Lava falls; welcome to the chunder dome

Saturday, February 20th 2010

White Salmon river, Farmlands section, 3.5 feet

Class IV-V

5.1 miles

Due to a lack of rain and cold weather, this weekend a large caravan of people made a pilgrimage to White Salmon, WA. The group consisted of Jon, Jon's girlfriend Katie, Chipper, Chippers girlfriend Kelsey, jP, and myself, and we ended up meeting up with other groups that included Texas Dave, Dan, Fish, and Ian. Friday afternoon I drove down solo and went to All Adventures where we would be sleeping that night. I arrived at the old stomping grounds and was warmly met by Karen, I hung out with her for several hours and watched the Olympics and talked about politics, local gossip, plans for next year, and firearms. Time well spent with the Boss. The rest of the gang arrived late because of their long slog from Seattle.

After a bitter cold night (24 degrees F) sleeping in the bed of the truck, I roused around 8:00 am, and made myself some coffee while I waited for the sun to rise. The rest of the gang woke up soon after and we began to hash out plans for the day. We were going to wait for Fish and Ian to go paddling, and they wouldn't be there until noon, so we had a leisurely breakfast, checked the river level at the gauge in Husum, and then rallied up to the take-out to meet the rest of the gang.

Most of the group including myself wanted to have a warm-up day on the Farmlands section of the White Salmon, a class IV-V run located several miles north of the BZ corners. We dropped my truck at the take out, and the girls drove us up to the top and dropped us off. They had made plans to do some hikes at the advice of Karen.

We suited up and clambered down to river level, did some warm-up paddling, and then made our way down to the first rapid of consequence; Little Sidewinder and Sidewinder. Little Sidewinder is a straightforward class III+ with some weird water at the bottom. Sidewinder proper is a relatively easy line with disastrous consequences, if a paddler messes up their line there is a large undercut rock that the current pushes you under. The rapid looks ugly and in reality wouldn't be that satisfying, after some scouting, jP, Jon, and I decided that we didn't want to flirt with disaster and walked around. Chipper felt otherwise, he wanted to run it, so he did, and with a really good looking line.

This section of the river is pool-drop in nature, basically that means that there is a rapid followed by a flat pool of water. From below sidewinder there were several class III and IV drops, all shaped by the bedrock riverbed, some big ledges, and S-turning rapids all were fun and relatively low stress. The next big rapid we arrived at is Lava Dam Falls, it's a 15 foot ledge that has no lead-in rapid above it, just a glassy pool. We scouted and then Jon ran it first and had a really quality line, off the lip with speed and landed flat and paddled away from the hole. jP went next and had a different line but was equally successful. Chip followed and was not as successful. He approached the lip and threw in a really strong boof stroke, landed flat, and then the boil from the backwash turned him and brought him in towards the falls. I scrambled down the rocks with the throw bag to get a better angle because he had gone out of my line of sight and he was gone. When I say he was gone, I mean that there was no sign that he had even just run the drop, no paddle, no boat, nothing. Just a pounding waterfall with three kayaker's staring at it in puzzlement.

what had happened was the force of the falls had sucked him behind the veil of the falls and had pinned him and his boat between the veil and the rock behind it. Eventually you could see the orange of his kayak showing through the falls. After about 10-20 seconds of this Chip breached the surface downstream, I threw him the bag and pengulumed him to the shore. His boat eventually flushed out and went downstream, jP chased it through the next rapid and collected it in the pool below. Chip being too eager to get back to his boat, almost jumped back into the river to swim through the rapid, which was the only option, but at the time we - as a group - needed to take a second to smoke the proverbial cigarette and calm down a second and talk about our next plan of action. I still wanted to run the falls so I wanted to have someone with a throwbag and someone else in their boat to pick up the pieces if it all went bad.

Now it was my turn, I took a final look at the line and where I wanted to be, climbed in my boat, splashed some water in my face and started charging for the lip. From here the next thing I remember is being upside-down at the base of the falls with the falls pounding on the hull of my boat. I couldn't roll because of the ultra aerated water, I could feel the boat being tossed around, and I eventually decided that extricating myself from the kayak was going to be my best option to go deep and away from the cave that Chip had taken a short vacation in. Somehow the falls had imploded my skirt for me and I was now swimming freely underneath the falls. Swimming in a hydraulic is extremely disorienting, the water is tossing you around, and the things you learn as a raft guide about swimming whitewater aren't in the forefront of your mind, in some respects it's panic-mode. After being chundered around a bit I eventually remembered to ball up in a cannonball, this flushed me deep and the next thing I was catching a rope from Chip whom I had pulled out of the river only too recently.

My boat and paddle flushed downstream and Jon chased. Now chip and I were sans kayaks, standing above a class IV rapid that we would need to swim in order to get back in our boats. There were no options for walking around, so we got prepared to swim through some substantial holes in order to get back to our boats. Chip jumped first and I followed shortly behind. The first two ledges we stuck down the left side of the river and then swam strongly to the middle to avoid the hole on the left and the right wall that I had seen my boat get hung up in for a minute. The worst part of the swim was how cold it made my hands and feet. I had forgot to put thick wool socks in my bag so I had been forced to wear white cotton socks underneath my drysuit. Dumb. My feet wouldn't warm up until we got off the river an hour and a half later.

There was one last class V rapid at the end of the trip which I optioned out of because my confidence was in tatters. We paddled down to the take out and our cars.

The hardest part about this experience for me isn't the physical beating that I received, but more about the bruising of my ego and confidence. For the rest of the day I was in a solid depression about my situation, not because I swam, but rather because I had such a bad line that forced me to swim. It wasn't until a few days later that I was able to remind myself that I am a competent paddler, and that I won't do that again. Paddling teaches us plenty about ourselves and our limitations, it also reminds us what is so exciting about whitewater; the unforeseeable future.

Jared: my friend the narcoleptic

On Saturday February 13, my friends and I decided to paddle our local playboating run the Tilton. The day wasn't particularly exceptional, we surfed, and played down the river, stopped a few times to stretch the legs and regain feeling in our feet. But there was one instance that is memorable just because of how hard I laughed.

On this day Chris and I had gotten behind the main group for a moment in order to empty out the gallon or so of water that was sloshing around at our feet. We dumped our boats, and then got back in the water and paddled downstream in order to catch up with the rest of the group. The rest of them were floating in eddies around the corner waiting for us to run the rapid and group up again. The rapid that separated us was an easy class III with multiple lines, I started on the River Right and weaved my way over to river Left to catch an eddy that Jared was in.
Oh, here is some background information on Jared. Jared, is one of the first people I started paddling with when I arrived in Olympia, and he has a peculiar manner of things, but a good guy all around. The guys and I always give him a hard time about his sleeping habits. "If he doesn't get his required 17 hours of sleep he can't function" or, "Jared the undiagnosed Narcoleptic". The kid can sleep anywhere and anytime, sitting up, standing against his car, at a stop light, and now in his kayak.

As I pulled into the eddy Jared had his paddle in his lap, holding onto a rock, elbow resting on the cockpit rim, and his cheek against his hand. Dozing. Initially I didn't realize he was sleeping, but when I pulled up next to him and said "what's up!" and he startled awake I lost it. I laughed for the next 20 minutes, I had to go up to everyone and explain why I couldn't stop laughing. It became infectious, the legend about Jared and his need for sleep just gained notoriety. This morning while I was in the shower I thought about it again and started laughing just as hard. If I didn't know him like I do this event wouldn't have been very funny, it might have been even a little scary. I might be lead to believe that he was having a stroke or a heart attack, or some other disorder that was killing him. But no. I laughed. I laughed hard. I've woken him up enough times in a variety of other situations, but this was a first. Fast asleep, sitting in his kayak, at the bottom of the Tilton gorge. Classic. Sounds like a Seinfeld episode.

I think that doctors could use him as a case-study to write there doctorate thesis' on, any man that can sleep even while there adrenaline gland is pumping is truly special.

Gripped on class II

Sunday, January 24th, 2010

E. Frk. Humptulips Narrows 1400 CFS
Class II (IV)
5.0 Miles

On Saturday Kris and I had decided that we wanted to paddle our C-1's (The technical terminology used to refer to canoes in white water, C-1: one person decked canoe, OC-1: single person open deck canoe Etc.) , and Ben and his Girlfriend Shawna who had been in jP's group were going to join us. Kris and I are both novice canoers, but we're good whitewater folks so we weren't too nervous about the potential for swimming in a class II section of river. Ben would be in a kayak and so would Shawna, so they can look out for us if need be, at the very least they can pick up our paddles for us. So we thought.

We were slow going in the morning and didn't leave Kris' until noon, and by the time we had finished shuttle, and geared up it was already 2pm. "No worries" I thought, "still plenty of time to make it down this five mile section before dark". I took plenty of time to stretch my legs and warm up before I squeezed myself into the cramped C-1. We peeled out and I quickly grew accustomed to the single blade and high center of gravity, right up to the point when I flipped over in a slow moving pool. Luckily I was able to orient myself and roll the boat up with limited difficulty. At this point We could still see the put-in beach. My confidence was a little shaken.
The group began to make it's way down stream, and as we moved towards the gorge it became apparent that Shawna was not a competent class II paddler, in reality she was an introductory paddler, still not versed in the world of whitewater. She swam before we arrived at the first gorge. At this point I was feeling confident that I wasn't going to need saving, but was also aware that if I did swim I would need to clean up my own mess. Ben and Shawna were playing a game of "I'll yell where to go and you do your best to go there" and "I'm going to follow you so close that I hit the back of your boat". She was gripped, white-knuckle, tunnel vision, hyperventilating GRIPPED. So Kris and I would paddle ahead and point out the lines, and set safety for the nervous wreck that was barreling down the river behind us yelling "where do I go now" repeatedly, and "is that the last rapid" in the flat pools at the bottom of rapids. And the whole time Ben was so preoccupied with Shawna that it almost felt like we were on separate trips.

Everything went surprisingly well despite the two man circus behind us. We portaged around the unrunnable entrance rapid to the gorge, and then picked out way down to the landslide rapid that designates the end of the gorge and the last half mile of river. The landslide had fallen into the left side of the river at some point last year and had created a jumble of large boulders and aggregate in the river. There is a line down the right side of the rapid, a steep three foot ledge, initially I was going to walk this rapid, but when Kris (a less experienced C-1'er than myself) said he was going to give it a go, I had to run it as a matter of pride. Chris had some trouble in the swift water leading up to the drop, but came out upright. I paddled aggressively up to the lip, gave it my best boof stroke, landed in the confused water, broached and flipped. I flushed down stream into the pool, set up for my roll, and nailed it first time. WHOOOHOOO!
I had been telling Shawna that the landslide was the end of the big rapids, but my memory had deceived me had two of the most technical rapids of the day that guarded the take out. In the longest rapid, I took my first swim in a while. The entrance was a tricky reactionary wave with lots of confused water below it. I boofed the first ledge and then hit a strong eddy line, flipped and began to attempt my roll. After some monkeying around under the water I conceded to the fact that there was stuff down stream that I needed to be right side up as I passed by it, so I pulled my skirt, undid my thigh straps and swam out of my boat. I popped up and grabbed the stern loop and paddle and attempted to swim away from Woody Harrelson hanging out in the river. I was approaching the innocuous piece of wood and not making a distance with the paddle and boat in my hands. So at the last moment I ditched them both and swam around Woody. Once below I cleaned up my yard sale and swam into an eddy on river right. The $500.00 I spent on the dry suit were well worth it. I climbed out of the water with a bruised, but dry ego. Unfortunately my swim had prompted Shawna to walk to the drop, so this took a bit more time out of our already waining light.
Once we were all back in our boats we paddled the three hundred yards or so down to the bridge. By now Shawna was exhausted because her adrenaline gland had been pumping at 200 percent capacity for the past three hours. I've never seen someone so stoked to be done with a river trip. It was a gripped day on class II, Shawna was gripped for lack of knowledge and skill, Kris and I were gripped because of a lack of skill, and Ben was gripped because he knew that if this trip went badly he might not have a girlfriend on Monday morning. You can't buy that kind of fun.

Scraping Down The Satsop

Saturday, January 23rd, 2010

W. Frk. Satsop, 2400 CFS

Class IV

4.0 Miles

This Saturday Kris, Chip, Jon, Dan, and I made a trip down the West Fork of the Satsop Gorge, a short stretch that contained two walled in gorges and class IV water. Chip and Jon picked me up in Oly and we rallied over to Kris's for a cup of coffee and to load kayaks into and onto trucks. We worked out the logistics and began driving the hour-or-so north to the river. We wound our way through clear cuts and bumpy forest service roads in search of the take-out. At the take-out bridge we checked the visual gauge and discovered that the water was going to be lower than anyone in the group had run it before, but after driving all the way out here we felt it was still our best option. We were going to help with river bed erosion as we scraped our way downstream.

After running shuttle we began the usual slog through ferns, devils club, and deadfall, down steep and loose slopes to the rivers edge. The first mile or so consisted of class I and II shoals and maneuvering around and away from fallen trees. The gorge appeared very suddenly, walls closed in and the first horizon line of the day reared its head. We scouted along the left shore and were presented with a straightforward class IV rapid, the lead-in was obscured by trees hanging low in the water but were easy to avoid. The first drop was a S-turn in front of and then behind a large boulder in the middle of the current. Below this boulder was a very narrow gorge, perhaps 6-7 feet wide with fast moving current, the exit of this gorge was obscured by a log that we ducked under the right side of. From here there was several hundred yards of class III until our next horizon line.

Kris scouted from the right side, but unfortunately there was not enough room for the rest of us to get into the eddy. Chip scouted from river left as well while Ben, Jon and I waited in some eddies upstream. Kris and Chip scouted for a long time, scrambling and looking at the rapid from all angles. I was becoming increasingly uneasy about the rapid due to the amount of time they spent looking at the drop. Eventually Kris gave us the Thumbs Up, pointing to the middle of the first ledge then pointing left. I didn't particularly like this but trusted my friends and dropped in. The rapid turned out to be a double ledge, followed by a narrow gorge with some wood hanging into the river.

From here we exited the first gorge and quickly entered the second gorge. The first big rapid of this gorge was a mandatory portage, a large rootball obscured the left side of the entrance and water was flushing through and around this. Below the initial wood was even more wood that was piled 10-15 feet above the water level. The drop looked like it might be runnable without Woody Harrelson parked in it, but there was so much water flowing into the pile that it wasn't a viable option. We portaged along the top of the pile, carfully walking along large trees, passing the boats to each other in a chain until we could get back to river level. There were times where I was standing on gravel that high water events had deposited in the pile creating a cement-like substance. We all took our time getting back to river level and climbed back into our boats incident free.

Below this rapid the riverbed became much steeper and more continuous. Due to the low water there was some less-than-ideal lines we had to make, paddling close to wood and rocks that had a pinning potential. After about a mile of this the river slowed down and we eventually came around the corner and saw the bridge. We climbed the steep bank up to the river and to the cars.

Behind our group was my Friends jP, Brian, Nick and others that had joined them. We all hung out on the bridge and enjoyed the warm weather, partly sunny skies, and our Pabst Blue Ribbons. Not a bad way to spend a day on the water.