on the Robe. So we decided to wait it out & let the warm, sunny weather work its magic. By Noon, we were a hair below 6 feet & dropping, so we decided it was time for the main event.

The Robe Race starts with a bang .. the view down into the Tunnel rapids from the starting line eddy

Hale & Doof out of the gate .. Also, special thanks to our starting line crew, Heather, Liv, Erin & Jesse!

Canucks came all the way from Canadia for the race .. stoked they did!

TRL Original Gangsta Shane Robinson dusting off Ye Olde Gus for the race .. coincidentally, the innards of this boat also received a thorough rinse job during Shane's race lap.

For Race Day 2010, we had a nice fluffy & splashy water level

2010 champions Brian Fletcher & Aaron Johnson keepin it tight & fast through Last ("Little Miss") Sunshine

Muchas gracias to Hilary, part of the safe crew

Fredgnar stylin' the light-brown quasi-stouts, brah!

I'm realizing now that all these trees now have tons of foliage on them & the canyon is very, very green

Approaching T2's gloriously lofty boof .. I think this might be Don & Darcy (hey Darcy, I'll get around to amending your race time one of these weeks ..promise.)

LOVE this overhead shot .. Nice stuff Michael!

yessss .. almost Beer:30

We provided plenty of food & beer at the takeout, which I think was a nice treat

Andrew O!

The after-party scene .. note Tret trying to warm up his little hibachi while the ever watchful Robe Gnome, who will be going home to Bellingham with Tret & Wayrad, looks on in the background.

Brian F dons the Winner's Robe

((The following photos are from RT & Owen at the Finish Line!))

Half of last yr's winning team, the always jolly badass Rob McKibbin

Hey that's me .. either laughing, yelling, or probably mouth breathing

Slalom dudes Louis G & Kurt B kept it tight like prom night all the way to the finish line

Little D & JP

My pahdnah, Bryan Smith, stoked to be done

Classic! Wayrad & Tretwold swimming to the finish line, to take DFL

Congrats boys, you truly earned the Robe Gnome this year!

Team Oz putting in a respectable time .. plus, in true Dingo fashion, these guys experienced Granite Falls culture in a most raw & pure way: back-to-back all-night benders with the GF locals .. now that's husky!

Kiwi Sam & CO Ken

Brock's got flare

Finish Line scene

Tret's Rain-dog is a swim survivor

Drew & Fish

((The parting shot is mine ..))

Recently had the Robes embroidered with this year's winners' names. Unlike general blogging, I'm super motivated to keep the Robe Race going next year & to keep the tradition of the Winner's Robes & the Robe Gnome alive. Hope we can pull it off in 2011!

2010 Robe Race Results

2010-04-27T09:07:00.003-07:00

Congrats to the new kings of the Robe, Aaron Johnson & Brian Fletcher! Training pays off. The coveted Winners' Robes will be staying in Seattle this year .. but I have to wonder if these beautiful, embroidered Robes might end up showing the telltale signs of being in the care of native calf-ropin' Montanans: you know, those "dip can circles" in the back pockets of the Wranglers of every man, woman & child from Montana? Royal Blue satin damages easily, boys, take care of them Robes.

The Robe Gnome (prize for DFL finisher) this year goes to the inaugural race's 2nd place finishers, Chris Tretwold & Ryan Bradley, who both actually SWAM TO THE FINISH LINE trailing their boats .. setting a new standard for slow-ass-slow ..

The Golden Glove award for MVP safety boater goes to Hood River rat Jay Gifford, who bagged like 4 swimmers at Catcher's Mitt.

Shhurdle got the Stein Weasel award, but he always wins that ..

Here are the complete results.

(1) Aaron Johnson / Brian Fletcher (27:56)
(2) Rob McKibbin / Ben Hawthorne (28:45)
(3) Kurt Braunlich / Louis Geltman (29:07)
(4) Jon Prentice / Darren Albright (30:38)
(5) Sean Bozkewycz / Adrian Kiernan (31:59)
(6) Bryan Smith / Todd Gillman (32:52)
(7) Hale Hannaway / Jon Dufay (33:58)
(8) Brad Xanthopoulos / Marco Colella (34:23)
(9) Jonathan Ehlinger / Andrew Oberhardt (36:10)
(10) Scott Waidelich / Nick Hinds (36:41)(S)
(11) Steve Arns / Matt Kompass (36:50)
(12) Fred Norquist / Niko Peha (38:03)(S)
(13) Ken Olivier / Sam the Kiwi (40:27)
(14) Shane Robinson / Brock Gavery (40:54)(S)
(15) Don Beveridge / Darcy Gaechter (41:30)(S)
(16) Chris Tretwold / Ryan Bradley (55:15)(S)

Racer group shot at the starting line. (thanks for the pic, Erin P.)

So, in all the chaos & exhaustion at the end of the race, I totally blew it. I really wanted to pass the hat for our good pal Matt Thomas, who raced in the inaugural Robe Race, but who is now dealing with this pesky paralysis issue. Matt will be heading to San Diego for Project Walk, a spinal cord injury rehab facility. He's excited for the opportunity ... but ... the cost is about $1,200/week, & insurance covers exactly $0.00/week. So that's why we're shaking the tree on his behalf. Please, if you are able, make a PayPal donation through MATT'S BLOG. Thanks!

*** I'll work on a proper recap with lots of photos & stories as soon as I can. Email me your best photos of the day if you want them included. Back to work!***

In Twenty-Ten We Try Again

2010-04-01T22:40:00.004-07:00

It's April 1st, fools. Tis the season & the gnomes be hungry.

Last year, Mother Nature didn't comply with the organizing & oversight committee's request for mellow flows, & the race had to be cancelled. This year we're feeling lucky .. & a bit better prepared with a 3-weekend window for the race. So let's get it on.

This year we're targeting the last weekend of April. The flow window will reside somewhere between 4.9 & 6.0. If flows are unacceptable, we'll hold the race the following weekend, & ditto that the following weekend. So, the weekend of April 23rd is first choice, May 1st & May 8th will be the backups. And if in that 3-weekend period we can't pull it off, I'll be over it.

At minimum, what I need to make this happen:

Timekeepers: 2 volunteers to hike trail to start line & stage the starting line

Timekeepers: 2 volunteers to hike trail to finish line to meticulously record finish line times

Racers: 5 teams of 2 racers willing to race at given flow (all racers must have throwbag to race)

Ideally, we'd have some safety boaters at a couple places throughout the canyon, & some spectators to hold bags (& cameras & cowbells) around Tunnel & Sunshine are always welcome .. but the race is contingent upon neither of these. Again, all we really need to pull the race off this year is 2 timekeepers up top, 2 at the bottom, & 5 teams ready to rumble.

The Prizes:

The Winners Robes with custom race embroidery (designed by my brother) will be on the line. Rob McKibbon ("Old Man River"?) & Ben Hawthorne will be aggressively defending the title & the right to have their names added to the sleeves a second time.

For the team that finishes D.F.L., there is the traditional Robe Gnome that will be passed to its new keepers (we hope).

We'll have a party afterward & I'll provide a bunch of beer. Last year, we had a bbq planned with lots of food. That may happen again. At the party we'll have an independent panel of experts crunch the numbers & crown the victors. We will also "pass the hat" & try to raise a bit of cheddar for our pal Effigy -- who many of you know well -- who traveled all the way from Southern OR to race in the inaugural event .. but who is now bound to a wheelchair & facing a pile of medical & rehab bills. Everything about this race is free & grassroots, fools, so please have it in your hearts to dip into your pockets & help out a friend in need.

You want to be a volunteer? Awesome! Get in touch with me or post in the comments. Got a race partner? Aye, que bueno. Let me know asap. Post your team in the comments section or send me an email. We'd love to see some of our downstate, east side, OR & BC friends come out for this. Any forum-hounds, please feel free to cross-post & get the word out on your favorite forum if you want.

And .. as always .. the comments section of this blog are open for shit-slingin' business.

Little Miss Sunshine; Photo courtesy Chris Tretwold

Hillary at Garbage. The gnomes be watchin'. Photo courtesy Leif Embertson

Off Broadway on a low-medium day; Photo courtesy Chris Tretwold

The old Garbage high-water boof (RIP) .. the gnomes be waitin'. Photo courtesy Leif Embertson

Crankenstein on the old Garbage boof. Photo courtesy Chris Tretwold

Is this 20-ft Waterfall? I don't even know. Photo courtesy Leif Embertson

I'm sure I left some details out, & I know that those dates won't be *perfect* for everybody, but that's what I had to work with. Any questions, hit me up or post in the comments. Stoked to make this happen this year!

About a dog; On deciding & descending

2010-03-16T19:08:00.011-07:00

I just came in from walking Corey-dog, my 15 year-old Chesapeake Bay Retriever. Corey-dog came into my life back in '94, when I was living in Idaho. At that time, I was not a good kayaker, but I nevertheless identified myself as a boater, & I wanted badly to be a great one. Several years before that, while I was in college in WV, I hooted from shore the first time I ever watched as my friends ran flawless “blue angels” formation over Wonder Falls & Big Splat. I wanted to be on that team, flying off of falls, to fully comprehend the dynamics of something that seemed totally alien & so thrilling to me at the time. In the months that followed I foolishly tried to run part of the Big Sandy on a bodyboard. Badly bruised shins, knees. Whitewater: I was hooked.

By the time I arrived in ID, I had many years of ocean experience under my belt, as well as first-year training as a raft guide & a couple years of bumbling about in inflatables & kayaks. I went out West with a yellow Dancer I picked up on the cheap. I hated it. Never felt comfortable or safe or even a little bit in control of that thing. One day as I walked through town, I was stopped dead in my tracks at the glimpse of a brand new, flashy blue, white & pink New Wave Sleek on an outdoor rack at the local shop. I’ll repeat that: Blue .. White .. Pink. Something about the colors & the way the fresh, unscratched plastic glowed in the springtime sunlight .. it just emanated hotness. And with it’s super radical low-volume stern & short length, it was an aggressive design that had my name all over it .. nevermind that I could hardly execute a proper eddy turn, let alone a stern-pivot or stern squirt. But having been introduced to whitewater on the Cheat & Yough, I was beyond familiar with the influence of the Snyder Brothers & with New Wave boats. I had to have that boat. I had no money. Didn’t matter. I had a verifiable job, so the owner of the shop put me on a zero-down layaway program that included walking with the boat THAT DAY. Those were different times. And that’s when it got serious for me.

Corey-dog was a charity case. As a youngster, he was obviously a sweet, intelligent dog, & from stellar bloodlines, as the American Kennel Club certified. But he was about as compliant as a virus, & was often found wandering the streets with a salmon carcass hanging from his lips, after having raided the dumpsters behind Albertson's .. or else, in the pound as a result. The guy he belonged to was a total derelict, a "Darrel". He named the dog D’Artagnan (3 Musketeers?), “Dart” for short. His only trained command at the time was, “Dart! Guard!!” .. at which point his goofy, eager-to-please manner instantaneously transformed into bloodthirsty hell-hound. Because of that guy's incompetence & constant inebriation, my roommate & I often ended up looking after "Dart", or "Scooby" as my roomie called him. Eventually we thought of the dog more as ours than as his, & eventually his owner did as well. The AKC papers were turned over to us without a fuss, & as soon as we could, we changed his name to something more reasonable.

A lot of years & a lot of river miles have passed since then. Corey’s an old dog now. He no longer chases squirrels or dives off tall rocks. He invests no effort at all in finding the perfect patch of grass or soft, low bush to take a dump on -- a process that used to be a long ritual involving endless sniffing, indecisiveness & pacing, then a final tug on the leash & proud squat with a turn of his head as if to say, “I ALWAYS find the right spot!” Not anymore though. Now he just drops bombs on the sidewalk or wherever the mood strikes, not even breaking stride to squat.

He used to exhibit the same neurotic need for the absolute perfect spot to deposit river rocks. Anyone that knew me in my CO days will attest to this. Corey's riverside behavior was legendary. After obnoxiously slapping at the surface of the water for a while, he would scrape at the bottom of the river, pulling his rock into position .. then he'd dive his head & upper body under water until he'd resurface with a big river rock held in the front of his teeth. I loved the silence when he dove under water, but always cracked up as he resurfaced & commenced the long process of pacing the shore to find the .. absolute .. perfect .. spot .. to deposit the rock. And when he finally released the rock from his mouth, it was as if it were a delicate egg or a wee baby bunny wabbit: slowly, deliberately, gently he would place the rock in its new home. Then he'd start all over again. Crazy. Awesome. Dog.

In the ‘50’s, Nobel Prize-winning psychologist Herbert Simon theorized that American consumers were increasingly affected by an overabundance of choice & that consumer behavior could be categorized into 2 main profiles: “maximizing” & “satisficing”. According to the theory, a maximizer would deliberate indefinitely among all available options or choices until he had finally picked what he deemed as the best or highest-quality option. A satisficer on the other hand would settle on a suitable option right away, without much deliberation or hemming & hawing. A satisficer has criteria & standards, but is ultimately unconcerned with the possibility that there may exist a “better” choice. Generally, they’re happy with whatever they choose.

It’s been said that the rational part of the human brain -- the prefrontal cortex -- can efficiently handle up to 7 bits of information. When it comes to making decisions, the maximizer is often hamstrung because the number of available options is far greater than 7, making the task of picking the absolute “best” one a serious conundrum. The irony being, of course, that due to the rational brain’s relative inability to do anything other than cherry-pick relevant info beyond 7 choices, the maximizer must ultimately “settle” on a choice & then live with the nagging feeling that there almost certainly exists a better option than the one he ended up choosing.

I imagine Corey-dog, still wet from the river, in the back of the truck on the way home, fuming about whether his deliberate rock placements were the right calls. Or similarly, maybe he returned from walks wracked with the nagging feeling that he poo'd on the wrong grass when he should've hit the flower bed in the neighbor dog's yard.

The maximizer/satisficer theory can be applied to recreational choices too. Do you & your crew settle on your weekend mission early & decisively? Or does the decision usually end up going into extra innings before the plan comes together? Seems like our scene is plagued with the latter. It'll be late Friday night & the choice to head out and surf the Strait vs. the choice to do juicy Robe laps still hasn't been decided. In my network, we ALL seem to lean toward the maximizer profile in that regard. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that most of my friends are passionate weekend warriors like me, & that our free time is so limited & precious, that the thought of wasting any part of a weekend is a serious threat to our wellbeing. And undoubtedly it's also influenced by the environment here in the PNW & how our weather is so dynamic & unpredictable. On any given weekend, I find myself having to choose between a bunch of different activities, & each one of those activities has a bunch of different location options & a bunch of potential participants .. & it all relies on not just favorable conditions, but the absolute BEST conditions for the particular activity that I want to do .. in combination with the people I do or don't want to spend time with that weekend. Wow. That's how people like me become neurotic about weather & activity planning .. & just plain nuts, in general.

The past couple years I've taken a lot of time off from boating to focus on my surfing & other activities. But this year I've decided that I'm going to be satisfied with maximizing my kayaking opportunities as well. I got in back shape & begged the coaches to let me try out for the team again. Here are some shots & stories from our first exploratory of the 2010 season, a mission which came together spontaneously, LATE this past Saturday night.

3 or so years ago, our pal Paul encouraged us to look into a sister drainage to our beloved SF Stillaguamish (Robe Canyon) .. the North Fork, near Darrington. As I recall, he said something to the effect of, "I think y'all oughtta do some pokin' 'round up the North Fork Stilly way."

Tret took charge & in spring of '08 did just that & came back with a compelling report & some pretty pictures. (photo Chris Tretwold)

Another shot Chris took on his '08 recon

It's always so hard to tell what's what from from point 'n shoot recon shots .. but the run remained on our shortlist of worthy missions for the future. My notes from talking to Paul back then seemed to indicate that the NF hadn't really been run. Sounds like the good Dr. S, who lives right there in Darrington, suggested the exploratory to Paul, who later told me. I dunno, & it doesn't really matter anyway.

So on sunny Sunday morning I met up with Chris, Leif Embertson, & Fred Norquist in Arlington, for what promised to be a day full of pain & suffering & bushwhacking. I brought a LOT of food.

Chris & Leif, the other 2 "old guys" on the trip, preparing to suffer
TG Photo

Chris had the foresight to bring a mountain bike to stash on a trail adjacent to the gorge, in the event of an aborted mission. After that we spent an obscene amount of time driving switchbacks all over North Mountain on several wrong roads .. only to learn that we'd driven right past the correct road, which looked just like a driveway, 4 or 5 times already.

We did a lot of this ... (Photo Fred Norquist)

... and this. (Photo Fred Norquist)

Once at our put-in bridge we were dismayed to see not much water in our creek .. but what were we gonna do, not put on? Yeah, right. I was pleased at my decision to paddle my "old" boat & wear my "old" drysuit, cuz clearly, there would be a lot of rock bashing & jungle bushwhacking in my future. Much incredibly beautiful troutwater ensued .. class II/III in & out of calm, deep, green pools in low-slung gorges, with just enough channelization to keep our pace brisk, for about 2 miles.

Tret in the troutwater. (Photo Fred Norquist)

Then it got truly husky!

Gnarquist peering over the edge. We invited him because we knew he'd be down with the brown.
TG Photo

Downstream gorge view (Photo Fred Norquist)

Some sticks. If you're standing here, then you've already run the first super fun series & committed to the steepest part of the gorge.
TG Photo

Tret, amongst it
TG Photo

Scouting the husky biz. (Photo Fred Norquist)

Fred entering the gorge. Up til this point, the canyon was full of interesting geology, but here the rock formations & giant potholes become spectacular.
TG Photo

Couple shots of Chris takin' a load off in a deep pothole next to a nice waterfall.
TG Photos

Fred lining up the first real falls. You can see we had low flow, but in the gorge, it channelized enough to make it quite fun.
TG Photo

Fred's falls sequence. It's very stacked at this point in the gorge, with some husky & consequential stuff below here .. but Fred's just fine with the brine.
TG Photos

The Norskman in another fun one. This one is just below a 30-footer that lands all over a bunch of nasty rocks.
TG Photo

Fred's shot of Leif

Chris crankin' on a nasty boofstroke
TG Photo

Fred with another similar sequence on a different drop.
TG Photos

(Photo Leif Embertson)

In skating, rail grabs are not only stylish but functional. In snowboarding, grabbing rail is never necessary, but it does demonstrate poise & control while flying & spinning through the air, & since the 2 sports share a common heritage, it's accepted. Rollerbladers & skiers grabbing rail, err, boot, or whatever, never made much sense to me .. but for some reason, grabbing deck on a kayak always kind of did??? I dunno, if it's fun, then just do it. One member of our team was repeatedly spotted flying off of boofs, not grabbing rail, but instead with one hand in the air as if palming a basketball, screaming "BROOOoowwwwwwn!!!".
TG Photo

6-ft rock smear executed by a 7-ft Norwegian.
TG Photo

One of the last major drops on the run. This one is pretty sketchy, shallow, with a thin line .. very husky. I should have left this lens on my camera & shot Fred from this perspective...
TG Photo

... instead I switched to my shitty lens & got shitty results.
TG Photo

All in all, the NF Stilly was a great exploratory mission that turned out to be no real suffer-fest at all. There's for sure some work involved, but nothing that would necessarily keep me from going back. It's definitely worthy of further investigation, with more water, before proclaiming it a new "classic". I think/hope there's a magic flow where all the boulder-boogie is padded out & fun, while the gorge is still doable without being terrifying & lacking eddies. We ran about 5 miles of river bridge to bridge, the first couple miles of which is easy, but incredibly beautiful. The gorge itself is relatively short, but very husky, & with a lot of individual drops .. & the runout goes on for another mile & contains lots of boulders, slots, ledges & one gnarly sieve, before flattening out & opening up to a jaw-dropping view of Whitehorse Peak -- one of the finest takeout scenes I've seen.

The incredible Whitehorse Peak as viewed from the takeout. (Photo Fred Norquist)

One thing that needs to be mentioned is the sketchy nature of the rock throughout much of the canyon -- lots & lots of sieves, potholes & undercuts.

Last thing .. while I've yet to hear that this thing has been previously run, I'm by no means claiming our run a first descent.. just seems kind of unlikely since it's bridge-to-bridge, super accessible, super obvious on any map & surrounded by other well-known runs. If anyone has info on it, please share!

Thank You Kenny Bloggins

2009-11-22T19:10:00.001-08:00

"Kenny Bloggins", my trusty PowerBook G4 Bloggin' Machine which has created &/or edited so much TRL content over the years, has gotten to be very old & tired. It seems like I average a blog post every 4 months or so these days. But then I realized that's because 4 months is how long it takes Kenny Bloggins to power-up & launch the most basic applications. As a result, I've been avoiding Kenny & therefore have ended up with a bunch of photos from the summer & fall just collecting dust.

Sometimes, like today, I put the key in the ignition & Kenny fires right up. I don't get it. But when it happens, I know I just have to take advantage of the opportunity. So here's some stuff from as far back as June...which just occurred to me that in today's uber-up-to-the-minute online content environment, would make all this stuff "archival" & even "dated". Oh well, so it goes...

I. Another One Bites The Dust
We learned this last week that another world-class BC creek will be lost to the "clean energy revolution". Given the pace of hydro development in BC, this didn't come as much of a surprise:

"The 25 MW Mamquam project will utilize the flow of SKOOKUM CREEK to generate annual green energy for roughly 9,500 homes and will create 140 direct and indirect jobs for local and First Nation communities..."

Follow the above link for the full article & be rewarded with all sorts of self-congratulatory, flowery language about sustainability & jobs creation.

II. Dipper Creek Video!
Bryan got around to editing some of our footage of last year's Dipper Creek explorations. Follow the above link to Vimeo where you'll find a short compilation of Bryan's best shots from the as yet un-dammed Dipper Creek.

III. And speaking of creeks on the chopping block, Callaghan Creek on the municipal outskirts of Whistler is one of the region's most reliable & well known boating opportunities for locals & visitors alike. The 2010 Olympics development in the valley provided super nice new pavement up river-right (though most boaters still use the logging road on river-left to access the put-in) .. & last I heard, a run-of-river hydro project had been APPROVED but was under moratorium until after the circus had left town. Maybe Bryan or someone else up there can confirm that for me?

Anyway, here are some shots Bryan & I got from a fun day on the super awesome Callaghan this past summer.

My shots:

Make a mental note of this shot ...

Bryan's shots:

Ryan & Hale shot at the same instant as my shot above, but from other side of river.

IV. And, as for our favorite BC river that's currently being raped, Ye Olde Ashlu was the subject of one of Bryan's ever-growing list of film assignments from National Geographic. For this project, he assembled a team of kayakers, including Shane, Tretwold, Schertzl, Max K. & me .. & a land-based team of shooters, including Matt Maddaloni, Tim Loubier & Fitz Cahall, to capture the true essence of Commitment Canyon over the course of a weekend this past Fall. He & Maddaloni unveiled their wicked-cool new cable-cam contraption to get some unreal shots of Last Tango, 50/50 & Corner .. as well as river-level shots on multiple cameras throughout the rest of the run. The very talented Steve Rogers also came out for a day & got some incredible still images he generously shared with us (& these are his "B" shots!):

When I talk, people (pretend to) listen.

Max Kneiwasser rolling into 50/50

For 6 years, every time I ran the Box, I dutifully walked out to the big granite slab that forms the river-left of 50/50 & looked down at the seething mess of froth below. And for 6 years I always continued walking right on past that sumbitch saying "maybe next time". Well this year I finally accepted the inevitability, & dropped in & stomped it.

Daydreaming

2009-11-15T00:27:00.004-08:00

Mid-November in Western Washington can be a bit of a drag. It's right around this time of year when most people around here seem to disappear completely. It's not that they leave town, but more that they just hunker down indoors with tons of coffee, heavy winter ales, boozes, blankets, movies, etc. It's like most of the population succumbs to a collective metabolic downturn similar to bear hibernation .. but more like a 5-month transformation into a state full of pale zombies. People actually refocus on their jobs once again. Lots of books get read. Weight is gained.

I'm a pretty active fella, but even still, it can sometimes be such a struggle to maintain my enthusiasm & motivation for activities & adventures when it's 45 degrees & drizzling all the time. On the other hand, it's this time of year when our mountains start to get hammered with the first winter storms of the year .. which also means the lowland rivers are full of water, & that our coastal zones light up with big swell from the North Pacific caused by the same storms that deliver so much snow to the Olympics & Cascades. Mt. Baker just opened up this week with a 70-inch base & reports of gagger pow turns in & out of bounds. I'm looking forward to some powder slashes & to reacquainting myself with my favorite whitewater paddleboating run, Robe Canyon, in the very near future. However, at the same time, I'm also looking back & reflecting on the warm, sunny, salty goodness that California offered up on a recent surf trip Matty G. & I did. Having just now come in from a cold wet dog walk, I'm really missing the shorts & flip-flops lifestyle we had for that week right about now. Here's some pics from our trip..

old-growth live oak grove on our buddy's property where we stayed on The Ranch

300 yr-old tree

Nothin' quite like a golden sunset szechuan with no one else out & screamin' rights & lefts

This is pretty much exactly what I'm talking about .. totally daydream-worthy

..yep...

###

So while I'm posting surf/beach pics, I might as well go ahead photo-dump some of my others from the PNW coast ..

In the NW, you often have to work a bit harder to find waves

But then you can end up at a place like this with no one else around ..

###

Around here late fall, as harsh as it can be, is very much a season of possibilities. So as I'm daydreaming about warm sunny head-high glass, I definitely still have one foot planted firmly in the reality of my current situation .. I went out today & got my snow-shredding setup all dialed-in & am anxiously awaiting my first deep turn of the season!

Tantalus

2009-10-25T22:22:00.002-07:00

In Greek mythology, Tantalus was a son of Zeus and of the nymph Plouto. He was favored by Zeus and allowed to feast on otherworldly Mt. Olympus with the gods. Myth has it Tantalus committed the crime of pocketing some of the food of the gods (nectar and ambrosia) & returned to the mortal world to share amongst his friends. Upon discovering his crime, the gods sentenced him to a rather difficult punishment: he was sentenced to Hades where he was immersed nips-deep in water and was surrounded by trees with ripe low-hanging fruits .. but every time he bent to quench his thirst, the water would disappear leaving him parched .. & every time he reached for a delicious fruit, the winds would lift the branches just out of reach. Thus Tantalus became the root word of "tantalize". Think about that the next time an advertiser pimps a "tantalizing" steak or creme brulee, and all you have to do is throw down your credit card.

In our non-mythological modern times, the Tantalus sub-range of BC's Coast Range is a spectacular vertical explosion of rock and ice running for about 35 km northwest from the town of Squamish into the upper reaches of the Squamish River valley. The range was allegedly named by a local climber who was "tantalized" by its soaring peaks and icefields, but who was unable to access the base of the mountains from across the wide, cold, turbulent Squamish River. Mt. Tantalus is the reigning peak of the range, but the lesser peaks are named after the ancient criminal's wife (Dione), daughter (Niobe), son (Pelops), as well as Pelops' son (Thyestes).

Anyway, here's a couple pics of the Tantalus that I shot from across the valley.

The Chelan Gorge is Neat-O

2009-07-17T06:03:00.000-07:00

I learned to boat in Colorado, and spent the majority of my first decade kayaking in there, so that's my main point of reference in this activity we call "kyaking" [sic]. That's also where I met Todd. We often reminisce about, and occasionally poke fun at the Colorado boating scene - perhaps even on this blog from time to time. Recently, the PacNW's latest Colorado transplant chimed in on the comparisons of the two regions with this post. It got Todd and I talking about Colorado boating again on our latest trip over to the East side of the Cascades, which happens to be very Colo-esque in climate. One conclusion we settled on was that, by comparison, photography is extra challenging over here in the deep, dark, well-forested runs of Western WA. Such would not be the case last weekend, however, as the Chelan Gorge has nary a tree nor a shrub in its bedrock crack, and nothing but crystal clear blue skies above. It also possesses plenty-o-sol allowing - practically requiring - shorties to replace the standard issue drysuit.

Prior to last weekend the Chelan gorge had only been run on one other occasion - during a flow study almost ten years ago as part of its Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) re-licensing process. Yet, this may be one of the most well documented rivers in the nation. This stretch is now in a three year review process with many stakeholder groups evaluating our actions on and off the river, which means even more documentation (such as here and here). And now, I guess, adding my own two centavos, and Todd's photos, makes it that much more documented. Hopefully all this will help future boaters determine if this is a run they are interested in and qualified for, as safety is the number one concern for boating this run, but it would also be good to show as much interest as possible over the course of these next three years.

A final note on the nature of this run during the review process. The agencies involved in these releases have been particularly concerned about liability issues surrounding our recreational activities. Participants must register on the Chelan PUD site, sign waivers, and check-in the day of boating. Realize that this is one of the more difficult sections of water to boat on FERC releases, and it is located in an area with no other class V boating options, so the community is not accustomed to the likes of us waterfall-loving types. However, you wouldn't know this by the welcome you will receive. The waitress at the Apple Cup Cafe asked about our adventure, a crowd of thirty or more spectators gathered on the bridge spanning the canyon, and the PUD folks were very excited to facilitate the process, working over the weekend and even baking us brownies. So, play by the rules, be patient with the paperwork, and come out to support this decade-long effort by AW!

I don't have a ton to add to the previously mentioned commentary. The run is fun. It's probably not destined for the fame of Tatlow or the fanfare of Robe canyon, but it is a truly unique gorge with amazingly beautiful water ... and did I mention that its hot and sunny over there. Time for the photos! (all photos by Todd Gillman)

Sequence of Bellingham-by-way-of-CO resident Leif Embertson in the 3-part first rapid.

Jonathan Ehlinger in the middle of the entrance rapid.

Tretwold

The bottom of the first rapid is formed by a tight constriction with plenty of funny water in front of it. The hole, at 350 cfs, is small in size, but curiously strong .. and difficult to hit with the proper combination of speed and angle, which produced some interesting results. Above is Scherdle on the approach.

There was one really nice cross-current boof..

... and a drop that was eerily similar to Monkey Cage on the Top Tye...

Chris on the Monkey Cage doppelganger.

The water spilling off the top of Lake Chelan was around 60 degrees, which, with the 95-degree air temp, was almost too warm. In fact, the excessive heat at one point had me feeling lethargic and lazy. On a day like we had you could easily get away with paddling in just a PFD.

The Chelan's stunning color and clarity is something more commonly associated with "butt-ass-cold," not "my-skin-is-melting-off-hot."

Directly below the Monkey Cage look-a-like rapid, there's a not-so-bueno big rapid that leads into a portage around a sieve. I think everyone portages both rapids all the time.

Some locals told us of the old days, before the dam, when as kids they'd hike into the gorge and play in the swimming holes. A member of our group discovered at least one "swimming hole" designed, it seems, just for kayakers.

The Chelan Gorge with water in it is indeed a "Chelan Beauty", but be advised if you're contemplating a long drive to take advantage of one of the scheduled releases: the run is short, like only 5 rapids short; there's a bit of mank to contend with on the way into the gorge; and there are 2 advised portages, one of which takes some time to move a group through. None of this is meant to dissuade anybody, just being clear about it.

On Relevance, Style, Semantics & Carnage-Filled Attempts

2009-05-10T09:57:00.007-07:00

I like when friends come to visit me here in Seattle. Whether it's for a specific purpose like kayaking or surfing or snowboarding -- or for no real purpose at all -- I can almost always find us something fun &/or troublesome to get into. And with the always entertaining cast of characters I run with, I can usually guarantee that my boring demeanor will be more than made up for by the likes of people like "Utah", "Shrtl", & "B-Rock".

Such was to be the case last week when my pal Evan, from the dry, brown, state of Colorado, came out to immerse himself in the essence of life, which flows in such abundance here in the Promised Land. From the git-go, the plan was focused on our annual Spring pilgrimage to that great Island of Fantasy to our north, which has provided reliable adventure, discovery, & story fodder in years past .. so it seemed a logical destination for early May, but with the caveat that the ever-wonky NW weather would almost certainly keep us on our toes up til the very last second. Heading over to the Island can be a bit of a financial investment & time-suck, so best we make certain them rivers is full before committing. And besides, mainland options would abound, so at least Evan was assured some good BC kayaking no matter what. From the git-go this was the plan, & a team of 8 was on board.

As luck would have it, neither rain nor sunshiny heat would hit the Island in time to justify our intended departure .. so the Mainland would have to suffice in the meantime. We could always just blast over to the Island for a quickie if flows cooperated.

Our 5-day trip began as a leisurely afternoon on the local favorite Robe Canyon. Prior to our trip, I'd only been kayaking like 3 times since Fall, so Robe's a good way to clean out the cobwebs & great introduction for our desert-livin', low-water mank-lovin' friend to the watery ways of the NW. From there we'd blast north to B'ham to drop off the Corey-dog at the dogsitters. It was there that we learned from our non-kayaking dogsitter friend that our trip -- before it had even begun -- was already being called a skunk fest. I was kind of shocked at her ability to see so clearly into the future & so I asked her if I would ever make enough money to buy a nice 3 BR craftsman in Seattle. Turns out, she didn't have the clairvoyance superpower, just a direct line of communication to one of the naysayers who had apparently decided early on along with 2 others to opt out of the plans.

No matter. In reality the exclusion of those guys almost certainly simplified things in a lot of ways. Coming to consensus on anything amongst the existing group of 5 was difficult enough without the addition of 3 more equally opinionated dudes:

"Where are we going today?"

"I dunno, I'll do whatever, as long as it's not this or that .."

"Can we stop & get some coffee?"

"No, seriously, it's almost noon, where are we going today?"

"I dunno. What's even running anyway? Maybe we should go into town & get online & look at the levels.."

"And get coffee!"

So at this point, the crew would be set at Schertzl, Tretwold, Evan & me .. & so onward we pushed, headed for Bryan & Lise-Anne's place in Squamish, with the promise of sunny skies & boring Elaho/Ashlu stuff in the a.m.

Just for fun, here's Sherdle cozying up with the unpredictable Stein Weasel

Just before our trip, I picked up a copy of the recent "whitewater issue" of Canoe & Kayak magazine, & was pleasantly surprised to find that The Range Life was mentioned by writer Joe Carberry in a list of "best whitewater blogs". Since TRL’s inception, we've invested lots of time & energy into building this site. But obviously, in the last year our bloggage has been a lot less prolific. One reason for that is cuz I work full time. Another reason is because we are, collectively, kayaking less; there's a lot of other fun/exciting/adventurous stuff to do other than just kayaking. And yet another reason is that the proliferation of kayaking blogs has kind of turned me off to polluting the airwaves with more of my own mediocre drivel.

Seems the only way to get a leg up in the blogosphere these days is to either point it off a really tall waterfall (preferably with a minimum of 3 Hood River photogs/filmers/bloggers on hand to document it), or more importantly, by loudly proclaiming how "sick", "hella big", "extreme", "dope", "next level" "gnar", "core", etc you & your friends are when you “give ‘er” & “fire that shit” & "get it done".

For every decent, humility-infused story that Darrin or Kirk posts, there’s like 25 other chest-poundin’, fist-pumpin’, “next level” bloggers cloggin’ up the Intertubes like cholesterol. That TRL is even considered relevant in this environment is very flattering, but definitely a little puzzling -- not only have we not been posting regularly, we haven't kept up with conventional WW blogging techniques.

And apparently we created an unintended outcome: Joe’s comment about our “carnage-filled first-descent attempts” gave us some laughs. And a little bout of indignance, like, "Dang! Really?? People read us for the carnage? What carnage??" Hmmm... first off, our trips are rarely carn-fests. No, really, they're not. Seriously, guys, they're not, I swear. Stop laughing.

Also because we rarely label our exploratory missions as "first descents", so how would you even know we're doing 1D attempts when we carn out? How did this happen in spite of all my efforts to the contrary? Shit.

Anyway, getting back to the point .. driving up to Squampton with the crew, comments about our impending "carnage-filled thousandth-descent attempts" were being tossed around liberally. As well as comments about carnage-filled "most-complete descents", "most-successful descents", "first complete-descents", "possible first-descents", "highest-water descents" & "second-descents".

You've spotted this trend, right?

If you're a sponsored kayaker, or even one of the top pros, it's not enough to go explore a river & document it for public consumption; you apparently must brand the experience so the reader makes no mistake as to exactly how "hella sick" you are & how important your kayaking trip will be to the future generations of kayakers. Sometimes it's also important to point out that you're just doing it for the love of the sport & that you're just trying to "progress" the sport. A "second-descent" of any river or big drop, while not as earth shatteringly “killin’ it” as a 1D, apparently serves to bolster the credibility of what would otherwise be a totally pointless day of kayaking .. so you gotta claim that shit! Claiming "highest-water descent" will surely earn you a spot on the Badass List, when you run something that has been paddled more than once or twice before. I was impressed recently to learn about the "most complete-descent to date" of an exotic river .. which is just like saying, "We weren't the first to try this run & we didn't run everything, but we're pretty sure we ran more drops than those last guys who tried it, so, clearly, we're more awesome."

Publicly qualifying your carnage-filled attempt of a river in any of the ways described above (& if you could invite a minimum of 3 Hood River photogs/filmers/bloggers, that would work best) will ensure that your trip to Tibet or Sumatra or Bolivia or Yakima is justified in the eyes of your sponsors, ingrained in the collective conscience, and that you are legendary on the World Wide Web. Just lay down some hella tight beatz on yo film footy & you got a next level trailer to drop on all those headz in the forumz.

“Good morning, Viet-Squam!” Irony is when the UV-addicted Rocky Mountain kayaker comes to the PNW looking for “hella sick” rain-fed rivers & all he gets is dry & sunny, just like back home ..

But that ain’t so bad, really .. is it?

Shrtl ain’t skeert.

Is this “the brown”?? I dunno. And where the hell is Mt. Zion, anyway?

Tret getting squirrelly on Fear

Evan splatty in the funny water

Shrtl lookin’ good in the run-out after stompin’ out the portage. Quote of the day: “My lady loves it when I style the portage line on the big drops!”

Chris in the pinch

Evan, with what we think might be Mt. Zion in the background .. For all you Ras Trent’s out there, stay true to the path ..

Pretty nice little afternoon we had .. but we weren’t done yet. Bryan was doing some carpentry work out the Squamish valley & wanted to meet us for an evening blazer down the Ashlu Box. We got to the bridge & the level looked good enough. I mean, we were hoping for “highest-water descent” material, but that wasn’t the case, it was just a boring old “medium-perfect”. We’d have to go for some other monumental distinction on this run.

Turns out, we nailed it! I successfully logged my “most incomplete-descent” of the Commitment Canyon of the Ashlu when, after blowing it at Kernage, I ended up in a hungry hole & became permanently separated from my vessel. Complacency is a crime. ”Running the brine”, it turns out, is not. The upper canyon of the Box is not an easy solo egress. I made it up a little crack in the wall a couple hundred feet to a ledge where my hopes of “walking” out would be dashed. I’d have to hunker down & wait for my pals to return on foot, with ropes. I ended up ascending the last little bit of slimy vertical wall with the aid of a pair of Tiblocs.

So there’s the “carnage-filled” epic our loyal readers have come to expect from us! Now where’s my effin’ boat? Count that as my first-ever real sacrifice to the river in many years of whitewater paddleboating, cuz that Everest was never seen again. And I hate littering.

Next day was more Ashlu Box. Here are some “hella sick” angles.. these angles are definitely “next level shit” only available to the hardcore pro photog on foot who isn’t encumbered by a heavy plastic boat.

Kato

Tretwold finishing up Triple Drop

Dang! This angle on Kernage definitely illustrates how a fella might free himself inadvertently from his vessel, right? Is it “the brown”?? I think it could be ..

Man Chris, this is some "extreme brine"

Evan Dotcom, guide book author, “fired that shit” whether it was “the brown” or "the brine" or not.

So did Schartel.

First drop of Twin 10’s as illustrated in-sequence by several different paddlers.

Looking up the lower canyon at what could be Mt. Zion in the background

Interestingly, Shertyl logged his own “most complete descent” of the Box just a day after I logged my “most INcomplete descent”.

Last thing on the Box..

*********************************
Oh man oh man! I was really hoping to get to say “huck” a whole bunch! That’s another one that’s a guaranteed winner for bloggers. I’m in luck with huck, cuz we spent an afternoon conducting a “huckfest” at Britannia.

Huck!

Huck!!

Huck!!! Even though I love this shot, this is actually kind of embarrassing. Media Frenzies ‘R Us! This isn’t even kayaking. Next time, let’s go kayaking eh?

Bonus: Furry goes un-hucked

Try as I might, couldn’t convince anyone to "give 'er" or "fire that shit". Guess it was too “brown” to huck.

******************************

The last day of Evan’s little vacay would be a bit more exploratory. I think we can safely call this one a “possible 5th descent” of Ruby Creek, which is pretty rad because the “possible” implies that we could actually be farther up the chain than #5. Maybe we were #3, which is only one slot down from the coveted “second-descent”. And since no one really knows much about this creek, I might as well go ahead & claim the “possible 2nd descent” & throw that out to the forums, cuz no one will argue. Booya!

Shrtl.

Ev

Tret

We knew there would be a nice waterfall series in here. It was kind of hard to scout from above, but what we could see looked pretty great. I volunteered to go first, mainly cuz I wanted to take photos from downstream, but also cuz I hate dilly-dallyin’ above big rapids & I wanted to just get it over with. I got pretty nervous while I was trying to scout, but that’s exactly when I realized that someone had just survived a 186-foot waterfall & that it was totally ridiculous for me to kook-out about a 30-footer. Seriously, think about that the next time you’re in your boat above that 15-footer that’s giving you the willies – 186 feet. Thanks for that Tyler.

Ev in sequence.

Shrtl.

Chris

After this thing, we had to portage a ginormous cascading mess. Chris was expedient in setting up the rappel. I went down first & received 3 out of 4 boats before requesting another man. Again, I wanted to take pics. The next hour was spent getting hypothermic in the mist zone while god knows what was taking so much time up on top of that cliff. I never got the real story on what the hold-up was, but I have a suspicion it might have been the result of a fierce Stein Weasel attack, but maybe we’ll just never know..

Evan finishing the rappel

View of zone from downstream

You can barely make out Chris rapping down in the upper-left of the shot

Nice little thing to exit the waterfall series.

***********************************

So that was pretty much our skunk-fest of a weekend.

One week later, *everything* is running at primo levels, it's sunny & warm ... but all I can think about is going surfing. Why is that? Maybe that's what is causing my blogger-relevance-insecurity complex, Joe Carberry. The swell sucked this weekend so i should've gone boating with my friends .. but I ended up riding my bike a lot, eating too much food, & drinking too much beer. I think I can honestly claim a "most successful run to date" of the Ballard Farmer's Market today. Seriously, when you factor in the out-of-season organic beets I magically scored, & that I sat next to & ate pizza with that hot, tattooed, Uma Thurman lookalike girl that I see around sometimes, man, it was a pretty successful & relatively carnage-free attempt. And to you folks who doubt the intensity level or "brown-ness" of it, try riding fixed, fast & brakeless through the hordes of Fremont gapers on a sunny Farmers Market day, with a bag full of fresh organic produce & farm-fresh cheese, & a beer in hand. Hey, move it, man! There's a beverage here!

So sick.

PSA: Robe Race Details

2009-04-26T21:48:00.004-07:00

Happy Spring everyone. We're targeting Saturday May 16 for the 2nd (possibly) Annual Robe Canyon Downriver Race.

Here are some relevant details:

* Teams of two

* Staggered start above Tunnel; finish at the beach below "Conversation"; +/- 5 mi.

* "Landslide" = mandatory portage

* Actual race date may be pushed out at 11th-hour due to flow considerations. Range = 4.9 - 6.5'ish (or however high racers are willing to go).

* This is an unsponsored, grassroots, non-event

* 1st Place team gets to take home the sweet winners' robes; Last Place team gets to take home & take care of The Robe Gnome for the next year

Interested in racing? Cool, please register your team asap by posting a comment below or emailing me your team members names & email addresses.

Interested in volunteering? Excellent, we need finish line timekeepers, shore support, & a couple safety kayakers.

Last year's race day was muy divertido! Here are a couple links to stories & lots of pics from last year:
Our own;
Owen's
EJ's

Also .. huge appreciation to my brother Tim for providing the artwork for the race announcement. This piece will also be embroidered on the backs of the winners' robes.

Feel free to post/email any questions, comments or shit-talking.

Updater Jan. '09 | Happy New Year/Era

2009-01-19T17:57:00.000-08:00

We're already a couple weeks into the new year, but tonight it really feels like we're on the eve of a new era. And that feels good.

Know what else feels good? Squeezing every last bit of fun out of a weekend. This past weekend's a great example. All last week, a beautiful head-high swell taunted any worker bee who dared peek at the charts or webcams. At the same time, Seattle's best local class V run had leveled off & stalled at perfect flows, after a very major flood event. By Thursday night, the weekend forecasts for both options looked to be holding somewhere in the realm of "super awesome". Plans were made. And then executed. Those who participated were rewarded with juicy overhead swell at Westport on Saturday .. & juicy extra-medium flow on The Robe on Sunday.

Lots of "stars" on the swell forecast!

Holdin' steady in the High 5's!

That was, as Schertzl says, a "proper weekend".

Okay, since we don't really blog all that much any more, there's a backlog of stuff to post .. so here's an Updater .. let's roll.

I. Robe Race 2009

II. Photo Dump
a. Ashlu kayaking
b. random stuff

********************

I. Robe Race 2009

Wayrad MacGnarly at Lil' Miss Sunshine 2009 v.1
Photo: Leif Embertson

The Robe Race Committee gathered yesterday to inspect the changes to the course, as put forth by Ma Nature in early January '09, and after not much deliberation, voted unanimously in favor of going forward with the planning of Robe Race 2009.

Notable changes to the race course include the following:

1. The house-sized rock just upstream of the lead-in to Little Miss Sunshine (the one in the center of the river in the flatwater adjacent to the river-left staging eddy; the one we would eddy out behind before running the "center boof" line) has been pushed or rolled about 15 feet downstream, right to the lip of the ledge. The river-left slide-to-kicker thing is still good to go & may have even cleaned up a bit. The center boof is still there, but there's currently wood in the channel making it not that appealing. There may be a far-right line available if you like dealing with junk in your face.

2. Over the last 4 years, Garbage had gone from bad to awesome to okay to bad to worse .. & now back to AWESOME. There is now a ridiculously lofty, clean ledge boof on the right. 8 feet if it's an inch. Best boof on the run? Perhaps ..

3. The river-left eddy water between the 2 ledges of 20-foot Waterfall now bleeds quickly downstream into the ugly pile of rocks on the left. Best to nail the top boof & then move quickly to the center line on the 2nd ledge.

4. Off Broadway has had a similar recent history as Garbage, & same as that rapid, it is now much better than recent manky versions. The first ledge has lost a lot of its gradient during '08 high water events, but it's now pretty much wide open from far left (great 4-foot slot boof) to far right (water boof or tongue option). The unstable second part of the rapid has changed again, and for the better -- there is now a superhighway-to-kicker-boof that, if you nail it right off the peak, sends you flying at high speed beyond the hole at the bottom. So good..

Other than that, most all major rapids are more or less the same. Lots of subtle & not-so-subtle changes to the 'tweener rapids .. holes or rocks that used to exist have disappeared, old fast lines are now squirly eddy water .. The deck has been reshuffled & everyone will have to relearn the canyon to be competitive this year.

Also, one last point .. we will pick a tentative date for the race based on snowpack & flow forecasts in the coming months .. hopefully in April again. And if on that date it turns out that we have 6 ft. on the gauge, the race is ON. So get comfy in the canyon & get out there when it's extra-medium, cuz it's extra-fun.

********************

II/a. Ashlu Kayaking Photos | Fall '08

Mine Run
Photo: Todd Gillman

Chris Tretwold
Photos: TG

B. Smith
Photo: TG

Portage on the Mine
Photo: TG

Shane Robinson, Fifty-fifty
Photos: TG

Commitment Canyon .. The Box
Photo: TG

Photo: TG

JP
Photo: TG

The Box Teacup
Photos: TG

Bryan getting Engaged
Photos: TG

Robinson
Photo: TG

II/b. Random Photo Dump | Friends & Places & Stuff

I shot a series of b/w images of Shane making Biodiesel at the local Bio CoOp. I like how they turned out.

Friends from the East Coast & CO on their first trip to BC .. peering into the Box
Photo: TG

Andy G. checking surf
Photo: TG

County Line
Photo: TG

Liv, Tret & Hillary canoeing/crabbing in Chuckanut Bay
Photo: TG

Dinner!
Photo: TG

w/ Matty G.
Photo: TG

Shrtlvision .. cold day at the Cove
Photo: Ryan Terry

Same cold day at the Cove
Photos: Ryan Terry

Liv on the Strait
Photo: TG

Jonaven serving breakfast in the Airstream
Photo: TG

Downtime in the Airstream
Photo: TG

That's all I gots. Here's to a fun-filled & safe new era y'all .. keep in touch!

Dipper Creek: The Lower Canyon

2008-11-08T20:10:00.000-08:00

((Be warned, this is a long report.))

Recall from our first Dipper Creek post that we encountered significant hesitation & resistance on our exploration of the Lower Canyon. Here's how it played out.

After hiking out of the Upper Canyon, we bid farewell to our land support team & headed to Dipper Camp, where Chris whipped up a Thai green curry masterpiece (suggestion: include a backcountry chef jedi in your crew). In the morning, Bryan & Shane jogged in for one last peek at Vertigo Gorge to make sure the flow was appropriate, while Chris & I cleaned up camp & set shuttle. Upon our return from setting shuttle we got the radio call from the boys saying, "It's pretty iffy. It definitely goes, buuuut .... You guys should come down here & look at it & decide for yourselves."

Not the report we were hoping to come back to.

Spent the rest of the day bushwhacking, rapping into the gorge, & just trying to get enough of a vantage into the gorge -- to simply see what was going on in there. We hemmed & hawed, ultimately deciding to pack it up & leave Dipper Creek defeated & demoralized.

In a high risk environment such as this, it's fascinating how the group dynamic can swing so swiftly from total confidence to total concession. When it comes to backcountry exploratory missions, we, as a team, are generally pretty gung-ho for a challenge & some adversity. And we are at home in difficult whitewater & box canyons. We'll run some shit. But at the same time, we tend to err on the side of preparedness & caution. All of us are over 30 -- way past college, so to speak -- so we're not as loose in our approach as we may have once been. And I'd attribute our longevity in the exploratory side of the sport, along with our relative lack of "episodes" (epic injuries in the backcountry, multi-person blowouts, near-death experiences, gnarly evac's .. you know, just general stupidity) to that conservative approach. And so, if that leads to more "hardcore" crews sometimes calling us pansies, or if it means the occasional trail-of-tears slog out of some ridiculous canyon, then so be it, at least we gave it a shot ...

I'm reminded of when we were in Peru last year. After we conceded defeat & hiked out of the Rio Huallaga, we headed to Cusco for more adventures. I ended up stuck in town by myself, sick as hell, while the rest of the crew was out paddling the Abysmo del Apurimac. After a couple days just hanging around our friend Piero's empty house sleeping, I got restless & decided to catch a taxi to another part of the city. I visited Piero's sister who owns a little restaurant/lounge & drank tea & tried to eat some food. I thumbed thru a coffee table book about mountaineering in the Andes & came across a quote that really resonated at the time, & still does now:

As mountaineers we look for challenges that make us feel alive, because we love life & challenges. These challenges allow us to decide when to continue or when to go back. After all, the mountain will always be there. The decision to stop is an opportunity to return again.

Renzo Uccelli

So there we were. At the take-out. But not because we successfully navigated our way down Dipper Creek, but because we were in fact being pansies. And what a lame feeling that was. The seeds of doubt had rooted into the collective consciousness & grown into a show-stopping lack of confidence. This is common in kayaking. An internal battle between that which you know you're capable of doing & that which is unknown. Part of you wants to push on, while the other half is wracked with uncertainty. We all knew in our hearts that we were more than capable of dealing with whatever the gorge put in front of us, but in our heads we were experiencing a blockage that kept the whole team from executing on that.

Turns out, sometimes the "easy" way out can prove to be even more stressful than the alternative.

Thankfully, Chris was not content to let us just leave the valley so hastily. At least not without a couple beers & some further discussion. We had another day to work with. So as the story goes, we turned right back around & went back up to camp. Chris had a strategy in mind for dealing with scouting, setting safety, running &/or portaging the 30-footer that drops into the gorge. It was already starting to get late in the afternoon, but once we got back up to camp, the plan was to run down the Cougar Trail as fast as they could to Vertigo Gorge to inspect Chris's plan & to drop some ropes from anchor points on the upstream & downstream ends of the gorge.

Suddenly we were reinvigorated. We had beer, we had food, we had a plan & we were sticking to it!

Weeee're baaaaaack! Oh man, I love the look on Bryan's face here, which foretells the trouble he's gonna be in with his wife upon his eventual return home!
Photo: Chris Tretwold

Chris prepping for his racing-daylight rope-setting mission.
Photo: Todd Gillman

Chris explaining to Bryan just WTF is goin' on here.
Photo: Todd G

Bryan & I got dinner rolling while those guys did their duty. We were relieved when they returned with the news that Chris's idea for dealing with the waterfall would likely work out. In the a.m., we hiked straight out of the back of camp, down into the canyon at one of the only places throughout the length of the creek where river-level access is relatively easy.

Chris admiring one of the huge Doug firs at camp.
Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Heading in!
Photo: Chris T.

Lower Canyon scenery
Photo: Chris T.

The first significant rapid in the Lower Canyon .. a tight, twisty s-turn thing.
Photo: Chris T.

After the 1st rapid there's a handful of fun slides & ledges in the 10-ft range .. then almost before you know it, you're at the cusp of the main event, Vertigo Gorge.

You'll need one of these (ascenders) ..
Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

We anchored to a tree that hangs into the gorge on a rocky outcropping upstream of the entry falls ... then rapped down into the LZ on the right, where there was a tiny slimy ledge adjacent to a tiny eddy at the base of the falls. From here, I'd be able to scout the LZ of the falls & set safety, as well as figure out whether or not we'd be able to drop into the gorge without running the falls.

From this angle you can get a feel for how bowled-out the LZ of the falls is.
Photo: Todd G.

The eddy room backed up by a huge boil against the wall downstream. You can also see the limited view we had into the gorge.
Photo: Todd G.

So what's up with the falls anyway? Well it's 25-30 feet tall with a very narrow channel of water on far river-left that slides/rolls off the lip before going vertical about 15 feet off the pool. The falls is almost entirely river-left, with a big granite block that keeps you from being able to go right .. so it falls into a room backed up by a huge caved-out wall. The exit of this room is via a tiny opening on far river-right. A tall boil forms along the downstream (river-left) wall, & it feeds fiercely either back into the eddy room, or directly into a nasty undercut pocket on the river-right wall.

I gave it the double-thumbs up!

Bryan was fired up to run it, thinking that he could either air it out directly into the outflow (threading the needle between the boil/eddy room combo and the undercut right wall), or just plug it into the tiny river-right eddy. We decided to run the whole gorge in pairs, so I stayed down in the landing to set safety while Shane ascended all the way up to the Cat Perch to run the cameras, & Chris hung on the lip of the falls manning ropes. There was lots of mist & although I was on belay, I felt very unstable on the slippery ledge .. so I left my camera in its drybag.

Bryan exploded unexpectedly into my peripheral vision, looking to be angled a little more vertically than we'd imagined, then he disappeared beneath the boil. He resurfaced upright but in the left eddy-room .. dang.

Bryan penciling-in on Vertigo Falls
Photo: Chris T.

I watched as Bryan battled unsuccessfully to traverse the boil & impact zone. Exhausted, he signaled he was ready to get bagged outta there. As he was being pulled thru the impact zone, being drilled by the falls, he lost his paddle, but I got him into my little eddy, which was the important part. The eddy room was unbelievably powerful for such a low-volume stream. His paddle would have remained in the room for an eternity, but we were able to fish it out. There was not room for the both of us & two full boats on the tiny ledge. It took a tense couple minutes to sort everything out without ending up in the water or losing our gear downstream.

Fishing for Bryan's paddle
Photo: Chris T.

Now Bryan & I were faced with the decision of whether or not to proceed. From where I was at, I could see down into one of the most beautiful & intimidating gorge views imaginable. Once Bryan caught his breath, he asked how it looked downstream & I told him not to look, he wouldn't like it. The double-drop at the exit of the falls room lands in a much bigger, cavernous, bowled-out room, then disappears into a steep, narrow, dark crack in the earth. We didn't know much of anything about this drop from previous scouts high on the rim of the gorge. It looked bigger & more vertical than we had imagined. We did know that if we dropped into the rapid directly below us, the only way out of Vertigo Gorge would be to run it & everything else below it .. none of which we really seen. I was sure that I could squeeze past the boil/undercut & from what I could see, I thought I'd be able to scramble out onto the left wall to scout the next falls. Problem was, if we didn't like what we saw, it didn't matter, we'd have to run it. This was a nerve-wracking but almost giddy experience.

We decided that we had to trust ourselves & trust that it was good-to-go. I dropped in first, battled against the boil & slid past the undercut & into the fun double-boof into the calm green pool. We were surrounded by waterfalls, but it was eerily quiet in this incredible sanctuary-like room. The view downstream was unreal -- nothing but dark polished rock with a tiny portal disappearing out the bottom of it all. Our scout of the drop was quite obscured, but it looked okay. We could see downstream the corridor to the next blind corner, which appeared to be a crisp right-hand turn waterfall. There would be zero safety & zero egress. Bryan went first. I could hear the hull of his boat make that hollow, throaty sound as it impacted water, but the drop was so overhung, I couldn't see him until he came into view downstream under the roof of the right wall. He howled in approval, then disappeared out of sight as he cranked a big cross-current boof off the corner falls.

Bryan in the double drop below the entrance falls .. this lands you in the heart of Vertigo Gorge.
Photo: Chris T

Bryan scouting a super-tight falls in Vertigo Gorge.
Photo: Todd G

Bryan running the super-tight falls in the middle of Vertigo Gorge.
Photos: Todd G

At this point, Bryan had disappeared around the corner. I had no idea what was going on beyond what I could see. He was on his own, I was on my own, & I was nervous & wanted to record the heaviness of the moment ..
Photo: Todd G

Turns out the falls I was standing on top of was great -- maybe 10 or 12 feet, slide-to-vert & very tight .. the landing moves fast to the right & resurfaces under the roof on the right. The corner falls is exactly what it looks like from upstream -- a super-crisp vertical cross-fader, maybe 15-20 feet or so. The surprise bonus was yet another mandatory falls of maybe 12 feet to exit Vertigo Gorge.

Bryan on Vertigo's exit falls, with the corner falls visible just upstream..
Photo: Todd G.

We were ecstatic! We ran down to our pre-set egress point above an unscouted huge falls .. and then gave the good news to Shane & Chris, who then made quick work of the gorge.

Overlooking the breadth of Vertigo Gorge .. Chris & Shane about to rap-in.
Photo: Todd G

Shane running the double & celebrating in the cathedral room
Photos: Todd G

Shane & Chris in the heart of Vertigo .. from waaaay up above. The corner falls is clearly visible on the left.
Photo: Todd G

Chris T.
Photos: Todd G.

Shane R.
Photos: Todd G.

Vertigo exit falls
Photo: Chris T.

Overhead look at the pool just downstream of Vertigo Gorge.
Photo: Todd G.

Fun slide below Vertigo Gorge
Photo: Chris T.

Shortly below Vertigo there is a very large waterfall that is impossible to scout without dangling into the gorge. We were racing daylight at this point & decided to expedite the completion of our mission -- we portaged the big falls & headed down to the next available river-level access, which happens to be just upstream of the two confluence waterfalls.

Shane running the confluence falls
Photos: Todd G.

Chris, with motion-blur, running the confluence falls
Photo: Todd G.

Me ..
Photo: Chris T.

And Bryan ..
Photo: Todd G.

At the Squamish confluence
Photo: Todd G

Shane & me running out to the Squamish ..
Photo: Chris T.

From here you just have to figure out how/where to climb out of the Squamish R. Downstream there's a significant gorge that we ran a couple years ago. The climb out wasn't too bad there, but we opted to hike out at the confluence .. bad call, don't do that.

We'll work on a wrap-up with all the vital details about the creek .. put-in, take-out, rapid count, etc. In short, we ran all but several individual rapids & one short section at the end of the Upper Canyon. Bryan sez there's one mandatory portage falls in that section, but apart from that, I didn't see a single rapid on Dipper Creek that wasn't runnable -- this includes both huge falls & Rowdy Flatwater. We left some serious scraps on the table, but we did what we had to do in order to get down the creek. I guess you could say Dipper Creek is like an amped-up version of Tatlow. So if that's your style then go get it!

Dipper Creek: The Upper Canyon

2008-10-30T19:58:00.000-07:00

Shane & I got out of Seattle at a reasonable hour after work. The plan was to meet Chris in B'ham, slam some dinner real quick & then finish the drive up to Squamish. The three of us were giddy with excitement, having resigned ourselves to our fate. We had done about as much prep work as was possible & even had a semi-complete list of all the known rapids on the creek. Comes a time when you just gotta step up & take what you got coming to ya, and in the morning we would do just that.

Morning came quickly. A high pressure system brought clear bright skies and cold temps, making for the first time this season I'd have to chip frost off my windshield. We were at sea level in Squamish, & we knew it would be even colder up in the mountains. Bryan was stoked to have coerced a land support team, including his wife Lise-Anne & our buddy Jonaven, into bushwhacking along the rim of the gorge with ropes in case we got ourselves into a pickle & needed a haul outta there. Stopping along the way at Jonaven's, we were surprised to find out that he'd also talked 3 of his gung-ho buddies into joining them on the land crew.

On the drive up, we were still unsure on the actual plan. Would be be starting with the Lower Canyon, since it seemed at the time like less of a chunk to bite off? And since, with our foot soldiers in mind, the hiking along the rim of the Lower Canyon was much easier. Or would we put our support crew through some pain & suffering, & just fire into the super-steep Upper Canyon without the benefit of a recent scout of the bottom part of that gorge? We debated the merits of each & ultimately decided to head upstream to attempt the Upper Canyon .. again.

The hike in wasn't hard by BC standards, but definitely got the blood & sweat flowing. And compared to our slog UP the very same canyon wall a year prior, it was remarkably easy. .

Big Dipper.
Photo: Todd G.

BD Falls is every bit of 70 feet & not nearly as "slidy" as it would appear in the photo above (blame that on a bit of distortion from my superwide lens). It is totally runnable, and I'd probably run it the next time I'm up there .. but I can't help thinking that the landing's equivalent to being a quarterback getting sacked by a really big lineman who came in hot on your blindside. Keep in mind this rapid drops immediately out of the pool that Double Dip, the 2-tiered 50-footer, lands in. Our goal was to actually figure out & run Dipper Creek to the bottom, not invest a ton of time in safely stunt-boating two big falls. We also couldn't risk blowing our long-awaited opportunity on a trip-ending explosion/evac scenario on the first rapid. So with that in mind, we admired the awe-inspiring view of Double-Dip-into-Big-Dipper on the way to our chosen put-in at the base of BD ..

Tret in the BD exit drop .. a fun, low-stress way to start this mission!
Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Shane very stoked to be committed to the gorge.
Photo: Todd G.

Upper Dipper is quite stacked. Just around the bend from the spectacular entrance series is Dipstick, an S-shaped rapid that involves boofing a small horseshoe ledge while limbo'ing some wood, then driving left & back to center for the main part of the rapid -- a silly 25-foot slide.

Photo: Todd G.

Shane sez: While this drop wasn't all that difficult, it felt good to actually have to make some moves to stick this drop. Dipper is such a low volume creek, it would be easy to get lazy and just drift and boof ... it ain't no Robe Canyon.

Chris on Dipstick
Photo: Todd G.

Dipper is all bedrock all the way .. pretty much.
Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Bedrock constrictions form most of the Dipper's rapids, which included lots of little ledges & long twisting slides. From Dipstick, a few mellow slide features leads you to Little Dipper Falls, a drop that we'd gotten a glimpse of on our first aborted mission, & ever since, had been calling "The 50-Footer", for the sole purpose of descriptive naming.

River-level scout of the drop formerly known as The 50-footer.
Photo: Todd G.

On one of Bryan's later scouts of the creek, he deemed it in the neighborhood of 35 ft. Scale & proportion tend to get skewed one way or the other when scouting from so high above the features. At any rate, this must-run slide-to-vert falls is very good to go, & was the standout rapid of the day.

Bryan "Kato" Smith calling dibs on this one.
Photo: Todd G.

Shane sez: ^^^ I love this shot. The vantage downstream almost steals the focus from Bryan, and it really captures what it looks like in there - the canyon is every bit as tight as is looks downstream!

Now for some perspective, here's Chris running it with Bryan in the pool below.
Photo: Todd G.

Chris's view of me running Little Dipper.
Photo: Chris T.

Shane rolling in ..
Photos: Todd G.

And we haven't even gotten to the crux yet ..

Shane probing a super-tight, un-portageable constriction below a sizable ledge. Maybe we should call it Skinny Dip .. I dunno. This rapid is visible in some of the Little Dipper shots above.
Photo: Chris T.

At this point we were getting hemmed-in. I mean, we were "in the gorge" from the put-in, but at this point it gets really deep & really tight .. which leads us to Rowdy Flatwater.

Los Dudes eddying out at the lip of Rowdy Flatwater.
Photo: Todd G.

Looking back up at Skinny Dip & Little Dipper from the lip of Rowdy Flatwater. It's a big steep drop into the slidey bit of RF, & it's this part that falls onto a ridge of rock extending from river-left that is scary.
Photo: Todd G.

RF is a looooong twisty, very constricted, very steep rapid formed by a vertical right wall that goes to the sky .. & a sloping, moss-covered left wall. The main issues with the rapid are: (1) the seemingly unavoidable piton in the entrance, which would slow you down enough (or stop you dead in yr tracks, or destroy your boat) making the violently recirculating hole behind it a real hazard; and (2) if, by the grace of the buddha, you make it thru that mess, you still have a couple more bad holes to negotiate. It's only a boat-width wide, so how bad could it be right? But that just means the holes are really long upstream to downstream & that moving left to right to get outta the holes isn't an option.

Looking downstream from the entrance. You see the line, right?
Photo: Todd G.

In spite of the very slick bedrock, moving around on the river-left side of RF is surprisingly easy .. but with higher water, that option would shut down. Since there was no way to walk "around" the bottom of the rapid, we put our land team to work for the first time here. The portage was very involved, & it probably would've been easier to just roll the dice on running the rapid. We set up a rope-assisted traverse with elevation-control from a line running up to an anchor manned by a couple of those dudes up the canyon wall. This worked for boats & paddlers. I think you could still make it work w/o the land team, but it would be a much more wet experience .. & I think in the future at least the bottom half of the rapid will just get run via a sketchy seal-launch .. hate to be the last guy, though.

Our portage circus.
Photo: Todd G.

Below the debacle that is Rowdy Flatwater, a little bit of boogie water & more jaw-dropping gorge scenery leads to some very fun stuff. It was here that Bryan said to me, "Now we're in the gorge!" .. I got a chuckle out of that. I knew what he meant though -- now we're in the deepest, most constricted, least portageable, & least known part of the gorge. Yeeha!

Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

The creek is small, so the eddies are tiny. At one point, we each occupied our own respective eddy while Chris had a scout from a boulder on river-right. He then waved Bryan, then me, thru a steep slot. Bryan got out below on river-left in the midst of the continuous rapid, while I awaited instruction. He gave the "so-so" look, but I was eager to move. It was blind, fast & very fun .. & I was under-prepared for how long the rapid was. I bombed over a slide-to-boof into a very tight pinch, into a fast jet approaching an obvious boulder boof, into ... it just kept going! finally subsiding in a narrow corridor of perfectly polished granite with a towering waterfall cascading down upon my head. Excellent.

Photo: Todd G.

Shane sez: This drop was such a bonus. I'd never scouted this section of the river, so this drop was a surprise and so much fun. It had an entry boof that looked tricky, but once I landed that, it was just splashy and fast all the way through. It just kept dropping, and I didn't know what to expect so I just kept throwing in boof strokes. Then you come around the corner and there is the amazing waterfall cascading in off the right wall. Wow!

Bryan
Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Appreciating the amazing place we landed in.
Photo: Todd G.

At this point, the creek continues to fall away thru a series of slides & small falls. Unfortunately, our progress was stopped by wood at a point in the gorge where portage was impossible. For a tense moment, it was questionable whether or not egress from the gorge itself was even an option .. but we were fortunate to have stopped in a place where the left wall mellowed just enough to allow us to rope up & out. We radioed-in our support crew to meet us with ropes. We hauled 7 or 8 pitches with their help & did a bit of a bushwhack mission in the typical BC fashion before reaching the road no worse for wear.

Photo: Todd G.

Decision time .. where do we go from here?
Photo: Chris T.

Up & out is where we went from there! Our ground support crew assisting in the get-out. Huge thanks to all those guys!
Photo: Chris T.

Dipper Creek: The Backstory

2008-10-23T05:00:00.001-07:00

I. The origins of interest

Bryan: Back in 2005, a boater friend of ours, Jay Mitchell, had just received his pilot's license and was trying to log as many flight hours as he could. He offered up a handful of scouting flights, including checking out the Upper Tatlow, which was one of Jonaven's big priorities. Jay had also been flying up both the Elaho and Squamish and kept telling us that we needed to check out the Upper Squamish.

One afternoon after a flight over the Upper Tatlow, Jay flew up the headwaters of the Ashlu, around to Salmon Arm, and then up the Squamish drainage for us to get a look. Jonaven was busy taking notes on rapids, while I tried to film what I could. From the air the Squamish looked really impressive. There was a rapid in the lower reaches that we called "Science Fiction", and in trying to get a good look at it, we saw a tributary just upstream that looked like it had a 20-footer into a 40-footer dropping right into the Squamish. So now in addition to the Upper Squamish, we had another creek we needed to inspect at ground level.

Todd: From the get-go, they called it "Waterfall Creek", and it was immediately on the list of must-do missions.

Shane: During this time, Jonaven and Bryan were really excited about the Upper Squamish. None of us knew much about it, and information from the older locals was skimpy at best.

Todd: Our "beta" was limited to,"It's got teeth!"

Shane: The funny thing was, after the first Squamish flight, all I remember Jonaven and Bryan talking about was this "Waterfall Creek". I really had to pry the actual name from them. We all got really excited about it, but at the time, we were narrowing in on running Upper Tatlow. Then with the whole Vacation to Hell thing, everything got shelved while we planned for Peru.

Todd: Dipper wasn't even the main thing; it was the Upper Squamish we were after, which, after a year or more of talking about it, Bryan, Drew & I finally got on in March '07. It was on that trip that we got our first real look at "Waterfall Creek".

Bryan getting his first river-level look at the waterfall at the confluence of Dipper Cr. & the Squamish R. in March 2007. Very enticing!
Photo: Todd G.

Todd: Shortly after we did the Squamish, Bryan, Lise-Anne, Drew & I spent a day trying to scout. Looking at the maps, river-right seemed to offer the best access, but we hiked all day through the BC jungle & never actually got to the creek.

Scouting.
Photo: Todd G.

Bryan rapping into the canyon.
Photo: Todd G.

Todd: Right when we got back from Peru, we began planning a couple weekend multi-day trips on the Stein & Clendinning. Bryan had worked out a deal with Darren at Black Tusk to fly a heli up to the Clendinning put-in, & to take a route flying slowly up the Dipper valley on the way.

Shane: I got tasked with riding shotgun in the heli, scouting and shooting video of the creek on the way up to Clendinning Lake. I had two initial thoughts. First, I was excited, because both Todd and Bryan had at least seen the confluence waterfall, and I really wanted my own peek at this thing. But my second thought was that I was nervous to be in the position of making the call about whether it was worthy of further effort. Upper Tatlow had been billed as a valley full of granite waterfalls, but was somewhat of a bust. I didn't want to repeat that by giving the go-ahead on yet another BC suffer-fest. However, flying over "Waterfall Creek" made that decision very easy for me. There were three others in the Heli who had no idea what we were scouting, and they were all piping-in on the intercom system as Darren buzzed the creek, "Whoa, look at that!" Steve said, and "Did you see that drop?" followed Tim. I think even Darren offered up, "that river looks pretty full-on."

Todd: It was really hard to contain our excitement when we saw the footage. I remember watching it with those guys, saying "15-footer, 20-footer, 10-footer, 15-footer .. Whoa! Big one! .. 10-footer, 20-footer .." I think it was pretty obvious we were onto something.

Bryan: Because we let the cat out of the bag, so to speak, with the heli flight on the way to the Clendinning, I was a little worried that word was going to spread on this thing. Steve Rogers and Tim Loubier were on the flight with Shane, and they both were very curious about the creek as well. I remember trying to suppress the rumor mill by telling them a couple weeks later, after our first real bushwhack scout mission, that the creek was choked with wood and way too steep. Every successive scouting mission up there was kept quiet, and I just kept telling those boys that we were working out the Upper Squamish

II. Just put on!

Todd: In September '07, we were talking about getting another flight over the creek. Shane ended up sending an email saying "I can't afford a heli scout, so I'm advocating for the Huallaga approach: Drive to the top on Saturday, drop in, be safe, hike out if necessary." Bryan replied, "We got topos, couple long ropes...ready for a big mission. From the topo it looks like about 400fpm. Bound to be a couple classic waterfalls somewhere in that section!" We all kinda came to terms with that approach & decided to just go for it..

The dudes at the Elaho/Squamish confluence, planning our approach. At this point, we still thought we could access the creek from river-right.
Photo: Todd G.

Route-finding. The valley in the distance is the Upper S., while in the foreground, where Chris & Bryan are standing, is the river-right side of Dipper. The mountain behind that is river-left. We are pretty much right across the valley from Dipper Camp, which serves as the halfway point on the run.
Photo: Todd G.

Todd: We drove up the river-left & came to a bridge in the headwaters area. The creek looked like junk there, but downstream there were some hints of fun bedrock. We decided that would be our put-in in the morning .. junk be damned.

Bryan: Just finding the creek was a huge success in my book. We had been up there 3 times prior just trying to get a view of the creek from river-right, with no luck. The heli flight had revealed logging roads in the upper reaches that crossed the creek and drew us further up the drainage. I could not believe we were actually putting on this thing.

Sunrise @ Dipper Camp, Sept. '07. We had clear, cold nights which kept flows off the icecap low .. right where we wanted them for an exploratory into a steep, deep gorge.
Photo: Todd G.

There are cut-blocks surrounding Dipper Cr & the Upper Squamish, but there are also plenty of huge, old Doug firs & cedars that were left standing. Good mornin'!
Photo: Todd G.

Chris is bummed he sold his Syncro Van!
Photo: Todd G.

Just put on! Shane approaching ..
Photo: Todd G.

Shane: I remember our excitement at that put-in. Just upstream we could see some low angle bedrock slides that got us all excited for what might be hiding around the corner.

Todd: But for the next couple hours we bashed our way through steep, low-flow boulder mank .. total boat abuse.

Shane: I think I was the first one into the eddy above Double Dip. It kinda sneaks up on you, especially when you are in the mank-bashing mindset. I just remember the horizon line was huge. I didn't know whether to be excited or scared. Actually, I'm pretty sure this sentiment followed all of us throughout this entire mission.

The first rapid into the gorge is Double Dip, a two-tiered 50-footer into a beautiful green pool ... that drops immediately into Big Dipper Falls, a +/- 70 footer into another beautiful green pool ... that drops into a nice 10-foot slot.
Photo: Todd G.

Chris: I pulled into the eddy last and Shane gave the "tall drop" signal. I remember everyone had that wide-eyed look on their faces, it was just the first of many more of those looks.

Todd: I saw lots of mist rising downstream & remember Bryan looking back saying, "I think we got a waterfall! Looks big!"

Chris: I remember standing across from "Double Dip" with Todd, the two of us looking at each other, and Todd saying with a nervous and excited tone, "We're gonna run this S@*T!" Slightly unsure, I nervertheless agreed with a "Hell yes," and then headed down to set safety for Bryan's probe attempt.

Bryan: We when got to Double Dip, I was feeling pretty fired up. We had been trying to run this creek for over 2 years now, my energy was high and we had finally found a waterfall after a morning of boat-bashing mank. The drop had issues for sure. It had a twisting 8-foot slide leading into the first of the 25-footers, which was going to make the entry hard. The obvious boof on the left of the first tier was scaring me a bit because of the caved-out left pocket eddy in between the two waterfalls. The pool at the very bottom was plenty big, but it did exit straight into Big Dipper Falls. We scampered around for a bit and found out that you could get out above Big Dipper. I told the crew I was ready to fire it up. Todd and Shane got set with cameras, Tretwold sat in the pool below with a bag, and I walked back to the top. I made one last radio call to the crew before I got in my boat and then made history, of sorts.

When bad things happen to good people. Dang.
Photos: Todd G.

Shane: After Bryan's crash, I think we all decided we were done paddling for the day - at least I did. We decided to use the remainder of the day to walk the rim and see what else was downstream. We were blown away! It was hard work navigating the bush, but it seemed like every time we got another view of the river we spotted another waterfall ... she was really living up to the moniker we gave her!

Todd: I'm pretty sure we knew before Bryan even ran the Double that we were going to be spending the rest of the day bushwhacking, not kayaking.

Chris: The real eye opener was the amount of time it took us to just get to "Double Dip" and then deal with setting safety for Bryan. We thought by about the third waterfall we saw while scouting further downstream, if each of these huge falls was going to take an hour of investment, or more, how long would it take to run this creek in its entirety?!

At the lip of Big Dipper Falls .. the river-right wall was vertical & very very tall, & would prove to be that way for the entirety of the length of Dipper Creek.
Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Photo: Todd G.

Big Dipper & the 10-footer exiting the teacup as viewed from downstream.
Photo: Todd G.

Chris: The boys had been making noises about this creek for a while. My only view of it pre-trip was some of the heli video, and it looked like some good stuff, but, you never can tell what's going to happen when things get this steep and small. Fortunately, the creek was sliding, falling, and pinching its way through a nearly squeaky clean gorge. Just scouting it was a lot of fun.

A sweet 12-footer into a plucky hole ..
Photo: Chris Tretwold

Typical Dipper Creek gorge scenery ..
Photo: Todd G.

Todd: We spent the rest of our day looking at nothing but gorge walls & bedrock features, one after another. We spent a bunch of time at an obvious crux -- a long, stair-stepping, sliding rapid that was formed where the vertical river-right wall met the dome-shaped river-left wall, & was only a boat-width wide for the length of it. It had a super steep lead-in that dropped onto what looked like a mandatory piton, backed up by a series of bad holes. We called it "Rowdy Flatwater".

The dudes sorting out Rowdy Flatwater.
Photo: Todd G.

Todd: Even though it was obvious the gorge continued on downstream, we had to call it here. It was getting late & we still had to climb out of the canyon with our boats. We knew there was lots more work that needed to be done on this before we could come back with boats.

Shane: The hike out was brutal! One of the worst I have ever done. There was one steep section about a quarter of the way from the road where I was really hitting the wall and losing my footing with every step. I almost ditched my boat there, and the excitement about finding a waterfall-studded canyon was quickly fading. I charged ahead with one last burst of energy and eventually hit the tangle of alder at the road cut. That s&*$ was so thick, I could barely get my body through it, let alone my boat. But I knew we were at the road ... what I didn't know was if I ever wanted to come back to this creek with the thought of hiking out.

Chris: Haha! I remember Todd slipped and fell, and yelled something about ditching his boat. All of us thought about it at one time or another, I'm sure. That hike was Hellish. We took a break and I actually climbed up a tree with the hope I might be able to see how close the road was -- it could have been a quarter-mile or few hundred feet away. Thankfully, it turned out to be the latter. After the hike I was sure -- in a nervous sort of way -- I wanted to come back. But the thought of hiking out would curb my enthusiasm each time I thought about Dipper Creek over the next year.

Bryan: As we hiked out, the morale of the group was at an all-time low. Yet it was this trip and what we learned about the waterfalls lurking downstream that cemented our desire to come back again and again until we figured this run out. We had seen the potential and despite the hellish hike out, we would go away obsessing about this place, and keeping a lid on the details until we discovered more. It was still "Waterfall Creek" and we still had a massive amount of work ahead of us.

Over the course of the next year Bryan would make several more key scouting trips into Dipper, connecting the dots working upstream from Dipper Camp to "Rowdy Flatwater". He learned that, even though we had seen many big runnable drops that day, there was still a lot more to the Upper Canyon. And we still had no idea what lurked in the Lower Canyon from Dipper Camp down to the confluence. When the team returned in Fall '08 to give it a go, the Elaho was hovering around 80cms. Turns out, Dipper was too high .. not by much, though. This creek runs through a very deep slot canyon from Double Dip the whole way to the Squamish; to be in there too high would be terrifying, and being an exploratory mission where we'd only seen bits & pieces, we'd prefer to err on the low side. Instead, we spent the day scouting, finally getting to see the Lower Canyon, including everything leading up to the spectacular Vertigo Gorge (which was named because, after peering into the deep chasm from high above, Chris & I both quickly backed away from the gorge rim with an eerie spell of vertigo). We saw several other slides, a huge waterfall, & the two waterfalls at the confluence.

Nothing we saw in the Lower did anything to deter our motivation to return .. in fact, it only strengthened it. Below are a handful of images from our various scouting missions.

Late summer & fall means huckleberries.
Photo: Todd G.

Bryan looking in on the Lower Canyon.
Photo: Todd G.

Shane about to scout a waterfall.
Photo: Todd G.

Lead-in to a waterfall.
Photo: Todd G.

Landing zone of a waterfall.
Photo: Todd G.

Bryan working out a line on a waterfall.
Photo: Todd G.

Waterfalls!
Photo: Todd G.

Ain't No Fat Ladies Singin' 'Round Here!

2008-10-19T16:30:00.001-07:00

"Man, I've never wanted to run a drop I didn't wanna run, as much as I want to run that drop."

Those were my words to Bryan as we were on what was supposed to be a quick final scout of "Vertigo Gorge" prior to giving the rest of the team -- Todd and Chris, who were presently setting shuttle -- the green light to drop in. But now the analysis paralysis had set in, which prompted us to radio them with the not-so-rosy report and get them to hike in and meet us for further inspection and a group decision.

After hiking down the cougar trail along the rim of the deep gorge and rapping in for a river-level look at the source of our indecision, Todd returned and expressed the same sentiment, almost verbatim.

And now here we were standing on the Cat Perch overlooking one of the most impressive and committing gorges we'd ever seen, all quietly thinking the same thing.

Hours later ... we'd broken down camp and wallowed in our defeat at the takeout, drinking a beer before returning to civilization and the responsibilities that always pull you out of the woods sooner than you'd hope. We were bailing out of yet another canyon. This time, the third time, on our ongoing 3-year project we'd taken to calling "Waterfall Creek" for obvious reasons.

"Everyone should drink another beer," Chris chided us, in an attempt to slow the retreat.

We were demoralized and facing a long drive back to the city. Boats were strapped, gear was sorted, and iPods were plugged in, ready for the road. So when Chris casually offered up his next proposal, it really seemed to come from left field, although now, after a couple beers, we were probably more receptive. Turns out, that was part of the plan.

"What would you guys think if we could get around the waterfall and down to that little eddy? I'm ninety-five percent certain there's a big tree upstream that I could use as an anchor to rap down into the gorge. If it works we could still run the rest of the gorge. I mean, would that change anyone's mind?"

"Ah man, that's cheating. That waterfall is the price of admission into that place." Todd said.

"No way, man! I mean, the goal is to make it down through the gorge, travel the river, run some good drops and see some good scenery, right?" Chris countered.

It took only a couple seconds of consideration for Todd to agree and pipe up, "Okay, I'm in! If you can get me to the base of that waterfall, I'll drop in," as he grinned and looked at the others.

I then upped the ante, offering to just go ahead and run the waterfall as long as I had a person at the base of the falls with a rope. All weekend long, Todd and I had been the most adamant about expediting the mission and getting back home early. But now here we were, all flipping the proverbial bird to responsibilities, SO's, and sound decision making -- we were driving back up to our camp. We were going to put on Dipper Creek ... again.

On the Cat Perch overlooking Vertigo Gorge
Photo Chris Tretwold

The heart of Vertigo Gorge is caused by the huge intrusion from river-right.
Photo Todd Gillman

Photo Todd G.

Middle of Vertigo Gorge
Photo Todd G.

The cathedral teacup within Vertigo Gorge
Photo Chris T.

The double-drop into the cathedral teacup. The lead-in to the double is a waterfall into a caved-out room.
Photo Todd G.

River level scout of Vertigo
Photo Todd G.

Bryan & Chris contemplating commitment & consequences in Vertigo.
Photo Todd G.

It's good to be back!

Upper Silver Creek

2008-06-09T23:03:00.003-07:00

Tret & Shertl told us Silver Creek was a lay-up. I was lured in & on the hook with tales of bedrock & waterfalls. Shertl arranged for a NF valley resident to pick us up at the gated road closure, then it would be a quick drive up the road plus an easy 3-mile hike in, then just fly down the creek & be back in town in time for BBQ .. I had even gone so far as to make plans to drive to the beach afterwards to camp & surf that night.

Hmmmm ..

Truth be told, I played waaaaay too hard & waaaaay too late the night before, & was operating on about 3.5 hours of sleep. The realization that our day wasn't going to be expedient set in when, before we'd even started our hike, Drew pointed out that we'd already invested 4 hours into getting to that point.

Hmmmmmmm ..

Sometime after my gnarly hole beatdown & logjam swim, plus several hundred subsequent log portages (with my club-like frozen feet), all that was going through my head was that witches' line from Macbeth, Double double toil and trouble! .. Over & over & over like a mantra.

For those of you who've forgotten, here's the whole passage, to refresh your memory:

Thrice the brinded cat hath mew'd.
Thrice and once, the hedge-pig whin'd.
Harpier cries:—'tis time! 'tis time!
Round about the caldron go;
In the poison'd entrails throw.—
Toad, that under cold stone,
Days and nights has thirty-one;
Swelter'd venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i' the charmed pot!
DOUBLE DOUBLE TOIL AND TROUBLE;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and owlet's wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
DOUBLE DOUBLE TOIL AND TROUBLE;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
Scale of dragon; tooth of wolf;
Witches' mummy; maw and gulf
Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark;
Root of hemlock digg'd i the dark;
Liver of blaspheming Jew; (ED NOTE: Drew, no blaspheming!)
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Sliver'd in the moon's eclipse;
Nose of Turk, and Tartar's lips;
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,—
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
For the ingrediants of our caldron.
DOUBLE DOUBLE TOIL AND TROUBLE;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.
Cool it with a baboon's blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.

Anyway, here's a couple shots from the day .. the real trip report & lots more photos will be posted at Bellingham Whitewater shortly .. so best you go there to check now.

The hike was so awesome!

Splashy whitewater sometimes frightens Shertl. This look of terror is something I've witnessed all too often.

On the hike up we couldn't help but notice the massive avalanche that bridged the creek. We were sure we'd have to climb out of the canyon & portage it. To our amazement, we were actually able to paddle beneath it. Bueno!

There IS a waterfall on this creek.

Remember, full TR at Bellingham Whitewater.

Also, Bryan's got some awesome stuff up at the Reel Water site .. "bergy bits" & such .. Go there!

Van Island Revisted: Do Not Forget Your Sixth Sense

2008-06-07T12:04:00.001-07:00

The most recent adventure to Vancouver Island was my first, and while Todd provided an excellent wrap-up in terms of a trip report and the usual eye candy, I thought I would chime in with a little verbal musing of my own.

Filming the previous rapid, I was the last of the group to catch the large eddy behind a house-sized boulder where everybody was pondering the next step. I could feel this tingle in my body and wondered why the pace of the group appeared to have stalled more than the usual approach to another horizon line. That tingle was not fully realized until I drifted over to Bryan who then stated, “We’re boxed in now!” Ah-ha ... the extra acute sensations I was experiencing was in response to the sudden change in river character – vertical walls on each side with very limited scouting and portaging options. This “spidey sense” is important for boating in the Northwest and indispensable when dropping into rivers on Vancouver Island – don’t forget it!

This was my first trip to the Island, but I had heard the many rave reviews from Mr. Gillman’s previous adventures and this one promised to include many of the same antics. Gold River would be our “Zone” (an apparently NW dialect) for this mission and after dropping Jakub’s car off, we had a huge list of classics and potential first and second and maybe even third descents thanks to the gracious beta from Vancouver Island’s Shane. Readers should be reminded at this point that the Northwest and BC in particular is notorious for beta that is light on important details such as marginally runnable rapids that are difficult to scout and portage, and rather the beta takes the “its all good … go get it,” tone.

So it should have come to no surprise when on our third and final day – the day we were supposed to be busting out three classics – we encountered our second fully boxed-in and vertical-walled junk pile of a rapid. And we were still on run numero uno. The spidey sense had been running on hyperactive for the last 36 hours and maybe due to fatigue this early in the season, almost allowed to us to get ourselves in a real bind.

As the dealing unfolded, an hour later we had not progressed much. Todd was still upstream making room on the camera memory card for many more incredible pics; Shertzl had not said in word in the last 45 minutes and still had not found a egress less than 5.11c; on the other hand Ryan had verbally dissected every possible line we could make out from upstream and none of those options sounded good to me; Jakub kept giving the signal of nervousness by pretending to chew his fingernails and pounding his heart; and Bryan had decided to go get a second opinion from Jakub’s perspective on the other side of the crick.

Heading home on the ferry, spidey sense back in recovery mode until it will surely be called upon in the coming weekends, we all relished in those memories. Some of which were not fun in the moment, but all of which worked out in the end with reasonable options for safe travel. Standing on top of boulder in the middle of the river, not knowing if I would be paddling downriver to the next eddy or attaining upstream to the top of the gorge; throwing my boat from a forty foot cliff and jumping in after it; portaging through the dense underbrush of the BC forests where the ocean on the other side of the mountain is closer than the nearest road; and getting deep in the sh!t – this is why I will go back to the island and love every minute of it!

If you read/skimmed all of that hoping for some pretty photos, you will have to just go back to some of Todd's posts ... and you should:
Van Island:Gold River Zone:Day 1
Van Island:Gold River Zone:Day 2
Van Island:Gold River Zone:Day 3

Clearwater Carnival

2008-06-04T23:41:00.002-07:00

A bunch of us had the good fortune of catching the Clearwater on a sunny Saturday last weekend. It's hard enough to just catch the creek running -- like the NF Snoqualmie (Ernie's), the Clearwater drains an area that's been extensively clearcut, so water levels tend to spike & plummet dramatically, making the creek extremely fickle. The B'ham crew tends to treat a Clearwater day like they would an epic powder day on the mountain. Find it running on a bluebird day & it's like "Drop whatever it is yer doing, Let's go creekin'!"

It's been said there's 30-some individual rapids in about a mile & a quarter .. so really it's more like one long rapid. And it's a lot of fun to just bomb it real fast. So I only stopped at a handful of places to shoot photos.

Drew

Kennet & Tret

Shane Sliding For Life

Paul G.

Checking In from Newfoundland!

2008-06-01T03:28:00.004-07:00

After coming home from the Van Island trip, I spent a week dealing with final preparations for over two months of filming on the East Coast. I always find it hard to leave the Northwest, but I was pretty stoked to get rolling on my next sea kayaking film Eastern Horizons and open my eyes to some new landscapes. The first stop on the Eastern Horizons film shoot and tour was Newfoundland. The main reason for starting the trip on "The Rock" was largely dictated by the invitation to be a whitewater guest at the Kayak Newfoundland Labrador Retreat held in Terra Nova Provincial Park. Every year the KNL crew invites two guests to come paddle, teach and swap stories with them. This year they invited myself and Fergus Coffey to share the honors. The keyword of this event is RETREAT. It is not a frantic, hectic symposium sort of event with people running around with radios and dealing with logistics. It is a gathering of both whitewater and sea paddlers from all across Newfoundland for a weekend of paddling, eating, stories, music, and catching up. The KNL whitewater guys Darren McDonald, Dave Innis, and Dave Mac showed Fergus and I some quality whitewater. The Northwest River was by far the paddling highlight.

This was a really fun twisty, turny bedrock drop on the Northwest.

photo by Fergus Coffey

This waterfall was a pretty full on 30 footer that has only been run a couple times by Kev England. We spent a bunch of time scouting the entrance and then decided to give er. We both stomped this one out, threading the needle into the meat of the drop.

photo by Fergus Coffey

The weekend flew by and the hospitality of the KNL crew was unmatched. I found it ironic to be getting a taste of how good the whitewater paddling was, yet having to set it aside to move onto filming sea kayaking for a couple weeks up North. I will certainly be back to Newfy with a creeker after the seeing some of the rivers and waterfalls to be had.

Post retreat I packed up my gear and headed North to meet Lise-Anne, photog Phil Tifo and his girlfriend Chelsea to go sea kayaking with the ice bergs for ten days. Not a bad angle on exploring Newfoundland and an incredible start to the next big project for Reel Water...Eastern Horizons

Getting into the ice bergs in Twillingate

If you have never seen an ice berg before I recommend the experience

Lise-Anne all smiles after a sunset paddle with the bergs.

Lise-Anne and I will be on the road through the end of July and back in BC for the prime whitewater season. You can follow our trip on the Eastern Horizons blog. Phil Tifo took some unbelievable photos of this trip which will be up shortly on the blog. Hope everyone is getting after it and enjoying Spring!

Hot Spot: Gold River; Part 3 / The End

2008-05-23T22:52:00.006-07:00

I would have preferred to get the 3rd & final part of this blog post up sooner, but time for quality blogging is in short supply these days. I don't really have much of a trip report to offer for our last day, so this will mainly be a caption-assisted photo dump.

The general overview is that we planned a big "hat trick" day for our last day. That is, on day 3 we wanted to complete 3 different runs -- the Upper Gold, the Upana, & the Heber -- before racing back to Nanaimo to catch a boat back to the mainland.

Sore from the previous day's dealings, we rose early, ate quick & headed out to the Upper Gold, which, according to our minimal beta was short, not terribly difficult, & well worth doing just to float into its spectacular gorge. We anticipated a "hit it 'n quit it" run that would be a good warm-up for the rest of our day.

This was our put-in wakeup rapid ..

The Gold is a river, not a creek. We ran about a mile or two of easy whitewater in a beautiful canyon before an innocuous blind bend sent the entire crew scratching for a surging small eddy at the entrance of a tight sheer-walled gorge. We were fortunate that the eddy was even there, & even more so that we were able to scramble up onto a ledge, then traverse, then up to the rim of the gorge. The rapid looked incredible & a little reminiscent of "Conversation" on Robe Canyon, all big waves & holes compressed between vertical walls. Upon scouting we found that the thing kept going & going into a super tight pinch with a couple bad boils & undercut walls. Problem was the log across the gorge at clothesline-yer-head-off level. There was no real option to run the top of the rapid without being forced into the ledge with the log. So we began the long portage ... Here we go again ...

This is the log that gipped us out of this amazing rapid.

Jakub contemplating the limbo-to-undercut-pinch

Jakub & Bryan decided to do the assisted drop, under the log & into the pinch. Both reported sketchiness with regard to the pinch move & the undercut wall, & didn't recommend doing it .. so the rest of the crew opted for the 30-foot throw 'n go from the gorge rim. We all got to float out through the unbelievably beautiful corridor, just some of us did it out of our boats.

Shertl with the Michael Jackson glove & with the assist

Dealin' with the boily stuff & the undercut

Kato in the pinch..

.. & out of the pinch

On the rim of the gorge, pre chuck, pre huck.

More class IV rapids led us to an obvious big-ass gorge rapid. Nothing about this rapid looked appealing from upstream .. but we dealt with it, just not quickly. We ended up taking so long to scout/run/portage this one that by the time we got off the run, we had to scramble to get shuttle run & head back down to the Upana. Here are some more pics from the Gold.

Me in some random boogie water

Right side = bad scene

Onto the Upana .. The Upana is a classic creek run with lots of manky boulder rapids, then slidey bedrock rapids, leading into another spectacular Van Island gorge. The first gorged-out rapid came as a surprise & though not very steep, it was a bit plucky with 3 back-to-back ledges/holes to punch. Then there's the perfect 25-footer .. & another big boof with a tricky lead-in .. followed by a bunch of bouldery mank. That's the Upana, & it's a must-do. By the time I ran the waterfall & met Bryan in the eddy below, we were really pushing our luck -- not with regard to daylight hours or the creek itself, but it was like 4 or 5 o'clock & we were still way up-Island, in a canyon, when where we needed to be was in the truck on the way to the ferry dock. Couple of us had to work in the morning. Needless to say, we wouldn't be getting on the Heber on our way out, or achieving our hat trick. Damn. We hightailed it off the Upana & out of the Gold River / Strathcona zone, happy nonetheless with an incredible couple days of exploring Van Island.

Here's some photos from just a couple of the rapids on the Upana .. didn't have time to wield the camera too much.

Wayrad in the first gorge section w/ Shurstle looking on from the eddy

Jakub approaching a nice corner-boof

Kato preparing for liftoff

This is the best view you can get of the waterfall prior to running it semi-blind. It's good, right down the gut.

Kato dropping.

Wayrad from the right..

.. and the left.

Giddy up! Time to drive like hell & catch a ferry!

Hot Spot: Gold River; Part 2

2008-05-12T21:54:00.004-07:00

There in our back-o'-nowhere version of a cul-de-sac, in the scrappy remains of what once was a noble coastal subalpine forest, we set up camp, ate, drank & told stories around a raging fire. Throughout the afternoon & evening the cloud cover had all but vanished, leaving us with clear mountain views & a setting sun that painted the snow-laden high peaks of the Strathcona with orange & pink alpenglow.

We drank a lot of beer, celebrating our good fortune & the fact that 36 hours in, Schertzl had somehow managed to avoid sabotaging the trip with some kind of ridiculous injury or accident. Jakub, the Czech, opened & passed around a bottle of hooch. I crept off to my tent & drifted off, listening for the chugging noise of the morning's first whitewater between the frequent howls & cackles coming from the fire ring.

Our morning plan was to expedite shuttle & breakfast & try to get on the river early-ish so we could make quick work of the Lower Ucona before tackling another river objective in the evening. Shane & I ran vehicles down to our takeout at the confluence of the Ucona & the Gold, & came back to a hot breakfast waiting for us. Ryan had done the short hike down to where we'd left boats at riverside & reported that the level had come up.

Our post-coffee wake-up call would be "peel out of eddy, drop into tight mini-gorge".

Bryan Smith about to wipe the sleep out of his eyes.

Shane forgetting all about his bad dream about not passing the Bar exam

Tretwold boofing-up on the right side of the bed

The geology of this first gorge was similar to that of the middle stretch & of Pamela Creek's creamy white granite. It continued that way for maybe another mile, with intermittent class III & IV & occasional vertical-walled sections. Rather abruptly the geology changed, & the appearance of chunky boulder obstacles became common.

Downstream view without "chunky boulder obstacles"

Upstream View with "chunky boulder obstacles"

While studying the maps the night before, Shane had said, "Here's our first red flag," pointing at the topographic feature due south forming the river-left canyon wall ... "Crumble Mountain." Appropriately, the canyon downstream of here, was not only steep, very deep & narrow, but also choked-off in many places with monstrous boulders that had broken off the canyon walls. These boulders lying on bedrock & pinched between walls formed the majority of the seivey rapids. As Jeff R. had mentioned in the comments section on the previous post, parts of the Lower Ucona were very reminiscent of Ernie's Canyon near Seattle .. which translates to "Please try to avoid contact with rocks & walls." We rounded a corner in a flatwater section & the river-right wall soared upward over a thousand feet. "Remember, river-left is our friend," Chris said.

Jakub on a random rapid

Shane about to get all Air Jordan

The author of this here blog post, gunnin' for a slot. Photo by Jakub Drnec, not by me.

We ran a handful of fun rapids before being faced with hideous boulder shut-down. We could have really screwed ourselves here, having gotten a little greedy with a series of fun boofs which lured us into a totally walled-in gorge section. Fortunately, we were able to squeak through the upper bit of this zone in our boats on river-right & portage easily down the rest. This put us deeper into the gorge with no real egress in sight, but everything we saw downstream indicated that it would be manageable at river level .. so we ate lunch & pushed on, which really was our only option anyway.

Shrtl "dusting it off & stomping it out" very much on the radar

Tret threading needles

The view into the top of the gorged-out section .. beautiful & sketchy

Easy portage around sieved-out mess

Slow, safe downstream progress prevailed through more fun, walled-in & sometimes sketchy rapids. Chris had a close call with a gnarly wood/rock sieve while leading through one section. Shane was able to set up midstream safety/assist so the rest of us could fly through the rapid. Several times from upstream rapids would look impassible, but we'd find a narrow slot that would allow us to stay in our boats.

Radley about to clear a big hungry hole

Dig the sidewall design on that Everest! Nice boof in the background ..

Kato driving the Everest through some heavy channelized stuff

Jakub closing the deal

Before long, we could see in the distance the river-right canyon wall of the Gold River, indicating that we were nearing the confluence & the end of the Ucona canyon. Just when we thought we were home free, we came into a section of raging Death Metal -- waterfalling, cascading, sieved-out chaos in a sheer-walled gorge. Sweet.

The calm before the storm. We were able to run the next steep tight slot along the left wall, but then the bottom fell out ...

The bottom of the first part of the nastiness. Chris' little point & shoot doesn't accurately capture the scale of this mess. Believe that it's large & very unrunnable.

Chris, Shane & I volunteered for scout mission, which involved scaling the river-left wall high above the gorge. We looked for an end to the madness below & a way to deal with it at river-level. Failing that, we wanted at least a short up/down route around the (hopefully) short sieve section.

We found neither.

The BS continued for a long way, carving ever deeper into the gorge. We were way off the deck looking down into nasty nasty whitewater. I wish I had taken my camera with me on the scout, but it was a brutal walk that I knew I would be doing twice, so I wanted to minimize the baggage. As such, we have very few images of that chapter in our story. We reached a bit of a plateau with fairly manageable terrain/vegetation for portaging, & we felt like we were beginning to work our way down toward the Gold R. (as opposed to back toward the Ucona). We decided that we would be portaging at least to this point & that it would be best to just get everyone moving together as a group. Chris & I guessed that we wouldn't be back in this spot for at least another 2 hrs. Shane & Chris were the only ones the day before with any interest in "just dropping in" on the lower Ucona at 4pm. Now, faced with a 'Nam walk, we agreed unanimously that a loose decision like that would certainly have resulted in tales of desperation & woe -- at best, a sleepless night spent shivering in the woods trying not to think about bears.

People like us, we ascribe a certain value to suffering. As much as we fear the brutality involved in dealing with hike-in's & bail-out's, nights spent huddled on a rock, crawling through the understory on hands & knees, solo, in a bear tunnel .. or having to knock on the door of a single-wide in Meth Country to beg for tap water .. Hard as we try to avoid those scenarios, we also take a thinly-veiled, sadistic pride in our propensity for colossal failures. The suffering allows one to truly appreciate the fleeting moments of glory that we are fortunate to occasionally achieve. And just as important, these episodes make for great story fodder (add a couple beers to the mix & you'd think half the stories are worthy of being turned into a screenplay) ... & really, who doesn't love recounting the tales to friends & family? Which, ultimately, is the whole reason that The Range Life even exists.

The easy stuff

The not so easy stuff

Merely one hour later, we had the whole group of 7, plus boats, up on the bench looking for the best way back down to water. A long multi-pitch rope-assisted descent ensued, & we re-launched within sight of the confluence. All tolled, we portaged for only a bit over 2 hours .. 2 steep, sweaty, dirty hours.

Two senior citizens .. This Doug fir, at the end of our portage route, was a couple hundred feet tall.

About to finish out the Ucona to the Gold confluence. (((Our run was not a first descent, but it may well be a LAST descent. Construction on a hydro project will likely begin on the Ucona later this summer.)))

Then, of course, we set up camp, ate & told stories around a raging fire. And drank a lot of beer .. celebrating our good fortune & the fact that now, 48 hours in, Schertzl was still with us in good health & without any new black eyes, broken teef, bones, "blisterpacks", "cankles" or "punji stick" incidents. Cheers to that!

Hot Spot: Gold River; Part 1

2008-05-07T22:55:00.005-07:00

Throughout our community of whitewater paddleboaters there are certain places that, due to a particularly dense concentration of high quality rivers & creeks, have become embedded in the collective conscience / lore, & are destinations on every traveling boater's life list. These zones have a couple things in common, most notably that there's a large "main stem" river into which any number of runnable tributaries spill, all within a close proximity of some kind of "base camp". Places like Fayetteville, WV, Hood River, OR, & Squamish, BC come to mind. This past weekend a crew of friends from Seattle, Bellingham & Victoria linked up to do some exploring in one such hot spot -- Gold River, BC.

Bryan Smith, Jakub Drnec & I had earmarked this 3-day weekend a while back with a Van Island adventure in mind. Jakub was hot to check out a couple rivers whose life expectancies, due to impending independent power projects, are especially short. As mentioned in recent posts, we've been experiencing a very cold Spring -- more like an interminable Winter -- so flows have remained low everywhere north of the Columbia. Throughout the past month we all kept our target weekend open, & as if on cue, more hospitable weather & more water arrived at the beginning of the week. On short notice, we made some calls & managed to cobble together the rest of our team, the usual suspects, who represent the underemployed dregs of Norfwest society .. but are damn fine boaters & perhaps even more importantly, great company on a long-weekend roadtrip.

One rig got an early jump on the Friday urban-escapee traffic & made haste to catch the boat outta Tsawwassen, while the other went north to Horseshoe Bay to pick up Kato.

We barely made it onto the ferry as the next-to-last vehicle allowed to load.

The plan was for all of us to meet in Nanaimo & formulate a quick strategery over dinner. Once off the mainland we came into rain, which increased in intensity throughout most of the night. Though no one was looking forward to a cold, muddy camp scene after a long day of travel, the rain was a welcome event just the same. The forecast called for sunny & warm for the rest of the weekend. We settled on GR as our destination & were psyched to finish out the remaining 3 hours of travel.

The route to GR takes you up the east side of the island to Campbell River, then northwest through the interior, over a divide in Strathcona Provincial Park, & then back down toward Nootka Sound on the Pacific side.

Hours of windshield time ..

.. leads to delerium.

GR is in the interior of the island, but sits at just 300 feet above sea level near the head of Muchalat Inlet, a great arm of Pacific that stretches deep into the island. From town you can see the big peaks of the Strathcona towering to over 6,000 ft, & in this year of heavy snows & persistent cold weather, they're still caked with big snowpack. It's a zone that's chock full of things we like a lot: big rivers & creeks, polished granite, lakes, rugged coastline, big mountains, big trees, wildlife .. & a very laissez faire attitude.

We pulled into our lakeside camp late Friday night, surprised at how dry it seemed. The rain had subsided long before we crested the pass in Strathcona & to me it looked like the storm hadn't really hit GR. We fell asleep to a chorus of croaking frogs & woke to chilly clear-blue skies.

From our camp on Star Lake

Dorking around with morning reflections on the lake

Within a 15-minute drive from camp, we had access to maybe 7 different runs, hence the "hot spot" title. We crossed the Ucona River & were disappointed to see low flow. We posited that perhaps a smaller, more channelized stream such as Pamela Creek, might be doable. So we continued on, only to find the same (predictable) situation there. But Pamela was perhaps the most seductive put-in I'd ever seen.

Her temptation overwhelmed the group, which didn't want to spend the day driving around looking for water on what was clearly a low-water day. So we decided to just drop in, knowing that we'd likely be groveling for some love on Pamela, but then would confluence with the Ucona, & with the extra flow, we'd have plenty of water for the second half of the day.

To the best of our knowledge, Pamela had been run once & the reports were "waterfalls in a spectacular gorge". The reports were spot-on .. once we got past the weak sauce low-flow boulder mank. In the gorge, the crystal clear water flowed over smooth granite & the mank was all but forgotten.

Tretwold on the first drop of the first one-two punch

The exit drop

Ryan B. on the same series, from below

Kato on #1

And Kato on #2

Stoked!

Another double

Shane coming out of the bottom of the second drop

Ryan in the beautiful gorge/pool just below the double

I took a ton of photos of the gorge/pool & the slide just below. The clarity of the water & the smooth rock were phenomenal.

Erik Schertzl

Below here the gorge ended & we banged down through an intensely beautiful run-out section to the confluence of the Ucona. For future reference, 2 to 3 times the flow would have been nice in there. At this point our plans were to continue boating the entire way through the Middle & Lower Ucona. The 5-km lower stretch would be considered exploratory, as at the time all we knew about it was that a team had attempted/portaged it. The Ucona drains a piece of southwestern Strathcona Park & flows westward to meet the lower Gold. Its final canyon is pinched tight between Ucona Mountain to the north & Crumble Mountain to the south for the duration of its steep 5-km descent.

We confluenced at several km into the upper/middle run(s) & were immediately into a stellar granite box canyon with plenty of water. Seeing the familiar sight of mist billowing up from below a horizon line, we got out to scout & saw an absolutely perfect 20-footer into a deep crack. Looking downstream, we could see another steep horizon line into a massive wide-open pool, but this drop appeared to be blocked by wood.

Chris dropping the first ledge ...

... & throwin' horns in the pool below.

Looking down on the bottom of the gorge. The plan became, get out river-right & portage the log, then put in immediately downstream of the log & run the last waterfall.

Looking up into the first falls

Bryan on the second falls

Ryan

The author .. separation anxiety.

Jakub .. our Island host

Schrtlvision

Afterglow ..

We took much longer than planned on Pamela & the middle Ucona. By the time we got to the point where we needed to decide whether or not to continue on through the lower, it was nearly 5 o'clock. We voted to leave our kayaks at river level & send one group for the shuttle vehicles (requiring a loooooong walk on a lonely logging road), while the other group attempted to scout some of the lower canyon. The scouting didn't work out so well so we dorked around instead. I made Wayrad run the rapid just below our takeout, so I could take advantage of nice light.

And then we climbed out of the canyon & built a fire on the logging road & waited for the other group. We ended up camping there with the plan to drop into the Lower Ucona bright 'n early.

Dinner, being prepared by Kato (& Tret), never tasted so good!

The Big (Low) E

2008-05-01T22:53:00.003-07:00

Coming off the excitement of race day on The Robe, a couple of us had it in mind that the warm temps would provide the bump needed to bring the ultra-classic Ernie's Canyon to a good level. Saturday night, we'd decided that a lower flow than normal/fun would be acceptable for the first run of '08. By bedtime, the hydrograph showed signs of responding, but it still had about a 100 cfs to go to meet our minimum. Morning came, but the water did not .. though it was still rising slowly. So our plan became, let's wait til lunch time, let it warm up & then just go for it -- we'll have at least 400-&-rising in there, which we'd consider "runnable, not funnable".

We made use of an alternate put-in trail that leads you directly to the river-right eddy at the lip of Ferryland, the first rapid in the canyon proper. Ferryland appears to have changed (again). The normal line on river-left is a junkshow &, even worse, the eddies are barely there .. even at low flow. So we opted for the main line down river-right, which netted us a kicker-boof into the bottleneck & the main ledge. The large boulder just downstream of the ledge-hole is a lot closer than it looked from the scout & is very undercut. Shane & I both narrowly avoided it. Not sure, but maybe it would clean up or cover up at a normal juicy flow. Scout Ferryland before dropping in.

Other updates .. Samson & Delilah is best run on the left (but it was last year too, so that's not news); Big Nasty is currently unrunnable due to a huge log spanning the channel (pic below). Make sure you grab an eddy immediately after Little Nasty & then portage river-left. Don't take either of the last two slots on river-left at the bottom of Bruce's Boil, badness awaits.

Low flow is interesting in there. The rapids are so channelized that all the same lines exist, they're just much tighter. I generally regard most/all of the rocks in Ernie's as dangerous. At lower flows, you have time to catch your breath between the major rapids, but the sieves & undercuts are definitely more exposed.

Here's some pics from what turned out to be a surprisingly good run down the Big E.

Shane nailing the boof into Ferryland ...

.. & blasting through the final ledge-hole ..

.. fun line! but don't get stuffed.

Johnny in the manky low-water lead-in to Samson & Delilah

... & boofing the main ledge.

Shane at S&D

Downstream view .. yeah, it's low.

The log shutting down the line at Big Nasty .. don't blow it.

Utah dropping into the left side of Vertical Vortex.

Robinson ..

Downstream view.

Utah scouting, with a pretty boulder in the foreground.

The Robe Race '08

2008-04-29T08:59:00.009-07:00

I. The Story, In 250 Words or Less
II. The Results
III. The Photo Dump
IV. The Robe Gnome

~+~+~~+~+~+~+~+~~+~+~+~+~+~~+~+~+~+~+~~+~+~+~

I. The Story, In 250 Words or Less

The 1st annual Robe Canyon Downriver Race! All the elements came together & conspired to make our inaugural race successful. 18 racers & scads of volunteers & spectators gathered at Granite Falls under bluebird skies to make it happen. Watching the flow from 5.3 ft to 4.low the day before the race was a bit of a nail-biter .. but Fri/Sat's warm temps helped to stabilize the flow right at a low, but worthy, 5 ft. The day's events went off without a hitch -- no carnage, no terror, fast times, & plenty of sunburn, good times & beer for all. The Robe Gnomes remained more or less at bay. We started out of a eddy at the lip of Tunnel rapid & didn’t stop til after Conversation, on a beach where our timekeepers awaited -- a length of about 5 miles.

Once we'd all made it to the take-out & shuttles had been completed, about 30 people crammed into the back room at Omega Pizza for the after-party. Amanda B. & the timekeeping crew had kept course times a secret, opting to announce times & crown the champeens at the party.

The winners would each walk away with a super cool satin Boxing Robe (robe, get it?), as well as bragging rights for a year. The robes will be embroidered with the winners' names, & next year, will be passed on to the winners of The Robe Race '09. A new tradition is born!

...........................................

II. The Results

The spread between 1st & last place was but 10 minutes. The winning time, posted by McKibbin & Hawthorne, was 33 minutes, 10 seconds! Congrats dudes & savor the sweet taste of sweet sweetness!

Rob McKibbin & Ben Hawthorne 33:10
Chris Tretwold & Ryan Bradley 34:08
John Minerich & Shane Robinson 34:43
Scott Waidelich & Nick Hinds 36:01
Erik Schertzl & Bryan Smith 36:10
Todd Gillman & Andrew Oberhardt 36:39
Jon Dufay & Brad Xanthopoulos 38:30
Ryan Terry & Matt Thomas 42:37
Jeff Bowman & Morgan Hutchings 43:46 (Robe Gnome Award)

...........................................

III. The Photo Dump

Many friends have submitted photos. Due to space & time constraints, I had to just kind of pick a handful from each. Still though, there's a LOT of pics!

Andrew Oberhardt & Shane Robinson, stoked.

Organizing the shore support & timekeeping detail pre-race

Building out the team list

Most of the racers posing for group portrait at the start line

McKibbin, confident

Brad X. & Jon Dufay, not as confident as McKibbin .. but pretty sure

Devin & Hale, exhuberant

JP running Tunnel rapid

The winning team outta the gate

Glory Boof #1

Bottom of Tunnel rapid, with GB1 in foreground

GB1

3rd place finishers, Robe regulars, Shane Robinson & Johnny Utard

If there's a radar in the area, this guy's probably way under it, stompin' shit out. There's no vision like Schertlvision.

Ben H., impervious shoulders @ Little Miss Sunshine

Nick Hinds' 2nd time on The Robe

BradX @ Lil Miss

Matt "Effigy" Thomas made the trip up from Medford, OR .. & that's cool. Lise-Anne's shot of him ...

& Owen's shot of him ...

Awesome shot of 2nd place finisher Ryan Bradley on the newly-opened right line on Lil Miss

Shane Robinson, globetrotter

Me on Lil Miss (thanks Owen)

Me & Drew in the runout

boogie water

boogie water

Utah & Shane in the boogie water leading into Hotel California

Sequence of me in the manky river-right channel of Hotel Cali lead-in

Love this backlit shot of B.Smith & Schertzl in the main ledge of Hotel Cali .. nice one, Kennet.

Doof Boof

Effigy running the meat @ Catcher's Mitt

Utah, backender

"The 20-foot Waterfall" is neither

Effingham @ takeout

Then we drank beer!

Kyle Kovalick, the voice of Robe Race '08, doing emcee duty at Omega Pizza

Ammen & Stephanie Jordan .. finish line timekeepers. thanks guys!!!

Hilary N. caught in the act.

Wayrad!

Half of winning team, Ben H., donning The Robe. His partner had to take off before the awards ceremony. This robe (& Rob's) will be embroidered with the winners' names & will be passed onto the next winners each year.

For even more stories/photos from our contributors, please follow the links below! Plunge Pool from Owen Callahan; EJ Etherington's Flickr Set; Chris Joosse's blog; Chris Tretwold & B'ham Whitewater.

...........................................

IV. The Robe Gnome

Our crew is ruthless about giving each other shit. It's an equal opportunity kind of thing, but when it comes to talkin' smack about kayaking, hiking out of runs, getting destroyed in rapids, being nancies, etc., certain friends tend to take more than they actually dish out. On Robe in particular, any time someone has a bad line or swims, somehow it ends up always being blamed on the pranksterish "Robe Gnomes" that presumably lurk around some of the more notorious rapids waiting for unsuspecting victims. I don't remember exactly how the term got coined or by whom, but it definitely had something to do with Shertzl & me. It was always "Hey Shertl, beware, I hear the Robe Gnomes are feisty today!" .. or "Whoa man! That was UGLY!" "Shut it Gillman, the Robe Gnome got a hold of my stern & pulled me back into the Mitt .." something along those lines.

So, while at the post-race party, that brilliant, inebriated Ryan Terry ("RT") produced a great idea -- A prize in honor of The Robe Gnomes who get the better of the DFL team, and, of course, in honor of the DFL team itself.

So, starting with Jeff & Morgan, each year, Newt The Robe Gnome will go home with the DFL team, will spend the year with the team, & will hopefully become better friends by this time next year. The DFL team will have to take a "family portrait" & have it printed for inclusion in the photo album that will accompany the Gnome to the Race each year.

Yes, we are serious.

Ladies & gentlemen, meet Newt The Robe Gnome.

Updater! ::: Spring 08 Stuff

2008-04-21T21:33:00.012-07:00

I. Baby Dotcom
II. Big Weekend, Little White
III. The Main Event -- Robe Race 08
IV. Pounds All Around

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~

I. Baby Dotcom

Poudre Posse stalwart .. Co-creator of one of the most celebrated websites in the whole history of the World Wides of Web .. Co-author of the river guidebook that redefined river guidebooks .. Proud wearer of the Yamika & observer of the Passover .. Mr. Evan Stafford, along with his lovely wife Nicole, are the elated new parents of little Kaija Michelle Stafford. Congrats & much love from your BFF in the PNW.

II. Big Weekend, Little White

The first ever official downriver race (& slalom event) on the LWS was, by all accounts, a huge success & a good time. Hood River loc Todd Anderson took the top honors. Congrats amigo! And nice work to Austin for actually pulling this off. Info & pics Here and also Here

III. The Main Event

And speaking of downriver races ...

Nowhere near as glam as some other PNW classics, The Robe Canyon of the South Fork of the Stillaguamish River humbly lurks in the North Cascade foothills an hour north of Sea-town. But for those who've been bitten by the bug, The Robe has become a bit of an obsession.

With somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 complex class V rapids & at least that many more class IV's, nearly all of which contain soaring big-water boofs, multiple lines, hungry holes & tons of "personality", this 5-mile canyon stretch is hoisting the "quality" flag high for the PNW. And at its best runnable flows, from +/- 800 cfs to double that, it's not really "creekin'", although there are plenty of creek lines to explore if you're so inclined. All of the rapids, except one, are remarkably clean, perfectly spaced, pool-drop style in a relatively remote, densely vegetated, basalt canyon. The gray glacial water is frequently pinched between polished vertical walls, & with ever present overcast skies, Robe can have an eerie vibe -- especially given the carnage this run has been known to dish out. But the more you get to know the canyon, the more you come to appreciate its dark beauty .. & in its current condition, the quality of the whitewater may be among the best you'll ever paddle.

This coming Saturday -- levels permitting -- we will be hosting the first ever Robe Canyon downriver endurance race. Teams of 2 will launch at 5-minute intervals to see who can make it through the length of the canyon the fastest. The race will begin just above Tunnel rapid, at the start of the canyon, & will include a mandatory portage at Landslide (cuz that's just a part of kayaking), & will finish at the cobble beach at the terminus of Lime Kiln Trail, just below the last big rapid, Conversation. With continuous class V from start to finish, it will be a pretty grueling race. I'd look for winning times to be somewhere around 35 min's. As such, emphasis will be placed on combining downriver efficiency with safety .. hence teams of two & a strong volunteer safety crew.

This is a NON-event -- there are no sponsors, no entry fees, no cash purse (though I did spring for some sweet prizes for the winners!), no red tape, no gapers, no celebs, & no attitudes. The day will be 1 part See-Who-Can-Make-It-Down-The-Fastest, & 1 part community celebration of this awesome resource. Then we'll eat pizza & drink beer.

If you're in the neighborhood, please come out & be a part of our little one-day circus -- For spectating, you can access one of the most action-packed parts of the river super easily from The Old Robe Trail, off the Mountain Loop Hwy east of Granite Falls. We'll be meeting Saturday at the Granite Falls parking turnout / Robe take-out at 9 a.m. for competitors/safety meeting. After party will be at Omega Pizza in cosmopolitan downtown Granite Falls, WA. If flows don't cooperate, we'll shoot for Sunday .. but I have a good feeling about Saturday. If you are interested in racing, please email me your team info asap so I can add you to the list.

To get you stoked, here's a short Vimeo piece on THE ROBE, shot & edited by our good friend Chris Tretwold of Bellingham Whitewater

Robe Canyon from CHRIST on Vimeo.

IV. Pounds All Around

For several days last week, drivers on I-5 seemed a lot less erratic. Bartenders & servers at Capitol Hill hipster hangouts & restaurants replaced their usual sneering or sardonic smirking with legitimate friendly smiles. Passersby on the sidewalks of downtown looked up from their fixed downward gaze & said hello to one another. And the sun even made a cameo appearance for about half a day.

His Holiness The Dalai Lama visited our fair city. Here he is seen showing Adult Contemporary heartthrob / Seattleite, Dave Matthews, the proper way to bump knucks. You'll start seeing this hot new style in all the gossip rags at the grocery store checkout .. but you saw it here first .. unless you actually saw it in the Seattle Times first.

Make Hay While the Sun Shines

2008-04-20T10:24:00.000-07:00

I love living in Cascadia, but it is not without problems. Often one of the most challenging aspects of life in the Northwest - on a daily and weekly basis - is choosing your recreation du jour. This is especially challenging in the spring as longer and warmer days bring life to the flora and waterways of this region. Of course, there is always something to paddle throughout the year up here, but when the flowers start coming up, you know that the plethora of choices is about to explode like a tulip bloom on a sunny spring day.

Of course spring is also a time of year when people start looking to get on their bikes with more frequency, or head for the east side to soak up some vitamin D at their favorite crag. Additionally, spring storms often remind us that winter does not want to fade into the past as huge swell pounds the coast and snow continues to blanket the mountains. Finally, the ocean is always there offering up some of the world's best sea kayaking. On any given day, the choices of how to go play in the wilderness can create a sort of paralysis - sometimes referred to as the Seattle Disease.

In the past I have dealt with this decision making process in two ways: keeping the number of activities I participate in low and placing quality above quantity. This year I might be breaking rule #1 as I feel tempted to dust off the rock climbing equipment and "pull down" whereas in the past I would simply keep my garage filled with only ski and kayak gear. We'll see how that goes. I am also being tempted by friends to buy a surfboard and sea kayak. Pretty soon I'll need a yakima rack with so many accessories that I can't actually put anything on it.

Skiing has the unique aspect of powder, which is finite in both quantity and quality. When it's good, it's only good for a short time - especially here in the lower elevations of the cascades - and can be enjoyed by others before you get the chance to indulge. Thus, I usually let powder skiing trump kayaking as I know that Robe will be running for several more months this year and the forest roads will soon melt out allowing access to all the other local delights. And, the highest quality of snow will quickly be a thing to only look forward to for next year.

As the forecast calls for yet another winter storm (with possible snow in Seattle!) this weekend, I am looking forward to another lap in my newest favorite tour: The Slot Couloir. Below are a few pics from some recent trips. Enjoy.

Dale dropping in

Dr. Timmy taking his turn

Photo by Jason Salvo

Our token splitboarder and resident dirtbag

Dr. Daniels fills her powder prescription

Exiting the couloir and opening up some speed for the apron

Tim coming in hawt!

Becca goes for more

One of the finest lines I have ever skied!

Time to go home

Photo by Tim Holmberg

One Week Changes Everything

2008-04-14T09:21:00.001-07:00

Just last week Todd, I and the Squampton crew were searching for something to do. With river levels ultra low and snow issues up the Elaho we stumbled into a couple of great days on the Lower Mile of the Ashlu pretty much by accident. While we thought we might encounter boat breaking low conditions, we were pleasantly surprised with some fun whitewater. So as this weekend approached, I spoke with Greg, Tim, and Matt Compass and motivation was high to get back into the Lower Mile for a few laps before she started to juice up.

On Saturday Squamish hit 20 degrees Celsius, which I think equates to about 70 degrees Fahrenheit. You can see life in Canucky is starting to take hold. I'm thinking Celsius, meters, and tuques these days. Toques are hats for you unseasoned yankee folks. Point being, the 20 degree sunshine started to melt a little of our low elevation snow and conveniently brought us some proper water levels by Sunday. Plan was to head to the Ashlu and see what we could find. The stoke started to build as we made our way out the Squamish valley. Cluing into to water level visuals on the Squamish we all started to talk smack about the Box being in. After conveniently checking in with Ledcor staff and giving them our names and license plate numbers for their world-class "safety management" in the Ashlu valley, it became clear that we had enough water to head to the Box.

Put-in to the Box. You can see the parked trucks just beyond us. They were skinning up to go skiing! The road is a no go beyond the 25 mile bridge right now. Going to be a while before we can get into the Mine.

photo Bryan Smith

Greg Daspher...this guy always keeps the stoke high!

photo by Bryan Smith

Right from the start we had lots of snow to deal with on the put-in trail.

We had solid medium to high flows which had those of us who know the run a bit on edge. The Box always tugs on the nerves when no one has been in there for a while. Post holing our way to the put-in, I suggested that it was imperative that one of use went on a scout of triple drop to make sure it was clear of wood. Because I knew it would slow the pace down if we all tried to navigate through the snow along the ridge, I pushed on while the others scouted the first couple drops. While nothing is super gnar-gnar in the first few rapids, it is all unscoutable and un-portagable from river level requiring a good knowledge of the lines and peace of mind that no old growth is lurking downstream. I pushed onto to triple drop and discovered a hunk of old growth wedged in the exit of the third ledge with just enough room to sneak under the right side.

The team scouting the first rapid from the canyon level pillow lines.

photo by Bryan Smith

Matt warming up the shoulders before dropping in.

The first few rapids went pretty smooth, with the log in triple providing an extra element to an already intense rapid. Then we hit Kernage. The entire entry was all chalked full of wood and the boulder scramble portage was covered with a few feet of snow.

Matt Compass probing. You had to sneak in along the left and drop into the first ledge sideways with no speed. Needless to say we had some interesting lines.

photo by Bryan Smith

The view of Kernage from the bottom. Note the wood junk show in the entrance.

photo by Bryan Smith

At the end of the first canyon comes what some consider a junky rapid, but when you have proper flows and know the line this one is a diamond in the rough.

Greg launching the entry boof

photo by Bryan Smith

And the glory exit from the first canyon of the Box

photo by Bryan Smith

The first rapid in the second canyon always has had a long history of collecting wood. Because of the amount of wood we had been dealing with, we opted to post hole our way to a quick vantage. I took the camera and shot from an angle that people rarely see.

Mt Ashlu guarding us.

photo by Bryan Smith

Greg dropping into the lower Box canyon.

photo by Bryan Smith

Wood continue to play games with us as we hit the two perfect 10 footers just after entering the lower canyon. The second of the two ledges always sends you right and of course there was a tree wedged in the exit. After scouting for a bit we came up with an alternative line on the left which proved to be an incredible boof.

Matt coming into numero uno.

photo by Bryan Smith

Matt going left on the second ledge to avoid the tree on the right.

photo by Bryan Smith

So just one week after "Low Water Salvation" we got the Box at a solid flow. Amazing. It is scary to think about what will happen if we get a week of sustained temps here in BC. It ain't going to take much before the low elevation stuff starts to blow out and we are scrambling up snow laden roads trying to escape the melt. Hold on...it's going to be a big water year in BC.

A Break in the Programming

2008-04-10T09:20:00.004-07:00

Before I begin, I want to draw everybody's attention to the TRL Del.icio.us Menu on the right sidebar. It is not new, but is always showing the most recent files added to our delicious folder. I try to keep a good flow of semi-relevant information there in case you get bored. Check it out if you haven't.

Now I don't know about all of you, but I am already getting excited to see the applicants of this years VACATION TO HELL. I hope some of you are planning to apply. Just a word to the wise ... we pretty much had half of the work done for us. We already had the blog going, lots of footage collected, and three of four team members. Despite all that, it was a great deal of work to get the application finalized. So don't procrastinate! Get a team, start collecting material, and get excited!

Next, I know that beer is the preferred beverage of choice for most kayakers, and we know what flavor to choose in that regard (hint, hint). But in case your not a member of AMERICAN RIVERS (which you should be), you can help them just by getting drunk ... on wine that is. Choose WATERBROOK WINE the next time you're craving some vino, and you'll be helping American Rivers out. Cheers to Waterbrook!

Finally, if you have your own kayak blog, or read other kayak blogs that you like, please shoot me an email (shanecrobinson+trl (at) gmail (dot) com) with the link. It is for a future post I am working on. Thanks!

Ok, stay tuned, as the regularly scheduled programming continues ...

Low Water Salvation

2008-04-07T12:39:00.003-07:00

It has been a weird Spring here in the Norfwest & BC -- one of the coldest months of March on record. For that matter, it has been really cold, down to sea level, all Winter long. What this has meant for us is lots of deep pow in the mts (90" in the last week of March at Baker) & of course, a healthy snowpack in the Cascades. Most interesting is, while we have a respectable, if not earth-shattering, snowpack (depth), the snow-water equivalents throughout the Cascades ARE pretty impressive. Throughout the winter, we've had very little boatable water available, & this has persisted into Spring. We got lucky on the Island a couple weeks ago with some warm weather & a bit of precip, but before & after that it has been full-on Winter. All that water has remained in storage, which can be either a good thing or a bad thing, depending on how quickly it warms up. I'd suspect that if we get any kind of sustained warm & wet weather in the next month, the flooding could be biblical around here.

This past Friday was TRL'r-by-marriage & matriarch of the Squamish Boaters Hostel, Lise-Anne Beyries birfday. Bryan & the local crew had a fete planned for her, so I blazed north after work with my boat on my roof. Bryan & I had talked about maybe Fear Canyon or else doing some bushwhacking/scouting, but it was clear that this weekend was more about LA's b-day, getting out of the city, & maybe getting lucky with some water.

Dragging from the festivus the night before, we headed up the Squamish road toward Fear Canyon to meet Madaloni & Greg. A little over halfway we got turned around by deep, soupy snow covering the road.

The Tantalus subrange of the Coast Range as viewed from the Upper Squamish valley

At a loss, I blurted out, "Let's drive up the Ashlu & just see what's going on up there .. maybe the Bottom Mile is scrapeable." Greg chimed in that 50/50 Falls is actually a fun double-boof at super-low water.

We found ourselves checking-in at Ledcor's hospitality office, where we heard over the truckers' cb radio, "Ah, looks like we got the first kayakers of the season 'bout to drive up.."

Not much else to report on this, so I'll let the pics/captions do the talking from here. The key takeaway is that even when everything else in the central/north Cascades & BC is bone dry, the Ashlu saves! Super-fun, super-accessible, super-steep, super-beautiful -- that's why we *heart* the Ashlu.

Til they get the project online, you'll be sharing the Ashlu road with a constant parade of massive machinery. Head's up when you're up there.

The first major rapid marks the point of no return. Hiking out after this would be pretty much impossible .. but if yr in at sane levels, you can walk around anything you don't want to run. Greg Dashper dropping into the granite zone.

It's a tight +/- 8-ft boof into a shallow runout with undercuts on both sides.

Ian exiting the room.

From here, it's a straight shot to the takeout .. just gotta get through a bunch of boulders first.

The Tantalus is one of the big ones. Sketchy entrance into a non-boofable pourover into a big backed-up hole with an elevated, super-tight exit. Here's Vancouver Kyle battling .. check out the granite.

Smith sneaking through by the hair of his chinny chin chin

Glory boof sequence

Kato contemplating the line

A quasi-waterfall of about 10 ft comes toward the end of the run. It's very tight, but good to go. Here's the dudes scouting.

I went first

Then Tim Loubier, who absolutely greased it .. I don't think he even got his face wet.

Kato

The bad thing that you think is gonna happen here .. didn't.

Couple more clean ledges & you're home free

Tim getting his grind on

The view back up into the Bottom Mile is pretty arresting .. it really is just a steep pile of car-sized boulders that you're boating through.

Beware the Aslu Sniper

So, the Ashlu is pretty much an industrial site these days. From before you even approach the canyon in your car it's obvious that Ledcor is in control of the valley. This is not new news. However, for the most part, when yr on the river, all that stuff disappears & it's just you & your friends in a beautiful granite-lined canyon.

Instead of beating our plastic on the shallow runout where the river splits & goes down to Twin Bridges, we took out at the super-convenient construction site where the powerplant is being built in a massive, environmentally-sensitive riverside pit. This is where they will carefully put the diverted water back into the river. This is also where diesel fumes, the loud drone of generators & the beeping of heavy equipment in-reverse welcomes you back to the reality that this river is being raped.

Vantasy Island: The (not so) Exciting Conclusion ...

2008-03-27T15:54:00.000-07:00

Happy Friday! Below is the end of our Vantasy Island adventure .. but if you haven't yet seen it, please scroll down past this post & check out Bryan's latest entry regarding a big win for BC rivers. Grassroots opposition is working!

~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.

Before we even launched on the Klanawa, Jakub knew that he might have to bail on the rest of the trip. His wife had called & let him know that his son was sick & getting sicker. It was obvious that Braden, with his mangled boat & injured ankle, was pretty much done for the weekend too. It worked out well for Jakub, who needed a ride back to Vic (but who didn't want to force us to drive all the way back) .. So there in the fading light, alongside a logging road in the middle of nowhere, we drank one last beer with our tour guide & then bid farewell to Jakub, Braden & Chris. That was a good day!

Before leaving, we made sure to get some local recommendations, but being left with only one rig presented some shuttle challenges. Then, as the designated MiniVanIslandVan driver, I very nearly crippled our progress on the way home. We were all just fired up on our day on the Klanawa, &, since we were almost certainly the only moving vehicle on any road within 20 km of us, I was driving fast & taking chances. I charged head-on into a huge puddle of snowmelt/rainwater doing about 45 m.p.h. & BOOOOOM!!! We bottomed out, slamming the underbody of the van on a big submerged rock. I'd never felt that big of a shot to the bottom of a car before! I limped the rig up out of the puddle, totally embarrassed & scared that I'd really done some damage to the borrowed van. Steam billowed up from underneath, but a quick inspection with headlamps didn't reveal anything out of order. So we cautiously continued on, counting our blessings, as being stuck indefinitely out in the woods due to my own stupidity would have been a sad end to this story.

Upon returning to our cabin, I got in touch with Shayne out in Nanaimo, who said we were welcome to join up with his friends on the Gordon on Sunday. The Gordon's a classic, so I was stoked to have a "sure thing" in the pocket to offer the Van Island virgins that comprised my crew.

In the morning, we discovered a half-deflated tire on the rig, so we preemptively swapped the spare, & then set out for a long bumpy drive south toward Port Renfrew. Passing over & beside several beautiful gorges, we drooled over the unknown goods, but kept our eyes on the prize & pushed on toward the Gordon ..

Until we got another flat ..

At this point, all we had was the half-flat spare & we were a long way from civilization. We'd have to make do & take it slow, but we were already pushing our luck on meeting our crew on time. Trouble came when our weak-ass jack caved-in on itself under the weight of the van, leaving us with a flat, a half-flat, a busted jack & deep-fried nerves. We'd have to MacGyver our way outta this ... which, fortunately, we did.

We came into a what could only be called a "community", like a crossroads or neighborhood, with no commercial services. We spotted 2 guys in a yard & I jumped out to ask them for some advice. They said we'd need to find "Brad" in the 4th house on the right on a different road. This Brad apparently had tire fixin' skills, and lucky for us, he was at home.

Brad was excited for visitors & told us to pull the van right up to his garage. He was a bit embarrassed about the condition of his "shop", which was littered with a million different tools, fasteners, & junk. But he got right to work on our tires & told some amazing stories the entire time. He's a logger by trade, but fell back on wrenching after an injury forced him off his logging crew. His advice regarding getting hurt on the job: "If you work, wear hockey gear & don't get hurt. Aaah, nevermind that -- DON'T WORK!"

Brad's garage/shop

That's our tire on the machine. We stood amidst what he called his "toolbox".

This is Bruno. He had a thick chain restraining him.

I was pretty sure he wanted to chew my face off, but he turned out to be nice .. smelly, but nice.

15 minutes & 20 bucks later, we were outta there, but we were waaaay past-due on meeting Shayne's crew on the Gordon. We'd have to call an audible .. we'd backtrack a half-hour to the Nitinat, which was reportedly foot-shuttle friendly. Only thing is, Where the hell is this river???? We spent hours driving back & forth between 2 obvious landmarks along the same 5-km-stretch of road, looking for a supposed Provincial Park that existed on the maps, but not in real life. We followed some rarely used roads & trails trying to locate the elusive gorge. It was getting late & I was getting very kranky about our wasted day. We ended up bushwhacking several times & finally found what looked like a stretch of incredible whitewater set among ginormous old growth red cedars. Yessssss!

I'm always fascinated by all the vegetation & mossy trees we come across during our bushwhack missions.

So are the Coloradans ..

Given the time & a takeout above some "unrunnable" falls, we'd have to make quick work of the runnable stuff. We had no idea where the takeout even was ..

Clear, green water on the Nitinat

Evan dropping into the first rapid

Leif on a different line in the same drop.

The entrance of the gorge reminded me a bit of Ernie's Canyon, which is a backyard run for us Seattleites. The basalt bedrock intrusions & boulders were full of sieves & potholes, but the water lines were clean as a whistle.

These potholes were big enough to climb through.

ScottFish

ES

The crew among the beautiful basalt gorge

Leif leading

Scott

Evan

One of several big drops on the Nitinat.

We made it to an obvious horizon line that revealed a very steep, twisting, blind secion of ledges, beginning with a 10-12 foot clean vertical drop. It was just before dark. Scott volunteered to billygoat up the river-left canyon wall for a scout, & came back saying that the first drop was all glory, but anything after that was impossible to see. We quickly made the decision to get the heck out while we still had a bit of light. After the second roped pitch, Evan & I bushwhacked downstream to see if we could sort out anything on the "falls" section. Looked pretty good to us .. full-on, but good.

Turns out, we made it to the "take out". After climbing out of the canyon, we were thrilled that the MiniVanIslandVan was parked a 10-minute walk upstream of where we reached the road. We were still way out in the middle of the Island & would not be making the last ferry over to the mainland. Stopping for burgers at the first tiny sign of civilization, we made a friend. We called her the Silver Fox. She was in her 50's or 60's, dressed to the nines, & quite tipsy on wine. She made a beeline to our section of the restaurant & invited herself onto the couch with Scott. Upon learning that we were "stuck" on Vantasy Island for the night, she insisted that we stay at her house with her.

And her 28 y.o. son.

And her elderly tenant ..

Outside a cool steady rain set in. Ughh ... decisions.

The Silver Fox ignoring Scott's sweat stench & admiring his "cowboy in off the range" masculinity.

The Silver Fox promised to cook us pancakes in the morning, & while Scott may have been her huckleberry, we had a ferry to catch in Victoria in the a.m., & an awkward night in this lady's house followed by a leisurely & equally awkward pancake breakfast wasn't on the agenda. I feigned receiving a call from our "friend in Mill Bay" who had room for us. We hightailed it outta there, laughing our lungs out at the ridiculousness & hilarity of our never-ending SitCom-worthy day. I swear sometimes Larry David is writing my script. In fact, we did end up sleeping in Mill Bay, but not at a friend's house -- Leif & Scott caught z's in the van while Evan & I set up our bivvies in the mud. We were in a parking turnout alongside the highway.

This is what we looked like at 6:30 a.m. the next morning

In those old Fantasy Island episodes, as I remember it, Mr. Roarke's guests signed up for some far-fetched, totally unrealistic experience that he could somehow provide on the Island. These well-funded, naive people showed up from LA & Houston & Chicago expecting some pretty big things -- Mr. Roarke could make their wildest dreams come true during their visit. But on Fantasy Island, as in real life, it's a thin line separating dreams from nightmares. (insert evil laughter here.) What one wants & what needs are usually two disparate things, & on the Island you usually get what you need in spite of what you want.

A month or so prior to our trip, I was the de facto Mr. Roarke (hopefully a lot less creepy though). I promised my buddies an amazing experience on Vantasy Island -- bedrock gorges, waterfalls & old growth all within spittin' distance of the ocean. They were coming from frozen Colorado & needed to just go kayaking. They wanted some adventure, classic new whitewater, waterfalls, & good times. It was a tall order, but I'm stoked to say that we got what we wanted and what we needed.

Check out the video piece that Evan & Jesse from Thrillhead put together:

Thrillhead TV - Vancouver Island Spring 08 from Thrillhead Creations on Vimeo

Thousands Rally to Protect BC Rivers...Pitt River Application May Die!

2008-03-26T10:47:00.009-07:00

Since Ledcor began bullying their way into the Ashlu Valley almost two years ago now, it has been hard to stay motivated in fighting huge companies that have enough money to facilitate whatever "green" PR spin they can come up with and enough political clout to legislate their way around the public. The issue has become so polarized it is difficult to sort out all the facts from fiction. Power companies say this, environmental groups, paddlers, and concerned citizens say that. Many of us work full time jobs and don't have the resources to be out there following every last meeting, chasing all the sheets of paper being pushed, and writing letters to decision makers. But people have banded together and the coalition of people opposing the massive give-away of BC's rivers has grown and grown. Thanks to the many boaters out there who have taken the time to write letters, share the story and help fight the fight. It is making a difference on the ground in British Columbia. The power of public opinion has impact when the numbers and efforts are big enough. While it was not the boaters exclusively, we were some of the frontline that started to get the message out that this issue was bigger than the Ashlu. With the efforts of groups like... BC Creek Protection Society, Save Our Rivers Society, BC Rivers Alliance, Take Back The Power, and many others the issue has boiled over and people are standing their ground.

The issue has been the front page of the major BC's Newspapers, on CBC radio every day for the past week, and making the 6pm news most nights. Last night was the re-scheduled meeting in Pitt Meadows. It went off. Over 1000 people turned up to express their views on the Pitt River Proposal. Today the media attention continued with a special CBC broadcast airing at about 9am this morning. Barry Penner, the BC Minister of the Environment announced that based on strong public opposition to this project he would not be recommending the boundary change to Class A Pine Cone Burke Provincial Park necessary for this project. While the battle is far from over, there is good likely hood that this could effectively kill the Pitt River proposal at least in the interim. While this is not the BC government backing away from their private power agenda, it is certainly a step in the right direction. More importantly it is a sign of the government having to respond and deal with strong opposition to their dealings with respect to hundreds of private power projects across BC.

Our guard will stay high here at TRL, as this could easily be a quick smoke screen to try to settle widespread opposition on one project while allowing others to keep moving quickly. Either way it is a sign of the power in the collective efforts of everyone involved. Thanks for your help!

Vantasy Island, Parte Deux

2008-03-18T16:55:00.009-07:00

Since my last post, I've received a lot of email from readers, mostly from people wondering about how to visit Vantasy Island. Best bet is to get in touch with Roarke Adventure Travel .. ask for Mr. Roarke or his executive assistant, "Tattoo". They'll make everything super easy for you, & you'll be surprised at Mr. Roarke's uncanny ability to put together a dream trip for you on the island .. It's like he's a mind-reader or something. If you're after waterfalls, he can definitely get you waterfalls.

Anyway, before we get into the Day 2 TR, I just want to plug Kayak Session for running a bajillion-page article about Squamish that I helped Bryan write. It features some great action images from Squamish local photogs Steve Rogers & Phil Tifo. Also included is a great interview with our boy Bryan. Cheers to Toon & Whitney for the great piece! And to Bryan for all his recent work & successes!

*****

Okay, moving right along .. Our 2nd day on the island started early with a huge breakfast and, of course, a peaceful row across the inlet. Braden & Chris had shown up the night before, so we were now at full strength.

The MiniVanIslandVan was running on fumes, so we had to wait til 9am for the "gas station" (more like a one-pump gas shrine) to open. That afforded us time to pick up our patched flat tire from the day before, & this spare, as we would later come to learn, was a very fortunate thing to have.

ES breaking "strickt" rules at the tackle/tire shop.

The Dalai Lama sez, "Be Stoked that the shrine provides you petroleum today."

Our plan was to head for one of Jakub's high priority 1D missions -- a low-volume, gorged-out creek averaging 250 fpm. It would need more water than what we'd seen in the area the day before, so the logic was that we'd be taking advantage of overnight rainfall on this small creek, & save the bigger drainages for tomorrow. But as we drove inland, we realized that the farther we went, the drier it got. Our storm must've been a localized coastal event. So, we called an audible & re-routed for the Klanawa instead.

Arriving at the put-in bridge for the NF Klanawa, we were all giddy looking down into an alluring series back-to-back-to-back ledges disappearing around the corner into a dark box canyon. The sun broke through on cue as we began getting geared up.

Looking upstream from the bridge. This is a deceptive photo. The water is much deeper than it appears, it's clarity was amazing.

What we knew of the Klanawa was that Jakub had pioneered the run 2 years prior, but was forced to hike out upon reaching a big waterfall at around sundown. We knew that there would be some arduous portages around wood & we knew that we would probably get to run some waterfalls. Beyond that, we didn't know much at all, and what lay downstream of the "big" waterfall was uknown. The water level looked about perfect from what we could see from the bridge.

Go Time! Scotty leading the charge ..

Entering the gorge.

Last drop, first series from downstream .. me, committed.

After entering the gorge, we were immediately greeted with an amazing sheer-walled room with a meandering deep green pool .. & a portage around some old growth blocking what would have been a fun 12-foot ledge.

This guy came early in the run too. Totally runnable, been run, but with a super thin, very technical line to avoid pocket-beatdown-to-undercut-stuffage combo. ES & I agreed that if presented this option a little later in the day, we both would've given it a shot .. Next time for sure ;-)

Typical BC scenery

Typical BC portage

Typical BC ledge boof .. Chris Mennell

We then came to a nice 15-footer with a technical lead-in into an "airplane turn" into the guts. So GOOD!

Jakub from below.

Jakub from beside.

Leif

More Leif(s)

Evan in the LZ

Jakub on another fun slide to ledge series. This one had a beautiful tributary waterfall spilling into the gorge from river-right.

Braden under the log

An obvious horizon line indicated we'd come to the big drop that forced Jakub's earlier retreat. It was at least 40 ft into a massive pool & looked absolutely perfect. I think we were all consumed with that anxious mix of excitement & trepidation as we scouted from the sculpted granite lip of the falls. There were no visible issues with the falls, apart from the technical lead-in. You'd have to punch a couple small holes in the very narrow approach, then power through the super-mushy water to the rolling lip of the falls. Looked like you wanted to be just left of center as the right side seemed to land on a protruding ridge.

Braden had quickly decided he didn't want to hem & haw, running quickly back upstream to get his boat. He was already locking in by the time anyone realized what was happening. "Do you wanna wait for me to get my camera??" "No, man. I can't hang around up here any longer!" & off he went .. He nailed the lead-in, driving left up onto the off-camber right-leaning slide, & rolling over the lip in a tucked position at the same speed as the water -- no faster, no slower. About two-thirds of the way down he began to roll ever so slightly over the handlebars & BAM! He clipped rock just before landing. Uh oh .. he slowly rolled up in the outflow & it was obvious that he was injured. He slowly made his way to shore, but was isolated, as we were all stuck up on the lip of the falls with no obvious/quick route down. At this point, we'd all gone into evac mode & no one was going to try to make another attempt of the falls -- getting Braden & the rest of us out of the canyon safely & before nightfall was now the priority. We considered rapping down the face of the falls, but opted finally to just huck out into the deep greenwater below the impact zone, & rope boats down to the ledge at the bottom. By the time I got to Braden, he said that he was in some pain but reasonably certain he didn't have any serious fractures, apart from the bow of his boat .. which he repaired at riverside with roofing tar tape.

It was getting late/dark & we were now more or less committed to paddling out through the unknown lower gorge. We were all totally relieved to find nothing more than unbelievably scenic class III the rest of the way to our takeout, which involved a bit of BC bushwhacking up to the road.

I think it's safe to say that we're all totally bummed that the waterfall didn't end up being the "lay up" that we had all envisioned. We wanted that glory drop SO bad! We were all very thankful for Braden & for the group that he avoided serious injury. An evac from from that spot would've been a dire exercise in pain suppression. My thoughts on the waterfall, having inspected it from below, are that it is most likely good to go, but certainly not without serious risks. I think Braden did exactly what he wanted to do & what we all had planned to do -- the same thing would have happened to all of us had we probed. Knowing what we know now, I'd say more speed & more of a boof-stroke at the lip would likely get you out away from the curtain & hidden ledge. I think that running it more to the right than where he ran it would be better .. & that a bit more water would help as well.

Fantasy Island Pt. 1

2008-03-13T18:24:00.010-07:00

Albert Einstein said, “How I wish that somewhere there existed an island for those who are wise and of good will.” Clearly, Einstein was not a kayaker & never he made it out to Vancouver Island. 2 years back I made a series of visits to the Island to run the shit. I fell in love with that place. The juxtaposition of the serene waters of the Inside Passage to the east, against the mountainous interior, and the roiling Pacific to the west, along with innumerable creeks and rivers, all on a compact, easily accessible island, to me, was paradise. For several reasons -- not the least of which was a recently repaired right shoulder -- I didn’t make it back out to the Island in ’07. Needless to say, it had been beckoning ever since.

Winter storms off the Pacific slip into the Strait of Juan De Fuca, providing lots of snow up-Island & at elevation, & lots of rain along the low-lying coastal perimeter & throughout the southern part of the Island. Come Spring, warming temps combined with erratic Pacific weather makes for a wealth of paddling opportunities. This time of year, while you can be reasonably certain something is running, it can be a total mind-bender figuring out what exactly that something might be. Navigating the twisted tangle of logging roads and actually finding your put-in &/or take-out presents a whole other logistical riddle .. But that’s all just part of the "charming" Island experience. Embrace the challenge & you can be rewarded with full-on adventure, awesome whitewater and stunning scenery ... or you might just get skunked.

Down south in HR, Austin R., who’s just as badly bitten by the Island bug, has been itching to head back out too. We’d talked of heading over for the weekend a couple weeks ago, but an illness prevented me from going. During that same time, I’d been invited by Czech-born Victoria resident Jakub Drnecto join him & some Islanders on a mission he’d been planning. Some buddies from CO had been vying for a long-weekend NW getaway, & this trip seemed like the best chance to introduce them to the Secret Garden and the locals that are working hard to protect it from hydro development.

Jakub’s plan was to base out of a remote, tiny seaside village two & a half hours from the nearest paved road, & accessible only by boat, then focus on finishing 2 runs he’d discovered / 1D’d some years back. He was also hot to attempt the 1D of a new run. We were encouraged early on by his emails describing plentiful gorges, bedrock, & waterfalls, all within spitting distance of the Pacific. He also spoke of favorable weather & flow forecasts.

The Tsawwassen to Swartz Bay route ..

The crew from the States would be Leif E. & Evan S., fresh off the plane from Fort Collins .. and Scott W. & me from Seattle. The BC crew would be Jakub, Braden F. & Chris M. Scott would be providing the Canoe & Kayak van, which, after picking up Jakub in Victoria, proved to be the necessaray component for comfortable shuttling with our team of 7. The drive from Vic was epic. The van was certainly comfy, but with about 4 inches of clearance, the miles & miles of twisting, rutted, pot-holed, boulder-strewn & even snowy logging roads made for average speeds hovering at about 25 m.p.h. We finally made it to our destination at about 1 in the morning .. much to the dismay of our cottage host.

The Seppo contingent, L to R: Leif, Evan, Scott, me

The Day 1 itinerary included the Sarita, a classic waterfall run, which is kind of like BC's version of Mexico's Cascadas de Micos. But to get there, we would first have to attend to a more immediate watery challenge -- Bamfield Inlet. As I mentioned, our town was water-access only, and as such, our hosts provided us 2 rowboats with which to get back ‘n forth between our cars & our cabin. After a huge breakfast, we piled into the little boats with what we needed for the day & made our way across the inlet. In less than an hour we were at our put-in, but Braden & Chris were nowhere to be found. After waiting for a while, Jakub & I decided to go ahead & deal with a one-car shuttle .. driving the minivan to the take-out, then hitching a ride back up to the lake with a truckload of friendly First Nations folks. We rode in the bed which was full of crabs, clams & salmon, all freshly harvested that morning.

Our own private dock on Bamfield Inlet

Scott W. manning the oars under persistent graybird skies

Jakub & me .. Wayrad says this shot makes it looks like we just dumped the body.

Our put-in with nice view of mountaintop landscaping across the way.

After launching, we floated silently on the familiar crystal clear “bottle-green” water that's common on Van Island, peering under our boats at big boulders & submerged old growth 20 feet below. The canyon formed out of Sarita Lake, densely vegetated with ferns, big red cedars, hemlock and moss-draped bigleaf maples lining the banks. The deep emerald water, though moving briskly downstream, was like a sheet of glass, creating a surreal mirror-pond effect that reflected our surroundings in 3 directions. We quickly reached our first rapid, a river-wide 30-foot waterfall. With the width of the streambed & what could only be considered low flow, we had less than ideal volume in the lead-in of the preferred line. No matter, the landing was aerated enough & the drop “went”, even if you went over the 'bars or corkscrewed mid-freefall due to the shallow lead-in. Several more big, river-wide falls followed. Day 1 was all about low-flow, low-stress, whiplash-inducing "stunt boating". The Sarita’s wide-open canyon & river-wide bedrock features are totally unique in the area, undeniably beautiful, and as Jakub says, a “very special place”.

The first drop.

Scott Waidelich dropping.

Guidebook author Evan Stafford.

More of Evan

Leif Embertson

Hmm .. a split-second before landing very nearly on my head

Numba 2. This one was a folding, manky slide into a bottlekneck with a plucky hole. We experimented with several different approaches .. all with some sort of piton involved.

Nice perspective of Scott on #2.

Evan, confident in his planned line, heads up to close the deal on #2

... & here he is grappling with the last bit.

I went for the far-left air line & ended up pitoning like everyone else.

Evan on the last big drop .. from my perspective

ES on the last big drop .. Leif's perspective

Scott from upstreamish

Scott from downstreamish

Upon returning to town, we again loaded up the rowboats & headed back across the inlet in the fading light toward our plush accommodations, where we dealt with gear, drank a lot of beer, cooked up a huge feast, and relaxed as a storm moved in. We went to bed dog-tired to the symphony created by wind-driven sheets of wet, wet rain buffetting the cabin, excited for the promise of more water & another new river awaiting us in the morning.

Our digs

Nick Hinds was kind enough to allow Leif to take his brand new Pyranha Everest, & how does Leif handle that? By driving the new vessel headlong into rock-solid rock. Here, Scott works on the piton victim's "hognose". (Thanks Nick!)

Lots more photos & stories to come .. stand by!

The Latest on BC Rivers

2008-03-05T15:31:00.000-08:00

For those of you following from far away and others who are home to BC's lower mainland...thanks for tuning in! For the past couple years TRL has expressed concerns through various posts and media about the rapid development of BC's rivers and creeks by private companies. The main focus through 2007 was watching and reporting on the swift transformation of the Ashlu watershed from a wild and scenic river to a gravel pit despite the overwhelming public opinion that there needed to be a plan and more transparency in the approval process. 49 MEGAWATTS was an attempt to document the decision making process on the Ashlu, share the concerns of others in the community, and expose the greater implications of BILL 30. We thank all of you who have supported our efforts and purchased a copy of the DVD, watched it online, and spread the message! It has been encouraging to see the film spur the interest of many groups outside the kayaking community, enrage people in BC about the theft of our precious rivers, and get people thinking about the issue beyond the propaganda of green power. This weekend brought even more encouragement with 49 Megawatts winning "Best Environmental Film" at the VANCOUVER INTERNATIONAL MOUNTAIN FILM FESTIVAL. Here is what the Jury had to say...

"Our choice for the Best Environmental film represents a badly needed wake-up call to communities throughout British Columbia. Presented as a commentary on environmentalism, we felt the filmmaker was driven as much by a passion for his subject as he was for documenting it. The film opened up a Pandora's Box as it explored the issue of private appropriation of public resources – namely of our rivers and waterways."

Now while we could easily take that as a pat on the back, it is more importantly an indication of a growing coalition of people that disagree with the BC government's approach to approving and assessing hundreds of new projects on rivers across the province. So as we close the chapter on the Ashlu, new chapters are opening and there is plenty to keep paying attention to as this issue steamrolls forward. Here is the latest news coming out of BC and some avenues for continued action and support.

THE PROPOSED UPPER PITT RIVER PROJECT AND POWER LINE THROUGH PINECONE-BURKE PROVINCIAL PARK

It is my opinion that this particular proposal could very well become the boiling point that forces the BC government into a moratorium on all private "run of river projects". It should. It has massive implications for all of us. If people were not already convinced that the one off project approvals were working in favor of the developers and spurring hap hazard planning, this one proves just how far they are willing to go. Please take a several moments to get familiar with a few details and write a letter.

PINECONE BURKE PROVINCIAL PARK is a class A provincial park located just east of Vancouver. Class A meaning that it has the highest level of protection. Commercial use like logging, mining, ect... are defined as forbidden. So you can't run a power line through the park right? Right...unless you "change the boundaries" of the park. Well guess what.

CASCADE POWER (a subsidiary of Run of River, Inc.) is proposing a 161 Megawatt facility that dams 8 different tributaries to the Pitt River. There are numerous reasons why the project is not desirable. The Pitt River has some of the biggest wild runs of Salmon in the lower mainland, wolves and grizzly populate the valley, and it is prime recreational and wild land close to downtown Vancouver. But the biggest issue by far is that in order for the project to be viable they need to put in a 47 km long power line which would connect the Pitt River to the Cheekye Substation in Squamish. The route would cut right through the middle of Pinecone Burke Provincial Park and Cascade Power is seeking to change park boundaries to allow this to happen.

This map shows the proposed line through the park, connecting 8 power projects in the Upper Pitt and while they won't admit it...it also will make the licences (which are also owned by Run or River Hydro, Inc.) on Skookum, Rafuse, and Crawford Creeks (known as the Mamquam Cluster)viable. The green area on the map is provincial park land. It does not take a rocket scientist to see that a power line bisecting a class A provincial park might have some impact on migration of species, let alone be in the best interest of the developers based on the ownership of the mamquam cluster. One power line...11 rivers. Makes sense for them but not for THE PEOPLE of BC!

Three "public hearings" have been held over the past couple weeks..one in Squamish, Pitt Meadows, and Mission regarding the draft terms of reference for the environmental assessment of this project. The public was invited by BC parks, the BC Environmental Assessment Office, and Run of River Hydro, Inc to come out and voice their opinion. I was appalled at the meeting in Squamish. Representatives of the BC government (although present) were not hosting the event, but rather Run of River Hydro executives were fielding questions, playing MC for the night, and every piece of information in the room was propaganda from Run of River. You would expect to see information from BC parks and the Environmental Assessment Office, but instead the representatives from the offices just carried on with an apologetic approach at the meeting. A vivid reminder of how much pressure is coming down from the higher up...GORDON CAMPBELL .

In Pitt Meadows the meeting was shut down, because over 500 people came in opposition to this project.

And last night in Mission there was another meeting that was attended by hundreds of concerned citizens. The BC FEDERATION FOR WILDLIFE spoke in opposition representing over 30,000 members!

This is positive momentum folks...let's keep the pressure on.

So, in order to keep you kayakers from getting bored with too many BC political details, here are some implications of this project and things you can do.

1. From a paddlers perspective if this proposed power line is allowed to cross the park it will pretty much guarantee viability of the Skookum Creek project. Questions I asked at the Squamish hearing about Skookum were quickly answered with "those projects have nothing to do with this proposal" and "the power line route has nothing to do with the fact that we own three licenses in the Mamquam drainage". It would obviously be in their interest to have one power line connecting all their projects.

Let me remind you of how amazing Skookum Creek is...

Perhaps the best waterfall in the Squamish area

The famous 60 foot slide

Umm...people we need this creek needs to remain off limits to private corporations.

2. Please take a couple minutes to read a few more DETAILS here and if you have 20 minutes watch this new documentary called POWERPLAY. It will flush out a few more details and carry what you may already know a bit further.

3. WRITE A LETTER PLEASE! If you care about the rivers of BC, the future of viable kayaking, the wild places that makes BC famous, you MUST write a letter on this issue.

Here is an example that you could cut and paste into an email and send off to the agencies that must continue to get public pressure on this issue. Weather you live here, visit here, or plan to visit...your opinion on this issue must be expressed to force the BC government into dealing with this issue.

I write to express my concerns regarding the proposed private power project in the Upper Pitt River watershed. It is unacceptable to allow a company to build transmissions lines through a class A provincial park and I 100% oppose Northwest Cascade Power, Inc's (a subsidiary of Run of River Power, Inc) application to change park boundaries to accommodate their project.

Additionally, it is unfair that the park boundary change was attached onto this environmental assessment process late in the application and it is only fair to extend the comment period beyond April 8, 2008 to allow fair public input.

The Upper Pitt River watershed is home to the largest salmon runs in the lower mainland of BC, exceptional recreation, grizzly bear, wolf, and many other species. No mitigation or study can effectively recover the loss that will occur if a powerline is run through Pinecone Burke Provincial Park. This is an example of a private power project that should not be allowed to move forward in the assessment process.

If you are not from BC and you like to visit here, you may want to add that these places are the reason that you travel to BC as a tourist and you would disagree with BC Parks being managed in this manner. By all means write your own personal letter...this will hopefully inspire you to do it!

These are the people that need to hear from you....

Barry Penner
BC Minister of the Environment
barry.penner.mla@leg.bc.ca
Room 112
Parliament Buildings
Victoria, BC
V8V 1X4

The BC Environmental Assessment Office
Martha Anslow
UpperPittRiver@gov.bc.ca
PO Box 9426
Stn Prov Gov
Victoria, BC V8W 9V1

****this one is really important and your letters will be required to be posted on the EAO websites*****

NATIONAL PADDLING FILM FESTIVAL SENDS TRL HOME WITH A CHECK FOR $1000 FOR THE BC RIVERS ALLIANCE

Todd and I were invited to this years NATIONAL PADDLING FILM FESTIVAL in Frankfurt, Kentucky. And while it took us longer to get to Kentucky due to ice storms than it took us to get to Peru, the festival was a blast. We had the opportunity to share our story of the VTH HUALLAGA and hang out with some really nice folks. Thanks you all! To be sent home with a $1000 for the BC Rivers was incredible.

The check for a grand!

WE STILL HAVE TWO FREE KAYAK SESSION SUBSCRIPTIONS TO GIVE AWAY TO "EAST COASTERS" WHO BUCK UP AND BUY A COPY OF 49 MEGAWATTS

Max Bechdel of MaCall, Idaho was our most recent winner of a Kayak Session subscription. So we have decided since we have given away two subscriptions to people here on the west coast, the next two will go to folks back east.

Max sent us this photo of him running 50/50 on the Ashlu.

And had these words to share...

I'm 22 and living in Bozeman MT finishing up school at MSU with my degree in Computer Science. I grew up in McCall Idaho where I learned to kayak. Two years ago I took a year off from school and did a bit of boating, some of which was in Canada. During that trip I got on the Ashlu and saw firsthand what an amazing river it is, not to mention everything else that surrounds it. It's sad to see what is happening to the Ashlu and so many others. I read TRL at work, busy busy work right, and saw how you got involved with this issue and I think its great and was totally stoked to support your efforts. Also, this photo is me running first drop of the box section."

Thanks for the support Max and everyone else out there! We are warming up and there WILL be some kayaking happening this weekend in our parts. Spring is here!

Oh yea and if you have not checked out Shane's DATOS INSUFICIENTES interview with Fitz Cahall over at years DIRTBAG DIARIES ...go have a listen.

A Purely Hypothetical Situation

2008-02-14T23:50:00.003-08:00

Remember this scene from The Empire Strikes Back? You know the one, the famous lightsaber duel between Luke & his daddy, that jerk Darth Vader. This is where D. Vader separates Luke's hand from the rest of his arm & then tries to lure him over to the Dark Side .. or else, die! "If you only knew the POWAAAH of the Daaahk Side!" ..

Now, I'd like to sketch out a simple analogy, a purely hypothetical scenario based on that famous scene. Darth Vader & the Dark Side, in this case, will represent BC's Big Biz & Development coalition, comprised of the Campbell Admininstration, the resource extraction industries, the Energy Lobby, hydro developers & of course, their guiding doctrine -- Bill 30.

And then there's Luke Skywalker, that plucky kid fighting the good fight. Let's say that he represents a fictional member of the BC kayaking community who, let's just say for the sake of a good yarn, is known far & wide for pioneering many of the now-classic rivers in Western Canada. Perhaps this totally fictional character organized the early opposition to the destruction of watersheds in the Whistler-Squamish area (also fictional). He's a long-time, some would say "legendary", penniless kayaker & ski bum .. but he's The Man, somehow the Chosen One (or self-appointed one?) who's job it is to lightsaber the hell outta the bad guys ..

So anyway, the stage is set. And we all know how the story goes right? Luke, fighting to keep BC's precious water resources in the hands of the public, gets handed some blows early on -- he loses the Rutherford. Then the Ashlu. He's battered & demoralized .. & then "OUCH! You cut off my hand off, man! Now I'm pissed!" He fights back with a furious vengeance & ends up blowing D. Vader's cover, exposing the ugly truth beneath the mask .. & all is good in the end for him, his hot sister, & all the people of the Alliance.

Well, WHAT IF ... instead of staying true to his values & his role as champion for the rivers & the Alliance ... what if BC's "Luke Skywalker" instead actually caves-in to the alluring power of the Dark Side? What if we learned that, in the end, Luke's life was spared, he didn't lightsaber the hell outta Darth Vader, & that he's now actually ON DADDY'S PAYROLL?

But that would never happen! Right?

Seize the day

2008-02-12T22:22:00.008-08:00

With Spring just around the corner, the infamously dark Norfwest Winter is beginning to relent & be a little more generous with the daylight hours, adding incremental bits to the waking- & the happy hour parts of the day. This makes the Dawn Patrol or the After-work mini-shots of recreation actually plausible, and also signifies the light at the end of the long, dark Winter tunnel. We've .. almost .. made ... it .... through ...

It was late last night when Running Man's text made the little chirpy noise on my phone: "What about a dawn patrol? Seize the day!", it read.

Me back to Running Man: "Consider it seized."

It was even later (circa 1:30 a.m.) when Timmy chirped my phone again saying he was in too.

With Ben jumping on in the a.m., we had a proper crew dedicated to the mission: bust out an early Robe lap at a fine flow & be back to town in time for work.

There's a lot to love about Robe Canyon, but I'd have to say that experiencing the canyon in off-peak hours (either early a.m. or late evening) is the way to do it.

See for yourself .. Enjoy the pics (thanks to Ben H. for providing some shots!)

Ben Hawthorne prepping for the short hike in to the Put-in.

Dig me. No, really ...

Dr. Tim amidst the Dawn Patrol splendor. Yeah, he still paddles a Topolino.

Brock Gavery is RUNNING MAN. Here he is hustlin' through the first rapid .. bombs goin' off all around him, no prob.

Lil Miss Sunshine. Dig.

Quasi-sequential of Running Man dealing with a nasty hole.

Timmy the internist, in a Topo, on the same drop. You kinda just have to gut it.

Paddling Into The Abyss

2008-02-05T14:07:00.000-08:00

Since coming home from Peru in August of 2007, we have had various bits of media trickling out about the trip. By far the most anticipated being the release of VTH HUALLAGA by John Grace of PENSTOCK PRODUCTIONS...which FYI is now shipping. TRL is anxiously waiting to see what Grace has concocted from our HUALLAGA DEALINGS

I figured that sometime about now we would drop the story on TRL's post-Huallaga Peruvian adventures. It was delayed a few weeks cause we have been busy slaying the epic powder conditions privy to us Northwesterners this winter. We have been receiving foot upon foot upon foot upon foot of snow. Unbelievable. This equates to less time bloggin' about kayaking and lots of more time keeping the goggles from foggin'. Please except our apologies for going over a month without a post! We live in the Northwest after all and have OBLIGATIONS to take advantage of water in all of it's forms.

Just to give you a visual...Lise-Anne Beyries rippin'!

Despite our distractions, the emails from loyal TRL desk jockeys desperate for a kayaking media fix have not gone un-noticed. So go grab a latte' or something and dig into this post about the Abysmo!

Contemplating one of the many mine fields deep in the Abyss

Photo by Andrew Oberhardt

After we left the Jefe's deep in the depths of the Huallaga and made our way back to civilization, we were faced with an interesting dilemma. We still had over two weeks left before flying home, but we no longer had boats. While it seemed a bit harsh at the time, I remember telling the team that there were only two options in my mind. Fly home early or figure out a way to keep paddling. Sight seeing in Peru with 3 other dudes was not an option on this trip. Keep in mind that we were absolutely beat down from the Huallaga and decision making with a group of guys is always challenging. Fortunately Piero chimed in with the solution. Bus back to Lima, Fly to Cusco, stay with him and his family at the TERRA EXPLORER PERU HEADQUARTERS, outfit ourselves into a Jefe, Nomad, H3, and Diesel, and go paddle the Rio Apurimac. Within an hour he was on the phone with his travel agent booking flights for us. Decision made.

We arrived in Cusco and immediately started to plan the next mission and decompress from our challenges in the district of Huanaco. Drew had been ill and that was now seeping into Shane's bloodstream. It seemed like this revolving door of only 3 capable team members at any given point. Piero was running a trip for BIO BIO and his intial suggestion was to run the Black Canyon above the commercial stretch and then keep paddling through the commercial stretch. Then he mentioned the Abysmo. We did a little investigative work on Kurt Casey's site PERU WHITEWATER. and found descriptions like "The run features several days of relentless, big, pushy whitewater in a spectacular vertical walled canyon" and "a thundering descent into the chasm formed below the snow capped peaks of Salcantay and Quishar which form the backbone of the Cordillera Vilcabamba." We started to migrate towards this option despite being warned by Piero that it was considered one of the hardest stretches of whitewater in Peru, chalked full of sieves, and we might have to wait over 24 hours at the take-out before finding a ride. With Shane laid out, Drew, Todd, and I did some last minute food shopping and the next morning we were on the bus with the Bio Bio clients heading for the Rio Apurimac. We would paddle 3 days with Piero and Bio Bio and then our food for the Abysmo would meet us at their take out and we would continue on for another 4-5 days.

For me paddling the COMMERCIAL STRETCH was really about two things. Enjoying the company of Piero's crew and getting to know Marc Goddard of Bio Bio and contemplating the team, balls, and stamina necessary to pull the trigger on the Abysmo. At the start of the trip Shane was ill and Todd, Drew, and I were still cool with attempting the Abyss as a three some. By day 2 on the commercial stretch, Todd and Shane shifted roles. Todd had become so ill that he was being fed Cipro by a doc on the trip rather than the gourmet meals Piero and crew were spoiling us with. The illness situation left all of us individually calculating what it would take to push on and if we should.

Then our decision time came. We reached the take-out of the commercial stretch at noon on Day 3. We were fed our last home cooked meal and we said our good byes to the clients and very unfortunately to Mr. Gillman as well. So it was Shane, Drew, and I ready to keep paddling on. All we knew is it would take somewhere between 3-5 days before we would hit the next bridge...Puente Pasaje. We paddled the remaining half day of flat water before arriving at one of the most stunning and committing canyon landscapes I've ever laid my eyes on. All three of us instantly knew that there was no turning back.

Committed.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

We were tested right from the start.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

Because of our lack of preparation compared to the Huallaga we had a limited understanding of how significant the run was both in terms of exposure and difficulty. However the fact that it had been successful run a few times before somehow gave us a sense of security to drop in. We were still very much prone to the unknown, the hazards, beatdowns, and challenges inherent in any attempt of the Abysmo, but because people had passed from start to finish it left us confident that we could do the same.

After 5 days total on the Apurimac we were so deep in the Cordillera Vilcabamba that campsites were becoming very limited and the sense of scale was overwhelming. It was clear why this section of the river had been named the "Abyss". Drew, Shane, and I were all starting to feel physically and mentally exhausted. We were getting everything from boat scoutable big water, to half hour scouts, to 1 hour portages, to the most endless horizons of gradient and canyons any of us had ever experienced. It just kept coming and coming and coming. Ever time it opened up a little it would quickly box back up and we would have to raise our guards. We were incredibly stoked to be where we were, yet scared out of our mind with what it was going to take to reach Puente Pasaje.

Camping on a small pebble beach below a towering canyon of sculpted granite.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

The relief in all directions was a constant reminder of how committed to the river we really were.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

Shane "waking-up"on the start of Day 6.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

One of the hundreds of waterfalls.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

On the 6th day (second on the Abysmo) we started to hit the wall. I look back on it now and can't believe we don't have more pictures and video of this run, but physically and mentally we were so taxed it was impossible to concentrate on much more than hitting our lines. There is a real difference between being able to paddle a big trip like this and being able to paddle and film everything as well. We would shoot the first couple hours every day and then the river would take over with it's unpredicatable nature. We would be able to read and run, drop into a few things and then the river would disappear around a corner or horizon and force a scout. Once of us would hop out and it would look good for a few moves, but then sieve out in the rapid below. With only three of us and an unkown distance to the take-out we would almost always opt out of media opportunities in favor of covering distance.

Shane...lots of pillows and paddling in this one.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

This pictures gives you a feel for how difficult it was to scout and navigate. The boulders were giant and the river was wide enough that we were constantly presented with challenges of seeing far enough ahead.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

Our real estate on the 7th night out...no shelter necessary.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

On the 7th day we figured we would hit Puente Pasaje for sure. We were being pushed hard and were executing every step of the way, but we were ready for the river to end on Day 7. Unfortunately it never came. If anything the river was boxing in more and we were gaining significantly more volume.

Starring downstream at another serious of canyons at the end of Day 7...check out the high water mark.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

After being on the water for 8 days our food was starting to get pretty tight and we still were unsure of how much further we had to paddle. We had made some very questionable decisions to before continuing into the Abyss. We had left with very limited beta, no topo, no shuttle arranged, a very small crew, and just enough food. While it kept us incredibly focused on the moment, it taxed us mentally and left us zero options other than successfully completing the river. On the 8th day when Puente Pasaje came into our view we all felt instant relief. Little did we know, the adventure was just starting.

Hanging with the coffee growers at Puente Pasaje

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

Setting up base where we could not be missed by an passing vehicle.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

Shane and Drew's Spanish was pretty much nil, so I instantly became the point person to try and figure out how we would be able to get out of the valley and move towards Andahuylas about 12 hours away. From there we would be able to hire a vehicle or take a bus another 6-8 hours back to Cusco. The coffee growers said that they may have a truck coming through the following day, but it could be as long as two days. An unknown departure combined with scorching heat, sand flies, and a dwindling food supply that consisted of some dried beans, well fermented cheese, and chocolate did not do much to boost moral. Piero had warned us of this very situation and even a sat phone call to him left us with..."have fun boys, you will get out of there eventually, take any ride you can get and insist".

The reality of a no-sock set-up with sand flies.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

I walked up the road to a small village of about 3 houses and managed to score some banana's, mangitos, and 4 eggs while Drew and Shane filtered some water. Pretty much everyone I spoke with had a different story and estimate of when the next truck would be coming through. One man told me it had been 5-6 years since he had scene anyone arrive by paddling through the Abyss. He offered me more bananas and wished me luck saying it could be days before we got a ride out of the valley. The coffee growers would likely be our best bet. They seemed to have the best pulse on vehicular movement through the area.

Lots of work goes into getting coffee beans to North America's latte craving culture.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

Raw beans

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

The coffee growers had taken to our company and even created a big padded area for us to sleep on that night. They piled up a bunch of burlap coffee bags and insisted we stay with them. The good thing about this was that 2 trucks showed up in the middle of the night clearly associated with the coffee growers. I immediately sprung to my feet and tried to have a word with one of the drivers. Doing the best I could with my Spanish I insisted that he take us, but he was not happy about the kayaks. He kept telling me that he "might" be able to take us, but it would depend on the load. They sort of fought amoung themselves, pissed on the bushes, and then they just left heading the opposite direction saying they would be back in the morning. While it seemed like a step in the right direction we were far from loading our boats on the truck and moving towards Cusco. For all intensive purposes we remained stuck with the bags of coffee at Puente Pasaje.

Shane sitting on hundreds of pounds of Peruvian java.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

The truck arrives late in the afternoon!

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

It was challenging to follow the Spanish that the "Jefe" of this operation was speaking. The guy that was clearly in charge was not interested in my constant efforts to move the boats towards the truck and he kept giving me a funny smurk. There was basically no way that truck was leaving without us. After they loaded thousands of pounds of coffee our moment came. We finally got the go ahead to load the boats.

Tying the boats on top of the load.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

We then switch backed up the side of a mountain for the next several hours climbing 10,000 feet in just over three hours. The view from on top of the coffee looking East into the Amazon basin blew us away. As the sun set, we scambled for sleeping bags and all the warmth we could muster and settled into another 6 hours in our truck top digs before arriving in Andahuylas. From there we would easily find our way back to Cusco.

Not a bad view.

photo by Andrew Oberhardt

And a bit of VIDEO to pull it all together...

Pretty stoked that Shane has also done an interview with Fitz Cahall of DIRTBAG DIARIES that will be launching here soon. I think it will ad a lot more to what we were all going through on the Abyss. Go check out the site if you have not already, as Fitz has some other really cool podcasts as well.

Closing Out 2007 with some new TRL Video!

2007-12-27T15:34:00.000-08:00

2007 has without a doubt been the best year of kayaking I have ever had! From the filming of Pacific Horizons, to the IR Vacation to Hell in Peru, to the never ending Tatlow Season, to rolling 15 deep via helicopter into the Clendinning... 2007 will be hard to forget. Here are a couple new shorts to close out 2007!

New Video #1... MATT MADDALONI FREE SOLOING YOUNG BLOOD

Some of the biggest adventures in 2007 came when partnering up with Matt Maddaloni. After successfully rigging the aerial zipline on the Ashlu last fall, we went for round two on Britannia Creek in the early summer. Finally the tide turned towards Matt in the late Fall when the rivers started to dry up and Todd and I found ourselves helping Matt with his own aerial project at the base of the Chief in Squamish. If you managed to miss the link in the 49 Megawatts post to Todd's Slideshow of this impressive day make sure you check it out. Working with a climber of this caliber has been so inspiring. You gotta check this VIDEO of Matt free soloing Young Blood...a 5.13a. Damn I wish I could climb like that.

Matt on Young Blood

photo by Steve Rogers

New Video #2... THE COMMERCIAL STRETCH OF THE APURIMAC PERU

Once we had re-discovered civalization after hiking out of the Huallaga in Peru, Pierro convinced us to head to Cusco. We were rewarded with the opportunity to join Pierro and Marc Goddard from Bio Bio Expeditions on the commercial stretch of the Apurimac. The rafts hauled our gear, we ate like kings (except Todd who was puking his brains out), and we had plenty of time to start getting nervous about the Absymo section which we would paddle into after leaving the rafts at the take-out. The commercial stretch was three days of great whitewater in an ancient granite canyon. Here is the VIDEO that I edited for Bio Bio to help showcase their Peru trips.

Taking in the Scenery

photo by Todd Gillman

Stay tuned for the full story coming on the Abysmo section. This was one of the hardest sections of whitewater I have ever paddled. The details will be unfolding over the next couple weeks!

Happy New Year!

A Christmas Miracle

2007-12-17T08:16:00.000-08:00

For the first time in forever, the stars aligned & I was able to mix a little paddleboating into my annual east coast holiday pilgrimage. Each year, my fam converges on the DC area to visit with Grandma & the rest of our huge clan. Most years we content ourselves with tons of eating, sleeping & football watching. We did all that normal Festivus stuff, but this time my visit would also include taking advantage of some super wet Allegheny weather. Forecasting this, I packed accordingly for my 5-day trip: one change of clothes & a pile of kayaking gear. Captain Panic Smith, Fat Andy, JBC & I made plans for a Sunday quickie in Northern WV. I was really hoping to catch the Upper B, but as is usually the case with winter rain-event boating, we'd have to make the call early Sunday a.m. after checking flows. The forecast was for increased precip but falling temps .. snow.

C.P. came through Frederick to pick me up on Saturday evening, with an extra Gus on the roof for me, but no Fat Andy in the car. Apparently he had bailed. So westward we rallied in the fading light & increasing storminess, toward my old stompin' grounds of Morgantown. After speaking with Roger, we detoured north to the Ohiopyle zone .. eventually stopping at the top of Seven Springs mountain in the midst of a hellacious blizzard. We hung slopeside with Roger & Jess in the lap of luxury while playing Wii & swillin' beers (Thanks dudes!). My plan was to drink just enough beer to induce sufficient drowsiness to fall asleep "early", but not wreck me for a super early rise 'n shine time .. keep in mind, I'm on a 3-hour Pacific-to-Eastern time difference. That hurts. Particularly when the wake-up call comes at 5:30, or more accurately, 2:30 "my time" .. an hour I'm normally accustomed to hearing "Last call! Drink up!"

Salting the wound was the incessant gale force winds buffeting the house with the noise of a billion tiny chunks of airborne ice. Sweet, let's go get wet! But then JB called confirming that the NF Blackwater would be at an ideal flow, & that's all it took to get me motivated.

We descended out of the blizzard into a steady rain in the early morning darkness, en route to Davis where we'd meet up with Canaan regular, Don Smith. JB & I scouted the super thin line on Douglas Falls before getting suited up. I'd been at this spot before, having run the Upper B numerous times, but for one reason or another, I was never able to catch the NF when it was running. I was stoked.

I dunno what the gradient on this bit is, but it's pretty steep. You're droppin' right outta the gate & for the length of the run .. lots of slides, couple waterfalls, & tons of great boof opportunities. We had some squirley weather during the trip, everything from brief periods of sun to driving rain to sleet & snow, but it was pleasantly comfy on the water. All tolled it was a great little breakaway from the flatlands.

I really wish I had more/better photos, but my camera was protesting the work conditions that day .. either too wet or too cold. Sorry, I'll try harder next time.

Nothing sez "Let's go kayaking!" like a little Ice Coast winter weather..

The only shots I got on the river before my camera stopped working was the standard "big drop" shot .. Don on Gluteal

JB could be a stunt double for actor John C. Reilly ..

Thanks to Topher for the gear, JB & Don for the leadership, & Rog/Jess for the accomodations! Merry Christmas y'all.

Win a Kayak Session Subscription!

2007-12-07T11:07:00.000-08:00

We have a huge thanks to go out to Matt Trebesch of Belgrade, Montana for being the first to purchase a copy of 49 Megawatts! Matt does not even paddle, but runs the website THE FRONT RANGE and is an avid fan of TRL.

here is what Matt has to say...

"There’s a blog I like to frequent called The Range Life. TRL, as they like to be called, is comprised of a few whitewater kayakers who like to paddle in small, extreme gradient streams especially in British Columbia. I like the blog because they document what they do, when they take time from their lives to partake in a sport they’re passionate about. They usually have some great video and photos of their expeditions (or missions, as they call them) paddling some really crazy water. I’m frankly fascinated by the beauty of where they paddle, and the extreme nature of their sport. They always seem to come out alive, after paddling in some of the most remote, rugged and beautiful country I’ve laid my eyes on."

I have tried to explain to so many people that we are not just in it for the gnarly whitewater, but the sheer beauty that you experience in these river canyons as well. I love how Matt, a non-paddler, can relate with not only the crisis on the rivers here in BC, but the remote and rugged wilderness that we expose through our media. We instantly connected on another issue that Matt explained...

"We need to partner up with guys like you to put pressure on government to deal with these out of control corporations. We have some of the same issues here - in fact a Canadian based coal mine, the Lodgepole Coal mine (being spearheaded by the Cline Mining Corp) threatens the WHOLE of the flathead watershed. This basically originates North of Waterton and Glacier National parks...Check out the VIDEO that details this situation. 'll quit my rant, but just know that I'm happy to help your cause. It's good we have folks like you out there to bring this to our attention."

NOW THE BEST PART THAT COMES WITH THE FIRST ORDER...A FREE 1 YEAR SUBSCRIPTION TO KAYAK SESSION!

We will be giving away 3 more 1 year subscriptions thanks to KAYAK SESSION for the next three weeks to people who purchase 49 Megawatts. If you happen to be one of the lucky numbers we select each week you will get your picture on TRL and a subscription to the best whitewater mag out there. Not a bad deal eh?

49 Megawatts DVD

2007-12-06T10:21:00.000-08:00

Over the past few years this labor of love we call The Range Life has established a voice in BC that resonates with many kayakers around the world. We have published some incredible stories, photos and video from our backyard paradise, given out the critical beta on the great runs in Southwest BC, and perhaps most importantly, we've taken a stance that free-flowing rivers are an absolutely crucial part of BC's future prosperity. We have voiced our opinions, raised awareness, and created some controversy. We've expressed to the world that we are paddlers who care deeply for the places that feed our spirit and inspire us to keep pushing the boundaries of the sport.

Now we turn it back to you, our loyal subscribers, fan club, haters, hecklers, and fellow dirtbag river lovers, with this humble but important and request...

PLEASE SUPPORT OUR CONTINUED EFFORTS IN BC AND ELSEWHERE BY PURCHASING THE 49 MEGAWATTS DVD, WHICH ALSO INCLUDES BC SUMMER 06, A BRAND NEW PIECE FEATURING PERU'S ABYSMO DEL APURIMAC, AND THE TATLOW TEASER FOR JUST $15.

By owning 49 Megawatts, you will have the opportunity to build on our grassroots Ashlu-focused intitiative and shine the light on the very real threats to ALL of British Columbia's threatened watersheds. And at the same time, you will be supporting our continued involvement in the issues on the front lines.

OK so if you have not clicked on the BUY NOW button above and you are still reading, then I guess you need some convincing. We are not embezzling your money to go kayaking, we are asking for your support to help us continue to produce media that convinces more than just kayakers to stand up for the rivers. So here are the details on why TRL is launching 49 Megawatts on DVD.

1. Since releasing the 49 Megawatts download on the web, we have been asked by numerous people when it would become available on DVD. The goal with this film was education and generating awareness -- not making money -- so we chose to delay the DVD release in order to allow the story to spread fast and free, which it certainly has. But now we need to get it out in a format that can be shown on televisions and projection screens around the world. Since so many people have asked for it, we are now offering it.

2. The production of 49 Megawatts was financed 100% out-of-pocket, and out of a desperate need to get the word out on how endangered the rivers of BC are. It started with attending all the public hearings on the Ashlu 3 years ago. We then started collecting historical footage of the Ashlu in it's natural state, then we set out to capture amazing kayaking footage from aerial ziplines, with the help of MATT MADALONI. We then chased down politicians, biologists, industry veterans, local residents, fishermen, and many others who had something to say about the Ashlu issue. All the while, we went up to the Ashlu day after day as the destruction of the valley began and continues. The story was then edited into a documentary-style film, to become a useful piece for a coalition of organizations concerned about the rampant privitization of public resources.... Point is, we have more hours wrapped up in this film than you might imagine. If you like what we produced, then PLEASE consider supporting us with this project. Simply put, it will help fuel our continued efforts to produce media that makes a difference.

3. We are also including on the DVD BC Summer 06, a sweet 5-minute short on the Abysmo section of the Apurimac in Peru, and the Tatlow Teaser. BC Summer 06 won the 2007 National Paddling Film Festival Best of Show award and to date, has never been released on DVD. All people have seen thus far is the low-resolution web version, so pairing it with 49 Megawatts was a great opportunity to get it out on DVD. The Abysmo piece, according to Todd (if you believe anything that guy says), is by far the coolest short TRL has produced to date. You will have to buy the DVD in order to see this one right now. We will put it up on TRL evntually, but it is the added bonus incentive for those who step up and purchase the 49 Megawatts DVD.

If you are still not convinced...please see reason #4

4. Come on people! The DVD is only 15 bucks. You help fuel a good cause, get some classic TRL footage, and it only costs as much as a 6 pack of beer in Canada. Besides, it's Festivus and your wife/girlfriend needs a stocking-stuffer, right?

5. If you are still reading ... don't worry TRL will still bring you free web-based media for the foreseeable future. Maybe you just don't have a physical address for us to ship the DVD to 'cause you are a dirt who lives out of your rig. Maybe you don't have $15 to spare. Maybe you are hoping Santa will pull the trigger for you instead.

We beleive in freedom of speech here at TRL, so speak up by purchasing a copy of 49 Megawatts, or speak up by posting your lame excuse in the comments, and we will exercise our own freedom of speech to berate you to the fullest extent of our capabilities.

Seriously though ... From all of us at TRL, Thanks for the support and Happy Holidays!!

Saturation

2007-12-04T20:37:00.000-08:00

Depending on which part of town you're considering, Seattle just reported heaviest recorded rainfall in local history. The northern metro NWS station reported a 24-hour total of over 5 inches of rain .. with an approximated SIX BILLION GALLONS of water falling on the Seattle area. A classic Pineapple Express system coming (literally) "hot" on the heels of several weeks of crazy cold high pressure followed by lots of low elevation snow. On Sunday Joe Mosquera & I were shredding a foot of fresh pow at Baker. By Monday morning Seattle was in the 50's & all our rivers were blowing out.

Obviously, this has caused a ton of flooding & problems for the city, but nothing compared to what's going on south of Oly, where hurricane-force winds & the flooded Chehalis River & other swollen streams have forced the DOT to totally shut down a section of I-5, both directions, for at least the next couple days. On I-5 in between Seattle & Tacoma, the DOT reader boards are advising Portland-bound travelers to take Rt 18 out to I-90 in Yakima, then down to I-84 & back west to P-town .. which is insane.

So, while rescue crews have their hands full plucking people from the roofs of their houses, our amphibious brothers & sisters are dutifully plucking low-hangin' high-water fruit. For instance, got this from Rathmann today:

Condit Dam ... Big one! So It's been raining like crazy here in Hood River...Here's a teaser of something I ran this morning...MORE on the way!

photo courtesy of Keel Brightman

This dude was totally impressed .. obviously.

I'm sure the playboaters around here are all goin' cuckoo about all the water in the Skykomish, etc. .. but our tribe is more concerned about The Robe & how this flood event may have bullied that ever-changing riverbed around. A year ago, a similar but even bigger flood event brought about The Robe's current incarnation (Version 3.0, for those of you keeping track) .. and we're all quite happy with that, so here's to hopin' that nothing got ruined in there .. or -- as Andrew points out -- that maybe some things even got improved. New info is sure to come to light in the next couple days as our favorite run drops down into sane "exploratory" levels.

Pacific Horizons DVD Release and Premiere Tour!

2007-11-23T11:07:00.000-08:00

Well November has come and I'm finally watching PACIFIC HORIZONS turn from digital files on my G5 to hundreds of DVD's being shipped around the world. Combine that with being a finalist at the 2007 BANFF MOUNTAIN FILM FESTIVAL and you get me, TRL documentarian Bryan Smith all fired up. Now I know many loyal TRL readers and hardcore whitewater boaters are thinking..."why should I be interested in a sea kayaking film, ain't that for when I retire the plastic creeker and start growing a beard?" Well I have a few answers to that question. First, I can guarantee that there is plenty of action in this film and while you may get all puckered up at the lip of a big waterfall, I'm certain the sea could pucker you up just as much if not more. Second, there are some stunning images and stories in this film that all kayakers will enjoy. Third, if you are pushing 30, married, and still paddling hard whitewater...this could very well be your future so you better start figuring how to be cool on the sea not just a bad ass on the river. Forth, at a bare minimum we will be drinking beer and talking kayaking at these upcoming events, so you really have no excuses and lots of reasons to come and join us at one of the following events!

VIEW TRAILER

The West Coast Premiere/Portland
Hosted by ALDER CREEK CANOE AND KAYAK
Thursday November 29th 7:30PM
Mission Theatre
1624 NW Glissan
Portland, OR
Free Entry!

Seattle Premiere
Hosted by SEATTLE RAFT AND KAYAK
Friday November 30th 7:30PM
Seattle Raft and Kayak
7777 62nd Ave NE Building 11
Seattle, WA
Free Entry!

Vancouver Premiere
Hosted by ECOMARINE
Tuesday December 4th 7:30PM
Ecomarine
Granville Island
Vancouver, BC
Free Entry!

Guest Bloggin's: Joe Keck on the Crystal Gorge, CO

2007-11-23T09:01:00.000-08:00

I guess since we don't have much of anything exciting to blog about out here -- it's that time of year -- we've decided to make it like open mic night for our friends. In this installment of Guest Bloggin's, our pal Joe Keck provides us a couple images from Colorado's Crystal Gorge, which is one of like 3 or 4 true gorges in that state.

Joe sez:

There's something about the Gorge that just captures the imagination. It think it's in the water color. It's crystal clear like its name suggests, but it has just a hint of limestone travertine-style tint to it.

Plus, every visit I like to dream of what it would have been like to be the First D team from Pine Tree through Zoot Chute and the inner gorge. It's a magical bit of boating. The photos are courtesy of Todd Patrick, who generally shoots weddings and lives in Glenwood Springs, CO.

I do like the summertime boating in CO, if only there was more. (ed. note: that's why God invented the Pacific Norfwest, Joe.)

Guest Blogger: Topher Smith on the Moose

2007-11-12T10:04:00.000-08:00

This from loyal reader and old roommate, Topher Smith (a.k.a. "Captain Panic")

Moose Trip '07:
The Moose is an awesome example of an east coast fall release river that has something for everyone. There are easy sections (top and middle), and of course the Bottom Moose, which is what we have always come up for. This trip was my 3rd time visiting Old Forge, NY for the Bottom Moose. Every time I've been up there it's cold, and usually rains with a good possibility of some snow. This time we got the rain, but luckily no snow! It's one of the only road trips that I absolutely prefer to rent a cabin or hotel room, instead of the typical camping set up. The basic trip is drive up Fri night, run on sat, run on sun, and get packed up for the drive home.

[Editor's Note: And by "run," Topher is referring to kayaking, not jogging! I just didn't want some of our readers who have a tendency to prefer the latter to get confused by that play on words :)]

The run starts off with a great bang, Fowlersville Falls. A steep slide of about 50 ft, with a nice hard hit that you always plug no matter what your intentions. The river is also the best example out there of an east coast drop pool run. After almost ever drop is a little run-out then a flat lake. The run also has 3 dams, 2 of which are frequently run as a lead into a rapid. Shortly after a few more drops you get to a very nice and fun waterfall - Augers Falls. But first you slide right over the first low head dam of the run, then into the falls. Paddle some flat water, portage a dam, and you come into the slidey section of the run. Sure Form is a fun 100 yard long, but no so steep slide; although, being a little off your line at the top equals a lot off your line a the bottom! Fun either way goes, but certainly it is much smoother to be left at the bottom. Right = likely carnage. Our group was on fire, with clean lines ALMOST all day long. After a few more drops and your at the big-daddy you've been dreaming about since last year - Crystal Falls. Crystal is the most complex drop on the run, with a few different ways to enter the bottom drop of the rapid. The standard starts river right, with a boof. Boof, break left and hit the plugger 15' drop at the bottom. There is also the Alpine line which involves two more straight forward ledges right on top of each other, then culminating in the same last plugger, IF your on line. There is also one last drop at the end of the run - Magilla. The real Magilla line is to run on the river left, but is has a semi tricky ledge to boof, and lands in a shallow slide run out. We typically opt for the "slide over the dam, hit the slot, run the falls" line on river right. Did I mention you have to slide over a dam and your line is completely blind??

Anyway, it's a great run that is nice and steep, not very committing, and always provides a bit of carnage from the groups that head up from out of town. It also has a spring time release season, but we typically are busy in our neck of the woods that time of year. So if your in the NY or east coast area in the fall or the spring, put it on your list of "TO-DOs." -T

The Team: Topher, Rodger, Geoff J, Stacey, Brian D, Jeff Urban

Thanks, Topher, for the update from the right side.

Powder Day on The Robe

2007-10-24T12:12:00.000-07:00

First, if you haven't seen these surveys on American Whitewater, please take the relevant one:

Colorado Boaters: Click Here

Green River (WA) Boaters: Click Here

Now, on to the action:

One aspect of snow riding activities that I find truly unique and enjoyable is that of the POWDER DAY ! Sure other activities have perfect conditions, but usually not with such a fleeting occurrence like that of getting fresh tracks on a deep day, which cause people to act with such reckless abandon toward their given daily and life responsibilities. However, Tuesday, October 23 was a Powder Day on Robe canyon ... and it coincided with my Birthday necessitating actions of irresponsibility in favor of pure joy.

Below is how the conditions set up:

10/21
This was supposed to be the day for Robe ... perfectly aligned on the day before the workweek, and following a week of rain that had everybody excited to get out on the local runs. However, another system moved in too early pushing the local runs into the extra juicy levels and pushing most paddlers in the region in search of that perfect latte.

10/22 @ 11:03 pm
Todd sez via email:
looks like tomorrow is going to be the EPIC fluffy flow & sunshiney day on robe. i'm bummed i can't do it.

10/23 @ 9:57am
Chris T. sez:
Wayrad and I had dawn patrol on c-water this morning, we were boofin ski jump when ya'll were just rubbing sleep out of yer eyes!!

While I had long since been up when they were getting their boof on, it was my Bday and I was feeling less than satisfied with the boating that took place over the weekend. I started thinking about how nice it was outside and maybe I needed to rally another dawn patrol for the following morning.

10/23 @ Noon - 65 degrees
Step outside from morning classes and this odd yellow sphere-shaped object is in the sky causing symptoms such as squinting, perspiration and thoughts of irresponsibility.

10/23 @ 12:02
Thinking there is a slim chance I can rally anyone today on such short notice, but knowing that its going to rain tomorrow, I call Chris T to see if he wants to double down on kayaking for the day. He sez that he's got a dentist appointment in a couple hours.

10/23 @ 12:03
I call several other local paddlers who either can't go or are not answering their phones.

10/23 @ 12:04
As I am about to give up on the mission, an incoming call from Chris T. The dentist appointment has been rescheduled and its on! Meet at the take-out at 2pm.

10/23 @ 12:05
I call Utah ... no answer. I call everybody else I know who might have any slim chance of joining the new momentum.

10/23 @ 12:15
I know Utah is not working and probably sleeping, so I call again. I wake him up this time and he says he'll call back in 5.

10/23 @ 12:20
Utah is in!

10/23 @ 1:30
Cruising down I-5 with minimal traffic and the windows down, sunglasses on, and arm out the window. All I'm missing is a flaming elbow tatoo.

10/23 @ 2:40
Riverside - 70 degrees!

10/23 @ 3:45
72 degrees and Utah is surfing in Mrs. Robinson's ... again!

10/23 @ 3:53
74 degrees and hitting the huge boof at 6.0 feet on Magic Fabric!

10/23 @ 4:40
Beers at the Take-out, sun is still shining, Utah is banging rays, and I know this is exactly where I was supposed to be at this very moment!

Winter is coming! Whether it is the first powder day of the season in the snow or the last sunny powder day of the year on the river, do your best to make sure you are exactly where you need to be on that day when it comes!

Blog Action Day

2007-10-15T07:51:00.000-07:00

In case you missed it, today is BLOG ACTION DAY. Since we are a blog, and since we kinda like rivers and they are part of the environment, here ya go ... a few links for your reading pleasure. Despite THIS, I woke to THIS STORY on NPR this morning. Also, THIS site has alot of great eco news and a pretty good blog, so check it out. Also, THIS blog is pretty good for the latest river-related news. So consider calling a representative or writing a letter to the editor or donating to your favorite cause today. (just don't leave some self-righteous claiming comment, Brock!)

And scroll down to check out some great shots from the Box!
bye

Box Canyon Beauties

2007-10-11T22:17:00.000-07:00

As the Fall season quickly turns winter here in the Sea to Sky corridor, people are already talking about LA NINA and predicting an epic ski season. I'm still watching the rivers in hope of a few good runs on Ashlu, Elaho, Squamish and Callaghan before I pull out my skis, but the BC coat range is slowly transforming into winter.

Chasing the flows after a recent storm, Chris Tretwold and I managed to paddle the Box Canyon of the Ashlu recently with PHIL TIFO. Phil is an accomplished photographer based in Squamish and works primarily breathing powder as a staff photog for Transworld. Not a bad job to have. A month prior I had dragged Phil into the Tatlow in an effort to get some potential land angles on the big drops. The rumor of mama grizz and endless bc hellfuck kept him waiting at the nymph pool with the dogs rather than attempting to scwack through the woods chasing kayakers. Not a bad choice.

Knowing that the Box is one of the more accessible runs to get a view into for photographs, I had been telling Phil that "we gotta get some cool aerial shots of the Ashlu this season". Also not knowing how long that section of the Ashlu would remain free flowing, it was paramount that Tretwold was introduced to the beauty of the Box in it's natural state. With the Elaho at about 120cms and the cloud cover breaking, everything lined up on a Saturday morning for the mission.

In case you forgot how beautiful the Ashlu was...

Last words before dropping in.

The crux boof at the corner rapid.

Engagement

The entry into triple drop

The exit of triple.

There had been some rumors flying around about some new changes in this run. The two things that were clearly different from the 2006 season where.

1. Triple drop. The entry ledge now goes down the middle. We use to run this on the right, then sneak into a small right channel and hit this really sweet boof at the bottom. Now you still enter on the right, but a big tongue and reactionary take you back towards river left. If you look at the above photo you can now see that there in no rock that used to create the river right channel and feed you onto the boof. Big change, but I think it actually makes the drop easier. The drawback is that is puts you on the left for the next drop that you want to run right.

2. Wood in the first of the 10 foot ledges in the second canyon. You used to be able to run the first ledge far right. You still can but wood prevents you getting the flake over there.

3. Having you license plate recorded and number of kayak noted. Thanks Ledcor!

Some people ran the drop immediately below the two 10 footer this year and I heard it had changed. It looked identical to last year when we were there. You have always been able to run the right side. There is a slidey sideways boof, but it does have issues. There is a shallow pin rock that still remains and the center boulder is very undercut.

Thank you Mr. Heribert of Cologne

2007-10-03T22:51:00.000-07:00

And now, a moment of reverence for the triumphant return of precipitation, crappy weather, and wet rivers here in the Norfwest!

And how about a hearty round of applause for our boy Heribert of Cologne. Hells Yes!

Not familiar with this Heribert character, you say? Well, it's time to acquaint yourself.

It's at about this time each year, all the folks in Colorado begin trying to invoke the blessings of a dude named Ullr, the Norse god of the hunt & of snow (who, was a master skier & who, clearly, favors Colorado's Mormon neighbors.. but that's another matter).

Similarly, when we become a bit parched around "always rainy" Seattle, who do we turn to? Heribert of Cologne, the Patron Saint of Precip, natch. Heribert was the Archbishop of Cologne beginning in the year 998, & is said to have called down a deluge of moisture upon the drought-stricken & famished peasants of that German city during a desperate year, thereby saving their harvest & their lives.

Ever since, he's been the go-to guy when you're feelin' that low-water pinch. This evening's after-work mission down the Robe is proof that Heribert loves us and wants us to be happy. Check the evidence.

Mr. Robinson in Hole In The Wall. The wood has moved out of the left side of the ledge.

Faceplant scoutage & classic autumn scenery in The Robe.

Johnny Utah enjoying the fall colors & extra-medium flow at Faceplant.

Utard about to get a face-full at Leap of Faith.

Shane at the bottom of Leap of Faith. The Leap isn't the issue at 6 ft., it's this sticky ledge after it that you gotta really charge.

Shane @ Garbage

Utah boofing the first ledge @ "20-Foot Waterfall"

And Shane boofing the 2nd ledge @ "20-Foot Waterfall". Note the new log in the left side of the landing of the 2nd drop! It's out of play unless you really goon it. Don't goon it.

The dudes in some random pushy boogie-water. Somewhere around here we saw a big Momma-bear with cub hanging on a rock right at river level. Shane didn't see them & ended up pulling into the eddy created by the rock they were hanging out on. The family had vacated by the time he got there though.

We also saw a huge bald eagle & a great blue heron, each flying low through the canyon.

5 o'clock put-in, several scout/photo stops, & still only 2 hours on the water .. gotta love those extra-medium flows in the flatwater paddle out!

The Clendinning: Best Weekend of 07

2007-09-24T21:14:00.000-07:00

Let's rewind back a couple weeks ..

While still in the midst of our 3-day Stein trip, Jeff Robinson, Ryan Bradley, Jenni Pelc & I had already started planning our next BC fly-in mission. The core group was formed & plans solidified when old friend Colby Mackley joined in shortly thereafter. Within a week, we had enough peeps (seven) to fill the Otter, the normal way to access Clendinning Lake .. A week later, with the addition of TRL'er Bryan Smiff & his lovely wifey Lise-Anne, momentum was shifting toward taking an an A-Star instead. Considering the huge time savings acheived by being able to fly a heli from the takeout (as opposed to a plane outta Whistler), when the price difference between the two options came in as "neglegible", the call was an easy one to make ..

We had 14 people at this point, & at the very last second added this goon, meaning that, apart from the obvious comedy that comes with Schertl's inclusion, we now had three FULL 5-loads on the chopper, & that total cost would be minimized. That made FIFTEEN PEOPLE in one group on one creek! .... And not a single hiccup; it worked out flawlessly, which is all about the team we went in there with.

So my favorite river trip of 07 has to be the Clendinning. It may come as somewhat of a surprise that a "backyard" 2-day class IV run would take top honors over an all-expenses-paid exploratory mission in South America. Peru will definitely go down as an all-time favorite & even a life-changing experience .. but our 2 days floating through Clendinning Provincial Park's wide open vistas, hanging glaciers, towering waterfalls, old growth stands of cedar & fir, and incredible granite walls, all with an awesome crew is pretty much THE perfect mini-vacation river trip .. and is probably my highest recomendation for a quality float trip in lower BC.

Also, I'm pretty proud to say that we run with a damn solid crew of female boaters out here. I love the fact that we had couples on this trip & that the ladies totally kept up with the fellas entire time. Don't let the "class IV" thing mislead either -- with the Elaho hovering at above 100 cms, there is plenty of challenging whitewater to keep an expert boater on his or her toes (it's BC class IV, after all). But this trip is all about the overall experience; the camping, the views, & the company you keep.

Shane sez:

Floating out the final clicks of the Clendinning, Todd asks me in a rather questioning tone, "How come you never talked more about this run???" After a long pause, pondering the question myself, I answered, "Well, how do you even adequately describe it? I do remember telling you that you MUST do it."

And he's right. This is a tough run to put into words, & one that you simply MUST DO .. so with that in mind, will start with some old low-flow FOOTAGE we posted forever ago .. and then here's about a bajillion nice photos from our trip. If these images don't get you totally stoked to pack up your boat for a proper river trip, well then ........ you may just be a playboater.

TG photo

TG photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

Steve Rogers Photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

Steve Rogers Photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

Steve Rogers Photo

Jeff Robinson Photo

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Jeff Robinson Photo

Steve Rogers Photo

Steve Rogers Photo

TG photo

Jeff Robinson Photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

TG photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

Jeff Bellis Photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

Steve Rogers Photo

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Steve Rogers Photo

Steve Rogers Photo

Jeff Robinson Photo

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--- HUGE THANKS to Darren at Black Tusk for working out the somewhat complicated logistics & pricing with us! Helis are obviously a decadent mode of transportation, but it doesn't get much cooler than flying over god's country in slo-mo, & then landing so deep in the backcountry that it takes a couple days before you see signs of civilization! ---

--- HUGE THANKS to Steve Rogers of Bread And Butter Media for the use of his incredible photos. ---

A Prayer For Daniel

2007-09-16T15:33:00.000-07:00

Listening to an especially good PATAGONIA DIRT BAG DIARIES PODCAST I was reminded of a certain friend and a certain photo ...

When Daniel DelaVergne passed, I put a picture of him on my computer.

And one up on the magnet board above my desk. At some point I contemplated taking them down, but decided that he would stay until we finished the Rio Huallaga and returned safely, all the while providing motivation and inspiration just as he always has.

Then, at the first camp on the Huallaga, Bryan pulled out the same picture I had above my desk and explained to the group that Daniel was with us in more than just spirit. Every camp, we would pull out the photo and find a good spot for him.

We returned from Peru, safely, just over a month ago, and Saturday night the Vacation to Hell torch was passed as IMMERSION RESEARCH announced the winners of the 2007 VACATION TO HELL.
Congratulations, Team Sweetwater!

A Prayer for a friend ... The DD Section of the Huallaga
The picture stays! Thank-you Daniel for everything!

btw, SR&K is hosting us for a slide show of the Huallaga trip Monday (tonight) night. Come CHECK IT OUT it out if you are around Seattle!

peace ...

The Tatlow Buzz

2007-09-06T14:46:00.000-07:00

The 2007 season on Tatlow Creek has been so f-ing incredible! While the normal window of Tatlow is somewhere between 7-10 days in August, an avalanche across the river at the put-in is the latest theory for why the run has continued to hold at perfect flows for over two weeks now. Austin Rathman and myself have been going head to head for record number of Tatlow laps in a year. Now that he has bugged out of BC and I still got a few days left to rack up some more laps, I think I got it in the bag. I'll be at 8 laps by the weekend. Non-media laps are coming in at around 45 minutes now.

With all the shit slinging in the latest LVMTV, I could not resist getting something up while it is still fresh. Stafford... last I heard you were suppose to be in BC. What Colorado a little dry this time of year? Grace...keep smoking that pipe it goes well with coffee from Starbucks. You do have Starbucks in Asheville right? You are gonna need some coffee to finish the edit of VTH.

So THIS SHORT will serve as a quick video guidebook to the Tatlow, and as a teaser for a short Tatlow documentary I will have out here soon. Every drop in the Tatlow is shown in sequence here besides the one or two boogie rapids in between a couple of the bigger ones. Enjoy!