Living the Liquid Lifestyle

You Gotta Love Kayaking in Ecuador!

2012-01-04T11:21:00.000-08:00

After a week of climbing mountains with my mom, it was time to move onto a sport that I have a little more experience with. So after returning to Quito from our Cotopoxi attempt, I headed to the airport to meet the most famous kayaking dentist in Kentucky, Clay Warren, for our week of kayaking and showing him around one of my favorite places in the world . My mom flew out the following morning and Clay and I headed to the Quijos River Valley and the town of Baeza to begin our trip.

Walking through the bus terminal on our way to Baeza (Photo by Clay Warren)

Clay and I on the Quijos (Photo by Doug)

In Baeza we met up with a bunch of my good friends and kayaking characters, including Big Drew, Kesha and Mr. Joe Ravenna. It did not take long for our first meal at Ginga's (where we pretty much eat three meals a day when staying in Baeza) and a "welcome to Baeza" Ecuadorian moonshine shot with Vicinte (Ginga's husband). That one shot turned into ten, and it became a challenge to try and turn down shots, which none of us needed anymore of.


The homemade Ecuadorian Tequila (the scale in the picture isn't the best, but that bottle is actually about ten times the size of a normal liquor bottle)

Joe having a hard time saying no

Big Drew and Kesha

While in Baeza we got on a number of my favorite sections of whitewater in the Quijos Valley and Ecuador in general, including the Bridge to Bridge, Bridge to Borja, and El Chaco Canyon sections of the Quijos as well as the lower Cosanga. Because the water is more high volume in this area, its a bit harder to get pictures, so I have very few. Sorry.

Drew and Joe floating through Chaco Canyon

Doug the "Pac Rafter"


A typical scene at Rodrigo's Place

We had hoped to get on the Cheese House section of the Quijos before moving on from Baeza, but the morning we woke up to run it we found that the rain overnight had more or less flooded the Quijos and made that no longer an option. So we quickly changed plans and decided to move on to Tena that morning, stopping at the Lodo (mud) section of the Misahualli along the way. I had not run that section in over six years and I had forgotten how fun it was.

A Volcano view on the way to Tena

The reason they call it the mud section

Me doing what I love best (Photo by Joe Ravenna)

Mr. Ravenna hitting his boof

Dr. Love takin it to the wall

Clay, being the philanthropist Dentist that he has, brought down a bunch of toothbrushes to give away to locals that my need one. We had been waiting for the right moment to give them all away, and the take out of the Misahualli proved the perfect opportunity when we were bombarded by a village of small children. Instead of just giving them away, Rodrigo helped us quiz the kids and make it more of an educational competition, which proved fun for all of us.

Clay and his happily toothbrush equipped children

The next day we planned on heading to the Jondachi (considered one of the most classic Ecuadorian runs and my personal favorite), but as we drove to the put in we noticed a bad storm in that direction with rain already beginning to fall. With many stories of people being flashed off that river, we decided to tell the taxi driver to turn around and headed off in the opposite direction to the Piatua River. I had never been to the Piatua before so I was excited to see a new river. It turned out to be beautiful continuous class 4 creeking.

Clay in a boulder jumble rapid on the Piatua

The following morning the sun was shining and we decided it was a much better day for the Jondachi so off we went. The hike in was just as muddy as I remembered it, making for a fun experience trying not to fall and laughing at those who did. Forty-five minutes later we made it to the put in and started our way down this ultra-classic run.

The Put-in

Clay seal launching in (Photo by Joe Ravenna)

We had a decent sized group, with a few newbies and only a couple of us that had been on the run before, years ago, so we made our way down carefully, fully enjoying the many great class 4-5 rapids on this creek.

Enjoying the scenery while waiting patiently for the group

Oh, the Money Boof

Me at Typhoid (Photo by Doug)

Clay coming through Tres Huevos

Joe at Tres Huevos

We all made it down safely and were stoked to have run the Jondachi. After seven days of kayaking and a lot of staying up late, we were getting a bit tired. So we decided to finish off the week by spending the weekend in Banos. Banos is a tourist town located at the base of the Tungurahua Volcano and a very special place to me as it is where I spent a large portion of time during my first trip to Ecuador and I still have many local friends that live there.

Joe, Clay and I arrived in Banos early in the afternoon and decided to hop on some motorcycles for a short ride. Clay and I were determined to do a full ride the following day (renting bikes in Banos is cheap and ridiculously easy, so I try and do it every time I'm in town), but Joe was on the fence since he had never ridden a motorcycle before. The afternoon ride was supposed to hook Joe and convince him to join us the next day. It worked.

So after a night hanging out at the club enjoying the banos atmposphere, we rented some more motorcycles and took off up the mountain. We did a four hour ride that took us up into the hillside, offering awesome views of the Tungurahua Volcano along the way.

Clay taking a moment to enjoy the view of Tungurahua

There was only one small mishap on the ride, and I was lucky enough to have a front row seat. As I was riding behind Joe, he accidently tapped the front break with a little too much enthusiasm and did a superman off the front of his bike. At first I was extremely concerned, rushing up to make sure he was ok. After it was determined that a bruised foot and some road rash were his only injuries, Clay started laughing and I had to join in. It was a funny moment, but one that could have been way worse. We're glad Joe was not hurt more, and it was a good story to reflect about over beers later that afternoon.

Joe showing off his road rash

A view of the Banos Valley from the road

After riding back to Banos we returned the bikes and headed off for some food and beer. It was the end of our trip together and that evening we would all be heading off to different things. Joe was back to Baeza to start guiding kayaking trips for Endless River Adventures, Clay had to get home to his dentist practice and I had to start my trip with Adventures by Disney.

The kayaking lifestyle in Ecuador is hard to beat. With really easy logistics, tons of great rivers close together, warm weather and $1.25 grande beers, what more could you ask for? Add in a bunch of old friends and new ones as well and theres no place Id rather be. That is exactly what this trip was for me. It was an awesome week filled with good kayaking, great friends and some awesome adventures. I can't wait to do it again next year!It was an awesome week filled with good kayaking, great friends and some awesome adventures. I can't wait to do it again next year!

Mountain Climbing with My Mom on the Equator

2012-01-02T15:02:00.000-08:00

I have to say, if you're going to have to work during the holidays, being in Ecuador isn't the worst place in the world to be. I just returned home from a ten day trip guiding for Adventures by Disney in Ecuador, but before work started, I decided to make the most of my trip south by going two weeks early in search of adventure.

My adventure began with a mountaineering trip with my mom. Neither one of us had ever really climbed any mountains before, but with numerous 15,000+ foot mountains lying next to the equator, we decided Ecuador would be a good place to start. So we signed up for a week long trip that involved four different summit attempts. I was very excited to get the experience of doing this with my mom. I am always proud of her for agreeing to join me on these kind of trips especially considering she is afraid of heights.

First up was the Guagua Pichincha Volcano (15,696 ft). The hike up to this one was fairly simply, involving a road then a trail up most of the way, followed by a little rock scramble near the end. The point of this one was to get our acclimatization started so we walked slow and tried to get used to the lack of oxygen in the air.

My mom and I at the top of the Guagua Pichincha Volcano

The next morning we woke up at 5:00am to get started with our climb of Volcan Imbabura (15,190 ft). The climb to the summit took us around four a half hours, with the first part on relatively easy trail and progressively getting more difficult, requiring a decent rock scramble to get all the way to the summit. Starting off as the sun was rising and finishing on the summit just as the clouds were rolling in, combined with the amazing scenery, made this my favorite climb we did.

Our view over the valley as the sun was rising

My mom making her way up through the rock scramble

Me at the summit of the Imbabura Volcano

After a night of rest in Quito, we were off to our third peak, Iliniza North (16,818 ft). This one required that we hike up to the refuge one afternoon, and wake up early the following morning for our summit attempt. The hike up to the refuge took a few hours and provided on and off views of the summit. We spent that evening drinking hot tea and resting up for the next morning.

My mom hiking up the trail to the Iliniza Refuge

Hanging out at the refuge

The following morning was an early start and unfortunately not with the greatest of weather conditions. It was cloudy and on and off snowing and hailing. The climb up to Ilinizas North is not a super technical climb, but it was the first for us that required wearing plastic boots, a harness and a helmet as well as roping up in a couple spots. From the refuge it started out scrambling up some rocks, then turned in to a bit more rock climbing, meandering along ledges where falling was not an option.

As the snow started falling harder, and I continued to visualize in my head watching my mom fall to her death doing something I may or may not have talked her into doing, I started to doubt whether going all the way to the summit was our best option. Both my mom and our guide seemed to be thinking the same thing, as we approached the final push which involved what they refer to as "the death step," our guide mentioned that this was the last spot to bail out and with the weather as unpredictable as it was, recommended we turn back. We all agreed that making it over half way was accomplishment enough in those conditions so we began to head down.

Fortunately, instead of having to downclimb the section we had climbed up, we were able to descend down a scree field which while very steep, was not too bad once we got the hang of it. We made our way down safely and after a quick stop in the refuge to warm up with some tea, we continued back to the trail head.


My mom at the top of the rock scramble about to enter the more technical part

Heading down the scree field

It was now time for our last big mountain attempt, and the highest yet, Cotopoxi (19,347 ft). Cotopoxi is considered one of the highest active volcanoes in the world and has the record of being the highest spot from the center of the earth (higher than Everest due to a bulge in the earth along the equator line). After our experience on Ilinizas and my mom's apprehension about the height and potential "crevasse jump" required for Cotopoxi, I realized there was a good chance we may not make it to the summit, but thats not what this trip was about for me. For me it was about getting out and experiencing something new with my mom, so I didn't really care how high we got as long as we gave it a shot together.

Similar to Ilinizas, Cotopoxi required a short hike to the refuge the day before the summit attempt. After arriving at the refuge, we took a short break before heading out into the snow to practice some of the more technical mountaineering skills we hadn't needed until now. We learned how to walk in crampons using an ice axe and how to self arrest should we happen to fall. It was a beautiful day and a fun afternoon practicing our new skills in the snow.

Its so close, but still so very far away

My mom practicing with her crampons and ice axe

My mom and I posing with our ice axes

That night we went to bed at 7pm in hopes of getting a little bit of sleep before waking at 11pm to start our summit push. With the anxiety of what was to come, combined with being at 16,000 feet of elevation, it was not exactly the best night of sleep I've ever had.

At 11pm we woke up and got all geared up and ready to go. As I walked out to restrooms, I was blown away by the sight of the summit lit up beautifully by a full moon.

The peak of Cotopxi lit up by the moon

By midnight we were on our way up the volcano. The wind was blowing furiously, so much so that I had to be careful not to lose focus and allow it to blow me over. With the direction of our guide, my mom and I followed up the mountain, making sure that every step we took was a good one, as the fear of slipping and beginning a long slide down the mountain was always in the back of our minds.

Walking up the steep snow field was not easy, and required a good bit of physical strength and endurance. The wind and the cold definitely did not help the situation. So after a couple hours of hiking and at the start of the more technical glacier part of the climb, my mom decided that that was as far as she needed to go. I was proud of her for getting as far as she did, and for even going with me in the first place.

Before starting back down, I took one last look at the volcano and then out into the valley, with Quito's city lights twinkling from afar, and my mom and I headed back down together.

My mom up on Cotopoxi right before we turned back down

On the way back to Quito that next day, my mom looked over at me and said "you know, I think I want to come back and give Cotopoxi another shot at some point," so you never know, we may make it to the summit together someday after all.

A Fall In Nepal

2011-11-29T12:40:00.001-08:00

Upon arriving into Nepal from India, we quickly headed to Pokhara, what we had been told was the best boating town during that time of year and immediately found some other boaters and started knocking some runs off of our list. We warmed up with a local classic the Upper Setti, just 45 min. outside of Pokhara.

Next up was a trip to the Kali Gandaki, a very commonly rafted river which involved mostly class three rapids, but we were surprised (and delighted) to find a pretty huge rapid right off the start with one of the bigger wave features I've seen in a while. Later we found out that a landslide had caused the rapid just two days before we ran it, so we were one of the firsts to see this new feature. We did the run as a two-day and spent time stopping along the way to visit with the locals and enjoy the scenery.

The most epic part of the Kali Gandaki experience however was the ride home. After spending a good bit of time trying to figure out when a bus might be by to pick us up, we finally got a bus, however the only spot available was on the roof. And being a festival time there were tons of people trying to travel, so we were not on the roof alone. The ride ultimately ended up taking around seven hours because of all the stops they made. At one point we had to load a desk and dresser to the roof with us. It was crowded. And started to rain. Little did I know that was just the first of many roof top rides I would take in Nepal.

After the Kali Gandaki we were ready for something a little more difficult and higher up in the watershed. However, because we were the first kayakers to come through the area that year, we were the first to go out and find out about water levels. We knew we were a bit early in the season and might find some high water, but with not much time to waste, we decided to go see what else we could find. After having experienced how long and epic bus rides in Nepal can be, we decided to pack only what we could fit in our kayaks and go from river to river, without returning to Pokhara in between, in order to minimize the time we spent on the bus and maximize our time on the water.

First we headed to the Madi Khola. Our plan had been to camp out at the put in and put on the next morning. We had a bit of an epic trying to find a spot to camp and put in due to a misconception as to where exactly the park boundary started (and consequently where you were expected to pay a permit fee). After some arguing, we were forced to carry our boats down to a location with no camping and no access to the river in the dark. Fortunately our jeep driver came back and helped us get to what turned out to be a pretty nice campsite.

The Madi Khola was a bit high as we expected, but still very good to go with some solid rapids near the top and turning into fun class three until the spot where we took out. After lots of broken English conversations, we finally figured out that there was a bus going leaving at 6am the following morning to our next destination. We woke up early to load up on what was probably the craziest bus ride I have ever been on. The buses there are four wheel drive machines and go where most other vehicles can't or won't. It was not driving on any road on a map, but rather on what was once a trail that eventually got wide enough for a bus. Eventually however we got to the next town and started our journey to the Marsayandi River.

Here we met up with Julian, a Swissboater, who was keen to explore the Marsayandi area as well. We started offjourneying up a tributary we had noticed riding in. With not much beta on whatthe trib was like or how high up it we could go, we made the call to rent atractor (no other vehicles could make it up the road) and see what we couldfind. While we were waiting on the tractor I had a pair of pants made for me ina little seamstress shop for $5 so I would have a clean pair of pants to wear.Gotta love Nepal...

We ended up finding that the tractor really couldn't go very far up the river and ultimately got dropped off in this little village on the hill above the river right as it was starting to rain. With little food and Julian without a tent, we asked around in the village to see if anyone would be interested in putting us up for the night and making us some food. Only one person in the village spoke English, and after finally convincing the guy we were not looking for a hotel or a restaurant, simply a sheltered place to throw down our sleeping pads and some Dal Bhat (local dish of rice and lentils eaten three meals a day by locals), he welcomed us into his home. It was an awesome experience and probably the most cultural one we had all trip. We drank yak milk by the fire, helped the children with their English homework and simply enjoyed the peaceful simplicity of their lives.

While not as long as we'd hoped, the tributary turned out to be fun creeky water and dropped us right into the Marsayandi. The Marsayandi was high as well and definitely got two low water Southeastern boaters' hearts beating a bit. Big waves and large, but easily avoidable holes, made up the entire run. We took out at a local temple where we took a moment to say Namaste.

Our final big adventure in Nepal involved doing the river that we had heard was one of the best in Nepal, the Modi Khola. The Modi Khola runs off of the glacier of Annapurna (the tenth highest mountain in the world) and runs along a popular trekking route. Gareth and I decided it would be an awesome adventure to first hike to the river's source (the Annapurna base camp) then continuing down the river once it became paddleable.

We started off doing something that was hard for the both of us- hiring porters to carry our kayaks. Being people who generally carry our loaded boats for ourselves, it was tough to have someone else do it for us, but we ultimately decided that it made more sense to support the local culture and it would also save us some time (when in Rome...). So we got the porters to carry the boats for what was probably around ten miles up the river to where we planned to put on and locked them up at a teahouse. We then pushed onwards towards the Annapurna glacier carrying only small packs, which we would later be able to put in the back of our boats when it was time to paddle downstream.

After two days of hiking alongside the river with epic Himalayan views around every corner, we finally arrived at the source of the Modi Khola. It was pretty interesting to hike next to the river for so long, simply watching it get smaller and smaller right up until the spot where it actually started.

From here, we were just a 20 min. walk from the Annapurna base camp where we decided to spend the afternoon and evening in order to watch the sun rise on this amazing mountain range the next morning. We enjoyed an evening at 14,000 feet drinking Chai and eating overpriced Dal Bhat. There was also a little high altitude Frisbee action going on.

The next afternoon we started our descent back to our kayaks. At this point we were anxious to get to the boats and get on the river. We did stop to enjoy the views along the way and admire the some of the crazy loads the porters were carrying. This guy below actually had about 30 chickens in that coupe.

The river ended up being just as sweet as everyone told us it would be. The day was filled with fun continuous rapids all the way down. After getting to the take out we quickly loaded up and hopped on a bus in order to make it back to Pokhara that evening. In typical Nepal fashion we rode home on the roof of the bus as the sun was setting over the surrounding peaks.

We decided to end the Nepal adventure with a three-day trip to the jungle in the Chitwan National Park. Notable moments included almost being charged by a rhino, searching for tigers in the night and of course, the "elephant bathing" or in reality the "elephant rodeo" experience!

After getting back I had two days before it was time for the greatest show on earth- the Green race! It wasn't my best showing ever, but it was a lot of fun and not bad for not having trained at all.

Stay tuned for a 7 Finger Media Video of our Nepal trip coming out in the near future!

In Transit to Nepal- Quick Stops in Amsterdam and India

2011-11-28T19:02:00.001-08:00

This past October, as hard as it was to leave the southeast in the fall (one of my favorite places at my favorite time) I decided to take a journey about as far away as possible. The trip was to Nepal and I was excited to see a totally new culture and new rivers with the backdrop of the world's highest mountains.

I did however make a few stops along the way there. First was a 24 hour layover in Amsterdam. What made that stop special was meeting up with some old friends of the family who are from the Netherlands, but once lived next door to me when I was younger. I had not see Rita and Saskia in over 15 years! It was great to spend the evening catching up and remembering the past. I also did manage to squeeze in a little trip to see what the red light district was all about...

The next morning I was off to India. Gareth Tate had been teaching wilderness medicine all September in India so it worked perfect to meet up with him there and cruise together off to Nepal to find some rivers to tackle. Before leaving India however, we took the time to get into a few adventures, most notably visiting the Taj Mahal during a festival time where they love to cover themselves (and especially the tourists!) in colorful flour product.

After a couple days of running around and exploring the Taj Mahal and Delhi we were more than ready to get started on the kayaking leg of the adventure, so we were off to Nepal!

A Little Nomad Love

2011-07-31T08:02:00.000-07:00

The Dagger Nomad - An Expedition Perspective from 7 Finger media on Vimeo.

A California Multi-Sport Adventure

2011-07-20T11:57:00.000-07:00

Adventure Guiding for Disney in the Galapagos

I recently found myself with a couple weeks off in between guiding adventure travel trips and decided to squeeze in a little adventure travel trip of my own back out to one of my favorite summer destinations, California.

Because of unpredictable and finicky water levels in California, I flew out there with no expectations of what I would get to run during the trip, but instead went with an open mind and an adventurous attitude knowing I would find something fun to get into. And as always, California delivered and I ended up getting to spend my week on an epic multi-sport charging mission which included a class 5 kayaking overnighter, back country skiing from over 12,000 feet and mountain biking through steep sierra terrain.

The trip started out with kayaking Dinkey Creek, quite possibly my favorite creek in the entire world. I cannot tell you how excited I was when Dinkey Creek literally dropped into a runnable level overnight and came in much earlier than we thought it would. A bunch of my friends were headed straight there, but I decided to wait for Gareth to get off of work that afternoon and we made a plan to drive through the evening straight to the put in and start hiking early in hopes of catching up with my other friends. Unfortunately, that plan didn't pan out because the drive took longer than expected. We ended up spending most of the day trying to work out another shuttle option (since we were at the put-in without a car at the take out). It wasn't until about 3pm that we finally worked out an option for shuttle that necessitated Gareth and I putting on then, just the two of us and completing the run by the following afternoon. So with that, we started packing and started hiking...


Gareth loading his boat for the overnight on Dinkey

At first sight of the river Gareth and I both realized that it was a bit higher than either of us had done it before, and we began to contemplate our decision to put on just the two of us. In kayaking, it is always better to have at least three in a group, but having traveled and kayaked together so much, and knowing how capable the two of us are as a team on the river, we felt okay about our two pack man/woman team. Our final decision to put on was not made in haste, and involved over 30 minutes of discussing and debating and ultimately deciding that we would go but with an extra conservative approach.

Hiking down the granite towards the river

We did not arrive to the put in of the river until around 6:30pm. Tired from the hike, but anxious to make some progress downstream, we decided to put on and knock out a few rapids before finding a camp spot. After 30 minutes of paddling, knowing that the river was going to gorge up quickly, we decided to make camp at the first good spot we found.

The best wine always comes from crumbled plastic water bottles


Drying socks by the fire...

After a wonderful night of sleep under a full moon next to a class five rapid, we wake up charged for the day. I have to say we were somewhat expecting/ hoping to find the water level having dropped, but no such luck. Without much other option, we put on and started making our way downstream.

One of our first rapids of the morning was the Willie Kern Slide. Known to be the largest mandatory rapid of the run, it involves a 15 foot ledge into a low angle slide, through a hole at the end of the slide then off of a 40 foot high angle drop. The higher level definitely made us a bit more concerned about the hole in the middle of the rapid, but after a detailed scout and a three minute zen break requested by Gareth, we put on and went. I went first, with Gareth right behind me. All went great until I hit the bottom of the 40 footer and had my paddle ripped from my hands. Fortunately, I hit my first hands roll and managed to hand paddle over to my paddle and regroup. I was a bit nervous for Gareth because around 20 seconds had passed and he had not come down yet, but alas he finally came flying off the drop styling his line. It turned out he had caught an eddy in the middle of the drop which is what caused the delay.

We breathed a breath of relief after successfully navigating Willie Kerns and continued downstream running more fun waterfalls and slides than you'd ever imagine possible on one six mile section of river.

Gareth below the rapid below the portage

Scouting the "Good Morning Slide" named because it is the rapid below the traditional camp spot

The first of the Twin Waterfalls

Gareth at the second Twin Falls

After getting off the river we spent another night at the takeout waiting for a shuttle ride then started driving onto our next mission, backcountry skiing Mt. Conness on the eastern side of Yosemite. This made for a beautiful drive as it took us through the western slopes of the sierras, through Yosemite National Park and out onto the eastern sierras.

A little bit stop overlooking the Yosemite Valley

Later that evening we arrived at our camping spot and starting location for our mission up to Mt. Conness. We met Aaron Stable and his fiance Laura and made a plan for the next morning.

After a 4:30am wake up we were on our way hiking to the top of the 12,500 foot peak. We started off the morning with a two mile walk up a closed road until we arrived at the Saddleback Lake trailhead. At that point we entered into the snow and things started to get interesting. First we walked along the steep slopes of hard packed snow in our tennis shoes, with the risk of slipping and sliding into the frozen lake very much on my mind. Eventually it was time to throw the ski boots on and we continued up the mountain. At one point, Gareth and the other Laura decided to climb straight up and over the ridge, while Aaron and I took a more laid back route up and over a saddle. Aaron and I ended up squeezing in a nap and having a snack for about 45 min. waiting for the more "burly" hikers to catch up :)

A view around the lake

Gareth and Laura at the top of the climb over the ridge

After arriving over the ridge we began following it along hoping that we were going to be able to connect it to the summit. While Gareth had submitted and skied the mountain a couple weeks earlier, he had not done this specific route we'd chosen which is why were a bit unsure about how it would work out. We climbed along the ridge, which involved some tricky rock maneuvering, until we found ourselves at another saddle. We did a bit of scouting to figure out if we'd be able to continue to the summit along that route, but unfortunately found it was not going to be able to be done safely.

Our options were then either to find a route to ski down or hike back down the ridge we just came up. Not wanting to backtrack, we began really exploring our options for getting to the snow and starting our back country skiing experience.

Coming up on the realization that our chosen route was not going to work out

Our fearless leader

Bishop passed out

Getting ready to ski down

Gareth was able to scout out a route that required some very sketchy down climbing on rocks, but eventually brought us to a safely ski-able slope. Well I should clarify, it was safely ski-able for everyone else in the group, for me, having a very limited amount of experience on skis and wearing Gareth's too large for me boots and his fat powder skis I was terrified. I more or less fell and slid my way down the slope and eventually decided to walk part of the way down. It was pretty entertaining or pathetic or some mix of the two.

The top slope we skied (we climbed down the left side of the cliff ridge and skied into the bowl)

Taking a break in between slopes

After a couple more steep slopes and me barely making it down, we finally arrived back at the lake's edge and began our cross country ski out around the lake.

Over two hours later we finally made it back to the road and convinced a person from the lodge there to drive us down the closed road back to our vehicles to avoid the two mile walk out. Hungry and exhausted, we drank a cold beer then headed out to find some food and one of the better free car camping spots I've seen.

The rainbow at our camp spot

Another view from camp

The following morning we were off, headed back north to Truckee to spend the day. Still buzzing from the paddling and skiing adventures, we decided we wanted more and started making plans for a mountain bike ride.

I called up my friend James Harrison who moved to Truckee from back east a number of years ago and he hooked me up with a spare bike and off we went up the mountain. He took me down a local downhill trail with tons of man made jumps (which I happily avoided). I did get to watch him hit some sweet jumps though.

At the top of the ride overlooking Truckee

James jumping

James rolling down an obstacle

The following morning Gareth and I woke up early as he had to be back in Coloma to start a weekend of work and I started to prepare for the end of my week long charge in Cali. It was time to head back to NC and back to work.

From kayaking one of the best creeks in the world, to skiing in July to cruising downhill on a bike, that was one epic week of multi-sporting in California.

My Muddy Motorcycle Adventure

2011-06-27T18:54:00.000-07:00

While I had been very much hoping to get to go kayaking in Ecuador during the couple of days I had off in between my Adventures by Disney trips, that didn't happen due to my kayaking friend in town getting sick. So instead I decided to spend my two days off in my favorite place here and the town in which I have spent more time in Ecuador than anywhere else, Banos. I had no real plans except to spend the night and say hello to my friends that live there and hopefully get into some type of adventure.

Me at the shop before the ride (pre-mud)

So, upon arrival I stopped into a motorcycle rental shop (there's a ton of them in town) and see if I could find a tour or a guide to go with since all of my friends in Banos were working. At one of the shops, the manager mentioned that there were a couple of guys from Quito riding the next morning and he called them to see if they wouldn't mind having me along. Keep in mind I had been honest that I wasn't exactly the most experienced rider, but I assured them I was a fast learner and used to doing similar style activities. The guys were a bit unsure, a little worried I would hold them back, so I offered to pay for us to rent the motor bikes for a half an hour that afternoon so they could see how I was before committing to having me along on their more epic ride the next day. Well, I guess I proved worthy enough during our little test/practice ride because they said they would love to have me come along the following morning.

I spent the rest of the evening playing pool and foosball with my friends from Banos, enjoying the nightlife, but staying away from any drinking because I wanted to be in good shape for my ride the next morning.

I met my new friends at the shop in the morning and off we went up the mountain towards the Tungurahua volcano. After about 45 min. of charging up the volcano and right as I was starting to get used to the bike and feel really good cruising through the rocky terrain, we came around the corner to find a land slide had caused 50 yards of ankle deep mud. Initially I tried to step around the deep spots and stay relatively clean as we moved the bikes through the mud, but that thought went out the window quickly when we realized it would take all four of us deep in mud to get all the bikes through. After lots of pulling and pushing we finally made it to the other side.

Pushing the bikes through the first mud patch

Almost through!

David excited to be done pushing the bikes (for the moment anyways)

We were stoked to finally get through the mud and excited to get on with the rest of our ride. Little did we know it at the time, that just a mile or so away we would encounter yet another stretch of mud. This time is was knee deep mud and once more we all started pushing our way through it. Fortunately, as we were about half way through some locals walked by and warned us that this was just the first of many more land slides ahead and that the others were even worse. After hearing this we decided to turn around and take a different route that would take us down to the town of Patate and then we could return to Banos from there. The locals assured us that this other route was open and good to go.

Plan A officially not happening

Me almost finished getting the bike back out of the second mud patch

The result of all the mud

Turns out it the other route "was" good to go, before the heavy rains of the previous night caused the biggest land slide we had encountered yet and one that was simply impassible.

Adrian realizing that plan B was also a no go

So we took the only option we had left which was to turn around and head back down the mountain the way we came. Fortunately the route we came from was lots of fun, but unfortunately it meant that we would have to push the bikes through the first mud patch yet again. This next time we were a bit more prepared (and were going downhill) so it wasn't as bad as our first pass at it.

Me post mud headed down the mountain

After an hour or so of riding down the mountain we arrived back in Banos tired but loving the adventure we'd just had and not ready to get off the bikes yet. So off we went down the road to squeeze in a little more charging, this time on paved roads with little chance of encountering mud. This was fun because it gave me a chance to really get the bike up to speed and feel the power (and yes, I'm hooked).

Adrian giving the thumbs up to an awesome adventure

After the ride, I quickly returned to my hostel where I had 10 min. to pack up and shower before checking out. Lucky for me, it turned out my riding companions were headed back to Quito and offered me a spot in their car. So instead of being stuck in a bus for the rest of the afternoon, I got to ride back to Quito in a car with my new friends. It was just the adventure I needed before going back to work on another Disney trip.

Thanks Adrian, Julio and David for letting my join in on your adventura en Bano. I can't wait to go with you again next time I'm back!

A Not So Hot and Sunny California Spring

2011-06-13T14:54:00.000-07:00

I just got home from a month long kayaking trip in California and I've got to say it wasn't exactly the hot and sunny California that I remembered. Actually, it wasn't hot and sunny at all, more like cold and rainy. And the water levels? They were a bit high most of the time. It was one of those things you just had to embrace. We wore dry suits and had cold hands. We life-styled and did other obscure activities. We did on overnighter in the rain. It was sweet.

I started off the trip in San Francisco visiting my big brother during what is claimed to be one of the best parties in all of California- Bay to Breakers. It lived up to its hype for sure, and involved walking like 10 miles in costume. I dressed up as a devil chicken.

My Brother and I the morning of Bay to Breakers

Next up was some time spent around Sacramento, finding things to do when the water levels weren't exactly conducive to kayaking. Ever heard of kite skating? Stand up paddle board surfing? I also managed to sneak in a little 49 to Bridgeport run of the South Yuba.

Robby Hogg kite-skating down an open road in Sacramento

Nick Urquarhart SUP surfing the South Fork of the American

Chad Pickens at Corner Pocket of the South Yuba

From there I decided to head up to Chico to spend some time with friends there and check out the town and nearby rivers. My friend Sean Corbett and I started off my visit with a trip down the local run, Butte Creek. Butte Creek is a class 4-5 creek with lots of fun rapids and beautiful scenery. The scariest part of the trip however was the shuttle ride on the back of Sean's new motorcycle!

Sean boofing on Butte Creek

Our Butte Creek shuttle vehicle

I also got a chance to cruise over to the North Yuba one day to get to do a section below Bullards Bar Dam which empties into the Middle Yuba. This section has not been done very often because before recently, there was no gauge available to know how much water the dam was releasing. With the introduction of the new gauge, I have a feeling this run will get done more often. Like every river in the Yuba watershed, it was absolutely beautiful and involved lots of great class 4-5 rapids.

Nick Murphy arriving at the put-in

Will Pruett stepping up to a line the rest of us walked

After hanging out in Chico for a few days it was time to go on a little road trip (those cheap Sierra Nevada Pale Ales are just too dangerous) so Sean, his roommate Scott, my Kiwi friend Rachel and I all loaded up and headed North to the Klamath watershed. Almost immediately after arriving into the area we ran into some good friends and spent the weekend enjoying the local rivers, camping out and spending time with friends.


A must-have camp accessory- the Sling Shot

The Clear Creek Crew

Rachel Curtis enters the biggest drop on Clear Creek (this rapid dished out some beatings)


Sean making amends for the swim he took on the rapid above

After our weekend up North, we headed back down to Chico, now with a couple of Europeans in tow. Sean and Scott were nice enough to offer us all to crash at their place for a night or two. We ended up staying for the next week...

Sean and Scott's front yard


Lifestyling in Chico (David and I sharing a ride downtown for $3 pitchers of Sierra Nevada)

Even though the weather was predicted to be less than ideal, Rachel (the Kiwi), Tomass (the Latvian), David (the German) and I (the American) decided to head up the South Branch of the Middle Feather to hopefully get in some good creeking. Unfortunately for us, the weather forecast turned out to be spot on. It was 35 degrees as we were gearing up at the put in. The hail and snow come soon after. Yes it snowed on us in June. Fortunately the super fun waterfalls and rapids the river had to offer allowed us to temporarily forget about the dismal weather.

After making it about 3/4 of the way down the run, we decided as a group that the conditions (high water and slick granite) might hinder us from finishing the run. Just downstream of us lied a mandatory portage that required ferrying above a 100 foot waterfall and walking around on steep granite. We ended up deciding that the best decision was for us to start hiking our boats at out of the steep gorge rather than continuing downstream. There was no trail and definitely no shortage of manzanita. I have to thank David for helping me and my kayak get up the mountain.


David stomping one of the many sweet drops on the South Branch

After the South Branch adventure, we spent a day inside recovering, watching "Flick Chicks" as the German would say. But one day indoors was enough for us to decide we needed to get back on the river, rain or snow. So we decided to just embrace the crappy weather the best way we could and do an overnighter in it. With highs in the low 60s, rain forecasted for the entire weekend and a high side of good water level, we geared up to do the Devil's Canyon of the Middle Feather.

Rachel loading up her boat with overnight gear

Our international crew at the put-in

Our first day on the river was great and included two distinct and beautiful canyons and tons of class 3-5 big water style rapids. Unfortunately because of the weather, there weren't many good picture taking moments.

After finishing up the second canyon, we decided to stop to camp for the night. The men got a fire started while Rachel and I got a shelter set up and some hot water boiling for soup and tea. Eventually the weather cleared enough to take a little on the Pacific Crest trail which ran straight through the camp.

David handling the boiling of the water

A view from the living room

Looking back at our camp from the Pacific Crest Trail

After a restful night of sleep to the sound of pouring rain, we woke up to a bit of sunshine and a slightly higher water level. The second day of paddling was awesome, with non stop class 4-5 rapids the whole way down. With our trusty Latvian probe leading the way, we charged through the day pretty quickly with only one mandatory portage.

Me dropping into a sweet rapid (Photo by Rachel Curtis)

Me entering one of the larger rapids of the day (Photo by Rachel Curtis)


Tomass finishing up the mandatory portage

And that pretty much ended my springtime Cali trip. While it was not exactly the trip I had been expecting, it turned into something much better. Sure the kayaking was awesome, but even more so was spending time with great friends and making lots of new ones along the way. Now if that snow would just start melting so things will drop in before I return to Cali in July!

The New Generation of Environmental Advocates

2011-03-22T09:22:00.000-07:00

Over the past few months I have been working with the French Broad River Academy, an up and coming all boys private middle school located in Asheville, NC. What drew me to this school particularly is their approach to fulfilling the mission of creating lifelong learners and leaders from today's youth. The French Broad River Academy prepares students for success by combining a rigorous academic curriculum with purposeful learning experiences on the French Broad River, its surrounding watershed and international field experiences.

What this means is that while the school places a great importance on academic-based learning, it also recognizes the importance of learning outside of the classroom, as well as bringing the outside inside the classroom. And because of the emphasis on the French Broad River Basin, the river and its surrounding watershed become the basis for study and inquiry, the focus of conservation efforts, and a resource for recreation for the students. From whitewater canoeing to overnight backpacking trips to downhill skiing, these students are given the opportunity to learn outdoor skills that support their studies inside the classroom and help them gain a better understanding of the world around them.

They are even learning how to be rock stars as part of the school band, The Salamander Band. And just in case you weren't already jealous, next week they are leaving for a school trip to Costa Rica where they will spend time studying at a Costa Rican school, doing service projects and some surfing too of course.

Why should this matter to you? Because if we want to continue to preserve the natural resources we love, we need to start creating a new generation of leaders to advocate for them. By providing the students with meaningful and relevant experiences, the French Broad River Academy is creating informed citizens who will advocate for the protection and restoration of the French Broad and other precious natural resources worldwide. And oh yeah, they're probably also going to be the next generations of shredders on the rivers and the slopes, so watch out!

If you would like to learn more about the French Broad River Academy, please check out their website at http://www.fbriveracademy.org/

Chile 2010 Video Update

2011-03-21T11:16:00.000-07:00

Another great video by Gareth Tate on our recent adventure to Chile this past winter. Enjoy!

Trip Report: Chile 2010 from 7 Finger media on Vimeo.

Its Hard to Beat the Southeast When Its Raining!

2011-03-21T09:02:00.000-07:00

Over the past couple weeks the Southeast has been getting a lot of love from the rain gods, and it just reminded me of just how good the southeast is when its raining! With tons of great options within a couple hours of Asheville, it really is hard to beat. In the past couple weeks, I have managed to get on a number of NC classics that rival the best rivers in the world.

Upper Big Creek, The Green (with water in it), Big Laurel (flooded), Overflow, Horsepasture and the Linville all in a 10 day time span. Gotta love it!

Anne Sontheimer at Singley's Falls, Overflow (Photo by Jason McClure)


Me at the final drop of Gravity, Overflow (Photo by Jason McClure)

Me entering Thrasher Pike B, Horsepasture (Photo by Robbie Gilson)

Anne Sontheimer exiting Thrasher Pike B, Horsepasture (Photo by Robbie Gilson)

Dave Herman coming through S-turn, Linville (Photo by Paul Stamilio)

Anne Sontheimer at Cathedral Falls, Linville (Photo by Paul Stamilio)


Me at Cathedral Falls, Linville (Photo by Paul Stamilio)

I must note that another thing that made this recent boating so awesome was getting my best friend Anne out on three big southeastern runs that she had never been on before (Overflow, Horsepasture and Linville) all in the same week! It was the first time we had gotten to do something new and big together since she gave birth to her son two years ago. Just goes to show that moms can still go big!

Going Big in Pucon

2010-12-17T09:15:00.000-08:00

The last part of our trip, Gareth and I ventured down to the town most people think about when they hear of going creek boating in Chile- Pucon. We got there by hitching a ride with some people we met at NubleFest and took a few days to make our way down and paddle a few rivers along the way.

Taking a break to enjoy the view and review the map

The Laja (one of the rivers we paddled on our way to Pucon)

One of many volcanoes in Chile

After arriving into Pucon we quickly hooked up with Matias (an Argentian friend who lived in the states for a long time) and spent the weekend hitting up the Pucon classics. That weekend we knocked off the Puesco, the Upper Palguin and multiple laps on the Nevados. The nice thing about Pucon is that everything is super close and relatively short so you can usually squeeze in 2-3 different sections of river in one day. Unfortunately while I got a photo on just about every rapid of the Nevados, I didn't get any shots on the other sections we did.

Matias and Gareth trying to figure out the stove

Gareth at the first drop of the Nevados

Matias sliding down the Nevados

Gareth dropping off the edge on the Nevados

Nicole Mansfield stomping the crack falls on the Nevados

Gareth at the Auto-boof rapid on the Nevados

Matias at Dulce Amor aka the wall boof on the Nevados

Nicole scouting the Demshitz drop

After saying goodbye to Matias, Gareth and I spent a few more days exploring some other runs in the area, including the Maichin and the Llancahue, both very enjoyable and beautiful sections of river. But before leaving town, there was one more beast so slay, the Middle Palguin waterfall. While Gareth was sold on this being something he had to do before leaving town, I was less certain of my interest in dropping off a 70 foot waterfall in my kayak. The second to last day we were in town, the opportunity arose to run the drop. I am the kind of boater that makes deciscions by the way I'm feeling, and I just wasn't feeling it that day. Gareth on the other hand was fired up and so I went for moral support to take photos and play safety. After a bit of scouting, our friend Danielle fired off the drop with a clean line and it was now Gareth's turn. I was anxious watching him up there alone getting ready to seal launch. That's one of the scariest parts about this drop, that to get in the water to run it, you either have to run a very stout 10 foot drop above it or seal launch in right above the falls.

Gareth scouting the falls

Danielle at the bottom after his run of the waterfall

Gareth going big off the Middle Palguin

Gareth had a beautiful line off the drop, but definitely took a hard hit at the bottom. He ended up hurting a couple ribs and rupturing his ear drum. That's part of the risk of running something that big- you might get hurt even if you have a good line. All in all though he was excited for the experience and was still encouraging me to have my go at it. I decided to see how I felt the next day.

I woke up our final morning in Pucon to cold and rainy weather, but also with a feeling of urge to go huck off a big waterfall. We joined up with the Demshitz crew and after managing to squeeze eight of us into a tiny truck, we were off to the falls. After watching a few of the boys give 'er, I decided it was my time to jump. I visualized what I needed to do one last time, then slid off the rock into the water. My seal launch went great, which I was pretty psyched about. Now it was time to go big, and I paddled off the lip. My plan had been to slowly get into my tuck and once there, simply drop my paddle right before hitting the water. I was a bit nervous about throwing my paddle since I had never done that before but it ended up working out really well. I tucked up tight as I slid into the water. I was waiting for the hardest hit of my life, but alas, it never came. The hit was soft. I couldn't believe it. And my skirt didn't blow. Another plus. I hit my first hands roll and paddled over to where my paddle was floating and smiled big because I had just run the biggest waterfall of my life.

Me getting ready to tuck up and toss the paddle

We then quickly headed back to Pucon where we grabbed our bags and made our way to the bus terminal (after a few celebritory beers of course). An overnight bus ride, a layover day in Santiago and an overnight plane ride later I was back in the states with only the memories of what turned out to be a way too short but very awesome trip to Chile.

NubleFest 2010

2010-11-28T14:05:00.000-08:00

When most people think of kayaking in Chile they think of the steep creeks of Pucon or of the big water at the Futa, but I was fortunate enough to spend the past week experiencing another gem of Chile, the Rio Nuble Valley located in the small mountain town of San Fabian. I was brought to the town because of my good friend Jon Clark, who found this place many years ago and has since been returning yearly to experience the beautiful vistas, play on the river's waters as well as to support a movement to fight the hydro electric projects that threaten the Nuble River and its tributaries.

San Fabian's town square

Five years ago Jon started organizing "NubleFest," a festival to promote the town of San Fabian and showcase the value that the river can have to not only the people of San Fabian, but to greater Chile. The festival lasted the whole weekend with its primary goal to get as many people as possible excited about the river. This involved taking hundreds of people on free rafting trips, a boatercross event, a raft race as well as a freestyle rodeo.

The raft racers plowing towards the finish line during NubleFest

The Nuble watershed has something for everyone. The Nuble River itself consists of over 25 miles of whitewater with a number of different sections including a harder class four upper section, a class three middle section and a lower class two stretch. When the water is flowing good, it has a feel similar to a cross between the Gauley and the Ocoee. If creeking is your thing, there are a number of tributaries to the Nuble that will give you what you're looking for. The week leading up to the festival, Gareth and I were fortunate enough to get to experience the magic of one of the Nuble's tributaries, Las Truchas.

I had heard about Las Truchas from Jon years ago when he went up there and got the first descent of it. He spoke of an overnight trip, with a big hike in and lots of creeky style rapids. Immediatley I knew it was right up my alley. Then a few weeks ago Jon did the second descent with some other friends from the states, and again the stories drew me there. With Jon busy preparing for the festival, Gareth and I decided to venture into the upper reaches of the Nuble Valley for a little expedition of our own.

The adventure started by hopping on a bus from San Fabian that took us as far up the watershed as you can reach by road. We were dropped off next to another tributary of the Nuble, Los Sauces and proceded to gear up and paddle ten minutes downstream to the beach where we would be meeting our cowboy in the morning to load up our boats on a horse and start the long hike to the creek.

The view from Camp One on the banks of Los Sauces

First thing in the morning our cowboy arrived and we helped get everything loaded up on the horse and started the 8 hour hike to the put in of Las Truchas. Intially, Gareth and I were skeptical about paying for a horse to carry our boats, but by the end of the hike we both conceded that Jon was probably correct to push us in that direction. The hike itself was one of my favorite parts of the whole trip. We were staring at snow capped peaks and mountain waterfalls pretty much the whole journey. We spent the night camped out by the river ready for a full day of kayaking down the Truchas the next day.

Our hard working horse getting loaded down with Nomads

Preparing to cross one the first of many cold creek crossings

Our first view of Las Truchas from high above on the hike

Gareth taking a break to enjoy the view

The aftermath of our little box of wine in the food bag disaster

The shelter we made at camp two after spending the previous night soaked by dew

Las Truchas turned out to be a great class 4-5 creek, with a steep boulder garden feel and lots of moves to make and boofs to hit. The steepest miles involved a lot scouting and managed to keep us both on our toes the whole day. In the end it took us eight hours to make it down to the confluence with the main Nuble and because we wanted to shorten our final day, we pushed on another hour down river before discovering an epic campsite below the Andean peaks.

Gareth nailing the line at the waterfall rapid (I personally decided to nail a rock instead, not recommended)

Another big boof by Gareth

Enjoying an Andean sunset by the fire

Our magnificent night three campsite

Our final day consisted of a full day of paddling on the Nuble, from the top most section all the way back down to the town of San Fabian. We arrived just in time to get showered and experience a real Latin American Thanksgiving, complete with a lamb asado and to make us feel at home, they even threw in some turkey and mash potatoes.

If the proposed hydro electric projects were to happen, it would flood the Nuble valley all the way up to the confluence of Las Truchas, eliminating the Los Sauces tributary (which is known to have some steep creeking class 5+ sections) and creating a lake where the best rapids of the Nuble currently sit. The easy logistics of the Truchas, with busing up from town and paddling all the way back to town would be lost and the experience not nearly as magical.

If you come to Chile, make sure to make the beautiful town of San Fabian and the waters of the Nuble watershed a must make stop on your itinerary. The more people that come and experience this wonderful place the better chance that we will have it in its current state (without dams) for many many more years to come.

If you would like more information on the festival or the logistics of visiting San Fabian, feel free to email me or contact Paul Jimenez of Extremo Sur Expediciones at extremosurexpediciones@gmail.com.

Experiencing the Rio Claro, Chile 2010

2010-11-23T14:00:00.000-08:00

Gareth on hour 36 of our travels to Chile

Last week Gareth and I decided to break away from the impending winter back in North Carolina and sneak away for a few weeks of kayaking in Chile. Our trip started out with getting denied at the Greenville airport with our boats, managing to change our flights to leave from Charlotte and eventually finally getting both of us and our boats on a plane South. After two full days of traveling, we finally made it to our first destination, San Fabian where we met up with my good friend Jon Clark.

Looking for a ride to San Fabian

Our first adventure took us up to the Rio Claro, most known for the Seven Teacups section. What I hadn't realized before, was that the Rio Claro also contained two other steep waterfall style sections that were exactly what I was looking for. First we did the Veintidos Saltos (22 waterfalls) section, which was aptly named as it contains 22 pretty sweet waterfalls.

Me at one of the veintidos waterfalls (Photo by Jon Clark)

Gareth disconnecting with the water on a huge boof (Photo by Jon Clark)

After a quick snack we headed back on the water to venture into the section (and more specifically the one rapid) which we had been talking about since our arrival into Chile. The section is called the Entre Saltos which contains the infamous, Throat of the Devil rapid. The section starts off with some fun drops then quickly walls up. This is when you know you've arrived. The Throat of the Devil probably drops about 50 feet in total, with the first 20 feet dropping steeply through what I would describe as a mix between a skate park and a drain pipe following which the water falls about 30 more feet of verticle. Jon went first and I followed quickly behind him. Gareth shot video of the drop before taking the plunge himself.

Jeremy Anderson dropping into the skate park/ drain pipe on a previous trip to the river (Photo by Jon Clark)

Gareth beginning his ride (Photo by Jon Clark)

At the bottom of the drop you end up in a toilet bowl pool with a pretty sizeable exit drop to get through. What happens next is something that you really can't put into words. The river narrows down and the gorge walls fly to the sky and you find yourself paddling through the most magical place I've ever been in a kayak. Then you turn the corner to find a 30 foot tributary making the most beautiful waterfall pour down just beside you. Unfortunatley because of the nature of this, it is very difficult to take pictures, so you are just going to have to come experience it for yourself.

Finally we dropped through the "Vaginas," two very narrow slot rapids which its best to stay upright in. After a couple more drops the walls start to open up and you are transported back to the real world. That section of river is officially at the top of my list for one of the msot amazing places I've ever seen.

The next morning we dropped the classic, Seven Teacups section, which includes, you guessed it, seven waterfalls, before hopping in the truck and cruising back to San Fabian.

Gareth at the first of the seven teacups

Gareth finishing off the seven teacups section dropping the final 25 footer

Waterfall vista on the way out of town

The Hillux loaded down for the trip home

The Grand Canyon of the Colorado

2010-08-28T14:23:00.000-07:00

The Grand Canyon, is and should be, on every kayaker's hit list and I was no exception. So I was super excited when I was recently given the opportunity to join Jeorgia and the Fischer Family on the Grand to help run kayak support for their trip.

With the help of a motor-boat for support, we did the 226 miles from Lee's Ferry to Diamond Creek in 10 amazing days. There were tons of wonderful moments had in those days and rather than spend the next week writing about them, I figure I'd rather just show them through pictures...

The alcohol (we finished all it of besides one half bag of wine)

The bathroom

The team

Typical camp

Playing frisbee in at Red Wall

Me trying to stay dry on a side hike, which I was unsuccessful with

Hiking at Saddle

Typical beautiful Grand Canyon scenery

Jeorgia and me floating through Hermit together

The kitchen

Cruising along on the motor boat

The scorpion I found in my bed (while I was sleeping in it)

A sweet waterfalls whos name I can't remember

My self portrait at "The Patio"

Cool lizard I found

Randi and Eric enjoying the hike

Not much to say about that

The Majestic Grand Canyon

Playing in Havasu Creek

Eric explaining the rapid "Lava" to us

Me attempting to surf the Lava wave

Randi modeling her new hair do on day 9 (she told me I could try to make her hair into dread locks so I put a whole container of super salve in it)

The sign that you're about to arrive at Diamond Creek

Nate, our fearless kayak guide

Katie, the swamper


Eric, the motor boat caption

The motor rig all loaded up to go back to the warehouse

Exploring the Granite Planet on Upper Cherry Creek

2010-07-28T21:27:00.000-07:00

Last week I was fortunate enough to take a trip to the granite planet on Upper Cherry Creek. Due to a work commitment and coordinating a plan for Gareth's dog, we had to wait a couple days to put on, which led to the water being lower than preferred. As it turns out though, Upper Cherry with any water in it is a spectacular place not to be missed.

Typical Upper Cherry scenery

I feel like most things great require work, and for Upper Cherry that means a 12 mile hike to the put in with a loaded down kayak strapped to your back. The first two hours were pretty miserable for me as my kayak backpack system more or less fell apart on me. Eventually I decided to give up on it and create a new system for myself with made the remaining 5 hours of the hike much more bearable.

Taking a lunch break on the hike in

Hour six of the hike

After arriving at the creek we spent some time relaxing in the water and enjoying the sunshine. Eventually we decided to get away from the notorious mosquitos at the put in and head downstream a few rapids to find a campspot. The put in slide/drop was super fun. Just downstream we found a sweet granite slab with its own sandy beach to rest up for the night.

Me hitting the first boof of the run (Photo by Eric Giddens)

Introducing Gareth Tate, the newest up and coming videographer to the whitewater world

Chilling at Camp One (Photo by Eric Giddens)

Waking up on Upper Cherry (Photo by Eric Giddens)

This trip was special in that it not only included two friends, Rebecca and Allison, who hiked the entire trip along side us in our kayaks, but it also included Bishop, Gareth's dog. Bishop now has the first known dog descent of the entire Upper Cherry Creek, from hike in to paddle across the lake. It was a pretty difficult feat for him, as he is not exactly fond of steep slick granite slabs, but he made it happen. Congrats Bishop!

Bishop checking out his new territory

No words can describe it (Photo by Allison)

After a great day of low angle slides and low water creeking, we finally arrived at the most well known rapid on Upper Cherry, and probably all of California- Cherry Bomb Falls. There was a big debate here as to whether or not to scout the gorge, or just go in there. With the water low, the fact that all of us have seen numerous videos and pictures of the place, and having multiple people that had been in there before, we felt pretty good about bombing (no pun intended) in there. The only thing we werent so sure about was how the exit drop of the gorge, which is backed up by a rock, would handle the low water. Eric was a bit concerned that there might not be a line there with the water being so low. After hiking up the first part of the scout, we all got lazy, had a group meeting, and inevitably decided we'd just deal with whatever we got in there and went back to our boats.

After a quick scout of cherry bomb proper at water level, we all launched off it. There were mixed results on whether or not it was better to go left of the rock at the entrance, or right of it. I decided to go right of the rock and had as good a line as I could've hoped for.

Rachel Curtis launching off Cherry Bomb (Photo by Allison)

Me dropping the Bomb (Photo by Tim Collins)

After we all got through the main drop, we still had the left, left, center, right, center, left sequence of drops in the gorge to get through. It was the final left that we were a bit worried about, but Drew was able to do a sketchy scout and give us the thumbs up that the final drop still went. That was a bit of a relief...

Our team making it through Cherry Bomb Gorge

After Cherry Bomb the creek just keeps delivering. Next up is the oh so fun Jedi slide followed by teacup drops which take you right into Flinstone Camp. We had a great evening of lapping these drops, racing them, swimming them, fishing, drinking tequila, and all around enjoying the company of everyone there. It was hear that Josh, Nick and Taylor caught up to us and joined the party.

Gareth boofing into Camp Two

Josh and Taylor swimming into Camp Two

Drew Duval fishing at Flinstone camp

Gareth prepping his camera

Enjoying the night

Flinstone Camp, Morning Three

The next morning we awoke to morning laps on the tea cups before making our way down to the good below. Right off the bat you have a series of back to back sweet drops... West Coast Groove Tube, Perfect Twenty, Double Pothole, Waterfall Alley, Kiwi in a Pocket and Dead Bear.

Taylor Cavin at West Coast Groove Tube (Photo by Allison)

Me at the Perfect Twenty Drop (Photo by Allison)

Gareth at Double Pothole

Waterfall Alley

Nick Urquhart at Kiwi in a Pocket

Taylor Cavin at the second drop of Kiwi in a Pocket (Photo by Rebecca Giddens)

My boat going big off of Dead Bear (Photo by Gareth Tate)

A big group of us all ran Kiwi in a Pocket and were psyched to get to do so. This was one place where the low water allowed us to run a rapid we may or may not have otherwise. This did lock us into a somewhat gnarly portage around Dead Bear, but we worked as one happy team and made it happen with relative ease. It turned out to be fun in the end as we all launched our boats off of Dead Bear with everyone else sitting on a rock just downstream cheering us and our boats on. Some boats had great lines, some not so much....

After lunch at Dead Bear we had a bit of a low water paddle out until reaching the last of the goods right before dropping into the lake.

Getting Bishop, the hikers and their packs across the lake (Photo by Tim Collins)

What can I say? It was an amazing experience filled with lots of beautiful granite, fun rapids and quality time with good friends. Low water is definitely better than no water on Upper Cherry Creek!

Living a Fantasy (and at times a nightmere) on the North Fork of the Mokelumne

2010-07-12T14:03:00.000-07:00

Team NC geared up for the Fantasy mission

After getting off Dinkey Creek we had to hit the road immediately once again to check another high sierra classic off the list. This time it was Fantasy Falls of the North Fork of Mokelumne and we were all excited to get into this run which we had heard was one of the most beautiful of all the California classics. One rest day and a food resupply was all we needed before meeting Darin and Jonas at the put-in to get started on our descent.

Knowing the water was low and the first few miles filled with mank, we decided to hike the first mile of river rather than abusing our boats in the water. Even with the hike, because of the low water, Day One still involved a decent bit of manky rapids for us, but it also had some pretty fun rapids tucked in there as well. After about 30 min. on the water the sky got dark, the air cold and we were all reminded of the fact that no one but Jonas brought any type of shelter with us. Fortunately, the hail storm that ensued didn't last too long and the sky cleared by the time we made it to camp. The best part of Day One was definitely the camp spot. Sleeping by the river totally surrounded by granite in the middle of no where is really something everyone should experience.

Beautiful Fantasy scenery

Our Bratwurst BBQ

Scenery at Camp One

We woke up to more or less clear skies for Day Two and started making our way down the river, hoping the extra flow of the morning would provide us with a bit cleaner rapids. The day started off well, but by lunch time the sky darkened and rain fell again and started to set the tone for what was to come.

Jonas showing us how to do it at one of the first rapids of day two

Sometime in the afternoon, after the storm had passed, we arrived at our biggest portage of the run up and over a big granite dome. While at one section where you walk along a granite slab about 15 feet off the ground, Ben slipped on some slick granite. As he started to slip he realized that there was no recovery, so he did the best thing he could have possibly done, he spotted his landing, threw his boat and jumped. He landed on his feet, but unfortunately, his left ankle landed in a hole and as he fell forward, he broke his ankle. Gareth was on him quickly, and after stabilizing him, a splint was built and an evacuation started.

Ben Blake keeping a smile on his face after the accident

Ben watching his ride arrive

For whatever reason, I had decided to bring my phone along on this trip, and out there, in the middle of no where in the Mokelumne wilderness, I got cell service. Quickly realizing there was no way Ben was getting out of there on his own, I called for a California Highway Patrol Helicopter (I specifically called CHP because they offer offer free heli evacs if they're not busy). Within an hour of falling we had Ben loaded into the helicopter and on his way to the hospital. ***See bottom of post for an update on Ben's condition***

Ben loaded up and ready to fly

Goodbye Ben! We miss you out here.

It was an eerie feeling to put back on the river as group of five instead of six, but we knew we had to keep moving downstream if we were going to make it out of there the next night. We only paddled probably another mile that night before finding a nice campspot to lay our heads and get some rest for the next day.

Minus the fact that we didn't have Ben along, Day Three was awesome. The scenery only got better, the rapids cleaner and the weather hot and sunny.

Jonas missing the log and hitting his boof

Gareth lining up for Fantasy Falls

Gareth boofing the fifteen footer after the Fantasy Falls drop

Taking an afternoon break in the middle of some unbelievable scenery

Jonas entering the Island Slide

Darin about to enter the meat of the Island Slide

Jonas hitting his boof over a hole everyone else walked

Cali Class Three!

Gareth pulling up to the dock after the big lake paddle

In total, everyone in the group besides Darin swam at least once, some others who we will not mention chalked up two swims. The rapids were committing and consequential and the overall feel rugged and tiring. I definitely recommend everyone who has the skills to check out Fantasy Falls, just don't expect it to be a Fantasy the whole time...

I think our trip might have been especially cursed. Check out the list below of all of the crazy things that happened in those three days:

First on scene to motorcyle accident on the way to put in
Flat tire at put in
Broken paddle during first mile
Dropped video camera in the water during second mile
Hail storm on Day One
Swim off of a log pin
Swim on first rapid of day on Day Two
Ben falls off cliff and gets helicoptered out
Swim at last rapid of day on Day Two
Strong headwind on lake paddle (ok I guess that ones standard but it still sucked)

***Ben Blake Update: After being evacuated to a hospital in South Lake Tahoe, Ben got X-rays to determine that he broke two bones in his ankle and needed surgery. A couple days later he flew home to Gainesville to be with his family during surgery. The surgery went ok, but was extremely painful for him, and he has still yet to be released from the hospital due to their inability to manage his pain. It could be six months before he is walking on his leg again. Please keep Ben in your thoughts and send all the good energy you can his way. He's an awesome friend, boater and all around person and deserves all the love and support he can get. ***

Fourth of July on Dinkey Creek

2010-07-12T12:56:00.000-07:00

While we are all pretty beat down from a long three days on Royal Gorge, Dinkey Creek was dropping in and dropping out fast, so after a day off we charged south to the put in.

While our crew started out with Gareth, Ben, Adam and I, along with our Kiwi friend Rachel, by the time we finished the hike and made it to the put in, crowds of people were showing up behind us. Turned out we weren't the only ones excited about spending the Fourth of July weekend on Dinkey creek.

Getting ready to hike into Dinkey

Hiking down the granite to get to the goods

We quickly peeled out of the put in eddy and started our way downstream hoping to beat the crowds at least for a little while. After a few big slides to get warmed up, we quickly arrived at the infamous Willie Kern Slide, the biggest unportable rapid on the run. Starting off with a fifteen footer into a low angle slide, it finished off with a 40 foot high angle slide. Following this the river continues to drop off into a granite wonderland all the way to camp, including two 20 footers, a big portage and a number of other sweet drops.

Rachel Curtis hitting the entrance boof to the Willie Kern Slide

Adam Bixby about to fall off the lip of Willie Kerns

A new perspective on the Willie Kern rapid (Photo of me by Darin McQuoid)

Gareth stomping the sieved out twenty footer

The manky exit to the twenty footer

Jonas Grunewald dropping in on the granite planet

Me on the Good Morning slide, which was the Good Evening slide for us because we decided to run it on Day One and camp just below (Photo by Darin McQuoid)

After an awesome day of kayaking, we were all psyched to get to camp early and spend some time relaxing and fishing and just chilling out. Once dusk settled in and all of the groups had found a camp spot for the night, we did a total count of everyone on the river. There were 35 people paddling and camping in Dinkey on July 3rd this year. Among the five different groups, there were four different camp spots being used, all of which were in eyesight of each other. It was quite the fourth of July party, with fireworks and all!

Day Two we paddled with Darin and Jonas for most of the run and had a great time firing off the oh so many classic class five rapids Dinkey has to offer.

Jonas Grunewald running the pothole drop

Darin McQuoid boofing into beautiful Dinkey scenery

Adam and I cruising through a steep rapid (Photo by Darin McQuoid)

Ben Blake showing us how to boof

Darin and Macey tag teaming a twenty footer

Darin hitting the perfect line in the Nikki Kelly Slide

Gareth Tate entering one of the last big rapids of the run

This was my third trip into Dinkey Creek and it just gets better every time. For only having two mandatory portages and tons and tons of big clean beautiful rapids, I truly believe that Dinkey Creek is one of the best creeks in the world.

Feeling Royal on the North Fork of the American

2010-07-12T12:51:00.000-07:00

With the California snowpack high and the weather staying cool, it seemed like it was taking forever to start off the high sierra multi-day season out here. Friends from the Southeast made their pilgrimage across the country and for the the first week they were out here I showed them around my favorite day runs in the area, including 49 to Bridgeport and Golden Gate, while we waited for the water to drop. So when we heard that the Royal Gorge of the North Fork of the American was dropping into a good level, we geared up for a mission. Taylor Cavin was leading the charge as our local expert (he had just did the run the week before at a bit higher water, so it was fresh in his memory) and Gareth Tate, Ben Blake and Adam Bixby were representing team NC.

Because we were a bit worried about the level rising, we intentionally had a late start on day one so we would be able to check the level before fulling committing to doing it. Fortunately, the level showed the perfect trend and off we went to put in. Geared up and packed up we arrived at the bridge to put on and made sure we had a swift entry as not to bring any attention to ourselves from unhappy land owners.

Day one starts off with a bang, with a number or tight slot drops meandering through mini gorges. Eventually the rivers opened up a bit more and granted us with some really sweet rapids, including the awesome double drop rapid seen below.

Adam Bixby entering the double drop rapid on Day One

Adam firing off the bottom drop of the double drop

Taylor Cavin cruising through a random rapid on Day One

With dusk settling in and our energy a bit low, we finally pulled into our first camp. I've seen some pretty cool campsites before, but this one definitely topped the list. The site was located on a grassy field located up above and in between the Heath Waterfalls. Heath One is a perfect 40 footer and is followed pretty quickly by Heath Two, a slightly higher waterfall and much more consequential due to being backed up by a bad cave. After taking time to get dried off, we spent some time staring down at Heath One and choosing our lines for the next morning.

Night One Camp

Gareth and I checking out the Heath Falls from camp one

A view of Heath One and Heath Two Falls

There's nothing like waking up in the morning to the thrill of running a 40 footer! After getting up and making breakfast, the whole crew geared up to run Heath One. Once safety was set, Taylor and Gareth made their way up to the top of the falls to kick off the huck fest. Ben and I were next and we both nailed our lines and had big smiles at the bottom.

Me waking up to Heath One

Ben pulling the trigger on Heath One

After getting our waterfall running on, the crew portaged our boats around Heath Two and started making our way downstream. Day Two was filled was tons of excitement, including watching Taylor Cavin go big on two of the larger waterfalls on the Royal Gorge, 50 foot Rattlesnack Falls and 70 foot Wabena Falls.

Gareth stomping a perfect twenty footer on Day Two

Taylor coming through the white rock gorge

Taylor showing us how its done on Rattlesnake Falls

Taylor going big once again at the lip of 70 foot tall Wabena Falls

After firing off Wabena Taylor was a bit sore from the hit, so we decided to camp for the night pretty soon after. We spent our time at Camp Two reflecting on the day and all of the amazing rapids and spectacular scenery we experienced along the way.

Day three was long. While days one and two involved paddling around 3-5 miles a day, day three involved paddling almost 35 miles of whitewater. It took us over 10 hours to complete the mission, which included 8 miles of whitewater before arriving at the Generation and Giant Gap section of the North Fork. While mostly class 2-4, the day still involved many class 5 rapids and pretty much took every bit of energy we had to complete it.

To reward ourselves for such a successful mission, we did the classic California thing and hit up the In and Out Burger for some double doubles animal style!

Yuba Gap Big Kimshew Double Header

2010-06-11T17:45:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I had one of my best weekends in Cali to date. I got to run what I would consider some of the best day runs California has to offer: Yuba Gap and Big Kimshew.

After having left the state for about two weeks to return to the Southeast for a work commitment, I was anxious to get back on the water. Fortunately, my first weekend back coincided with a release of Yuba Gap as well as the first few days of Big Kimshew for the season.

Yuba Gap was only releasing 200cfs which we were told was low but still good and worth doing for such a rarely gotten run. After having done it, I would completely agree with this assessment. While it wasn't the easiest day Ive ever had (because of the low water there were lots of extra portages) it was still one of my better days of kayaking in California. The rapids were big and challenging and lots of fun all at the same time.

A chill but cool rapid on Yuba Gap

After getting off Yuba Gap I was initially thinking there was must no way I could put on another class 5+ river the next day as I was totally worn down. But after a couple of beers on the drive back to get our cars, I quickly pepped up and realized being tired was no excuse for missing Big Kimshew, one of the more elusive runs in California. So with that it mind I followed the crew back to Chico for dinner and drinks and a plan to go into Kimshew the following morning.

I cannot say enough good things about that run. Its big (with two 40+ foot rapids), its clean (with no mandatory portages and only two commonly portaged rapids) and absolutely beautiful.

Me firing into Big Kimshew Falls (Photo by Darin McQuoid)

Jonas hitting his boof at the top of Big Kimshew Falls

Darin lining up for Frenchy's Forty

The South Branch of the Middle Feather

2010-05-26T19:49:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to get on one of California’s best day runs, the South Branch of the Middle Feather. Anticipating a snowy and log filled road, we headed up a day early with a shovel and chain saw in hand to clear the way. We were pleasantly surprised to find that the forest service had brought in machinery and cleared the road for us. So instead, we drank cocktails riverside at one of the best camping spots I’ve ever had.

Camping at the put-in

Throughout the night, more and more people started showing up, and by the time I woke the next morning, our group had grown from four people to ten people, included in which were those who I will simply refer to as the Chattanooga Chargers. The level was also on the rise, but we decided to charge on anyways.

The run starts off mellow and slowly gets steeper and steeper. It goes from class 2, to class 3, to a 10 footer, to 15 footers, to 20 footers, to a 40 footer and finishes off with a beautiful 50 footer. Doesn’t get much better than that!

Darin McQuoid running the 10 footer which signals the beginning of the goods

Tim Collins stomping the first 20 footer

Meat the lip of the second 20 footer (Photo taken by Darin McQuoid)

Me at the first of the back to back 15's (Photo taken by Jonas Gruenewald)

Darin McQuoid at the second 15

Lunch time

I will say though that while each of the individual rapids on this run may not be super hard (but still class 5), the consequences to making a mistake are very much there and should not be taken lightly. There is one section in particular that starts off with a 20 footer that flows pretty directly into a marginal 40 footer (named 99 problems), which flows directly into a 15-20 foot drop that flows directly into a mandatory portage around a 100-foot waterfall. A mistake at any of these rapids could very quickly escalate into a fatal mistake (which one unnamed member of our group almost showed us when he ran 99 problems backwards, pitoned, got stuck in a hole, ran the next drop backwards and eddied out just before the portage).

Jakub Nemec soaring off the 20 footer just above 99 Problems

Will Pruett showing us how its done at 99 Problems

Me running the China drop, which is just below 99 Problems and just above the portage (Photo taken by Jonas Gruenewald)

After a not so quick portage around the large unrunnable waterfall, we did a sketchy seal launch and were on our way toward the 50 footer (it might be more like 40-45 but everyone else calls it 50 so I’m gonna go with that). Besides a few imploded skirts we all had good lines and celebrated our successful day relaxing at the lip of another big waterfall before beginning our steep and not so fun hike out.

Me approaching the lip of the 50 footer (Photo taken by Darn McQuoid)

Tim Collins on the charge!

Taking time to enjoy the scenery

Check out this video of the trip put together by Jakub Nemec

Dinkey Creek: The Spring Mission

2010-04-18T17:56:00.000-07:00

Last week we ran Dinkey Creek. In the summertime, this might not have been such an epic trip, but in the spring, when the roads are covered in snow and the rivers rising, running Dinkey creek can turn into a mission.

After attempting to drive Stephen Wright's van to the trail head of the standard hike in, we quickly realized that the snow would simply not allow that to happen. After pushing the van up a few hills and out of a few ditches, we finally decided that it was simply not going to happen. So from there part of the group decided to start hiking. We knew we had somewhere between 5 and 15 miles to go until we reached the trail head, and chose to commit to walking there.

The team using our paddles to dig the van out of a ditch

Dragging our boats through the snow up the road

Will Pruett charging!!!

After seven or so hours of hiking about ten miles of road, we eventually we made it to the standard trail head and started working our way down the two mile trail to the river. We were tired and sore and way over carrying our boats, but we still managed to take some time to enjoy the scenery on the hike down.

Dinkey Creek!

A tributary on the hike in

Right around dusk we finally made it down to the put in of the river. We decided to set up camp there and rest up to charge the entire river the next day. Dinkey Creek is generally paddled as an overnight, but because of our late start, we would have to paddle the entire river in one day. It was awesome.

Taylor Fearrington at the Willie Kern slide

Taylor taking a moment below a big rapid under the rainbow

Me at the bottom drop of Spike

Drew Duval entering one of many big rapids

Beautiful scenery on the Dinkey Creek

Taylor going for it on a classic Dinkey rapid

Me running the bottom 20 footer

Drew in the middle of the Nikki Kelly Slide

Me entering into the meat of the Nikki Kelly Slide

Our group hiking around the water blasting out of the dam

Was it worth the hike? Hell yea!!!!

Ecuador Video

2010-03-29T06:01:00.000-07:00

Along with the photos posted below, I also wanted to share this video that Gareth put together of our time down in Ecuador.

Going South for the Winter: Working in Costa Rica, Belize and Ecuador

2010-03-28T14:22:00.000-07:00

Two trips to Costa Rica, three weeks in Belize and two weeks in Ecuador very conveniently helped me avoid most of what was considered one of the harsher winters Western NC has seen in a while. While it felt like I was always on the move and never in one place for more than a couple days, I can't really complain. From golfing for my first time in 10 years, to seeing Mayan skeletons, to spear fishing to swimming like a fish in Ecuador, it was a great winter. Check out some of my favorite photos from each trip below.

COSTA RICA

Working on some rolling at the Fischer Condo pool

Taking a day off of boating to work on our golf swings

El Rio Tenorio

El Rio Colorado

A self portrait from an early morning chill session on the beach by the condo

BELIZE

Scouting out the islands we would return to with the Wofford College group (this picture was taking after the bumpiest/scariest boat ride I've ever had)

Pat and I doing our best jaguar impressions

Chilling in hammocks in San Ignacio

Some Wofford students showing off their mad canoeing skills

Catepillars that will soon turn into beautiful blue morph butterflies

Beautiful day at the Mayan Ruins of Caracol

A pot with a Gorilla carving found in an old Mayan cave

A full skeleton of a sacrificed body found in the Mayan cave

The Wofford students tasting the fruit of chocolate tree (Cacao tree) on our farm tour

One of the farmer's many children

The Cacao beans roasting

Unloading all of our gear at Queen Key for the star of our 5 day island adventure

Looking out at the ocean from my tent door

The first morning on the islands, also the morning after the epic wind/rain storm that took out tents left and right

The students getting out in the sea kayaks

Sunset on Queen Key

Busting open some fresh Conch for dinner

A view from Pomkon key

Jono showing of his mad sea kayaking skills

Preparing our freshly caught lobster for dinner

ECUADOR

An unusually clear view of Volcan Antisana

Getting loaded in Baeza

Gareth filming, which turned out to be a pretty common scene

Taking a break to check out a sweet waterfall

Sketchy bridge

Beautiful day of the Misahualli

A peaceful breakfast in Tena

Putting on the Lower Jondachi

Nightlife in Tena

Riding motorcycles in Banos

Mmmm... Guinea Pig

Gareth and I in front of Volcan Tungurahua

Gareth finishing up our run down the Papallacta

Mexico 2009 Video

2010-03-23T13:11:00.000-07:00

Mexico 2009

California 2009 Video

2010-03-14T06:22:00.000-07:00

With California creeking season on its way once again, I thought I would share this video recently put together by Gareth from our 2009 trip. Most of the footage is from Dinkey Creek, South Merced and West Cherry. Enjoy!

Adventuras en Mexico

2009-12-17T06:57:00.000-08:00

Gareth and our fearless guide Fernando

Last month Gareth and I decided it was time to get out of the cold weather of Western NC and head south to the land of cheap tacos, warm weather and big waterfalls. We had heard nothing, but great things about Mexico (besides people scaring us about the border) and were excited to check it out for ourselves. After the long drive down to Southern Texas we decided to spend our last night stateside camped out on the beautiful beaches of South Padre.

Finding our campsite on South Padre Island, TX

After almost being arrested at the US border (Gareth decided it would be fun to set up the video camera to tape our border crossing which as it turns out is a federal offense and resulted in us being frisked, searched and the video camera almost being confiscated), we drove straight to the Micos River, outside of Valles City. The Micos is only a class 3-4 river, but totally worth doing for the fun factor of running lots of low stress waterfalls in one of the most beautiful places Ive ever seen.

After playing around in the crystal clear waters of the Micos, we headed to the Salto River, which turned out to be another one of those magical places. Lots of fun drops, super clean and super scenic. Unfortunately it is also the place where my camera stopped working. That said, the rest of the pictures from the trip are not great quality, but at least you'll get the idea...

Me at the put-in below the 60 footer on the Micos

Classic Micos Scenery

Me boofing a classic Micos drop

Gareth on the Micos

Playing behind the waterfalls of the Micos

Having a beer at the takeout of the Salto

After getting off of the Salto (and a quick stop at a sweet Taco stand), we hit the road for the town of Tlapacoyan, the launching point for running the Alseseca River. We spent two days exploring the Road-side section of the Alseseca and had a blast. The river is dirty, like the dirtiest river I have ever seen, and while that was hard to get past, the rapids definitely made up for it. There were lots of lots of clean fun drops, including one especially big rapid called "S-turn" which involves a 15 or so foot drop into a really narrow canyon. I actually decided to walk it on first inspection, but after watching Gareth fire into it it looked so much fun I carried my boat back up and fired it up!

On a whim we decided to leave Tlapacoyan before having paddled all the rivers we wanted to there in an effort to try and catch up with some other Southeast boater friends. We headed five hours South down the coast to the Rio de Oro, a run we'd heard nothing but great things about.

Gareth on the drop above "S-Turn" of the Roadside Alseseca

Gareth and Jon running "S-Turn"

A typical morning on the Costa de Oro

After camping out near the beach, we woke up early to start figuring out how we were going to get on the Oro. We knew absolutely nothing about the run besides that it had some sweet waterfalls and finished in the ocean. The only beta that we had was from a website that said to drive to this little town and ask for Pepito and that he'd show you the way to the river. At this point we hadn't found our other friends, but just knew that there was some chance they'd be there that day. After about 2 hours of cruising around the tiny town of Arroyo de Lisa, we found Pepito's parents, who took us to Pepito, we then took us to his brother Fernando, who fed us a breakfast of shrimp at his restaurant on the beach and then finally we were off to the river. We didn't fully understand what was going on, but Fernando was wearing flip flops and carrying repelling gear telling us we was going to come down the river with us.

As we were about to the start of the hike in, we heard someone honking at us and looked behind to see a truck loaded down with boats and our friends Toby, JJ, Ben and John as well as their friend Rocky. So as one big team we headed to the river with Fernando by our side.

After about a 45 minute hike in we arrived at the river. The first move of the day involved ferrying across the river above a 50 foot waterfall that has yet to be run.

Gareth checking out the waterfall at the put-in

Our man Fernando

The Rio de Oro turned out to be nothing short of spectacular. After a couple miles of beautiful, clean class 4-5 gorges the river drops off the first 30 foot waterfall. We all fired off it with reasonably good lines (I got a little worked and ended up behind the veil which was a bit scary for a moment) and headed downstream. None of us really knew what to expect, so imagine our surprise when after paddling for only a few hundred yards in a totally walled in gorge we came to our next horizon line. We were at the second clean 30-footer of the run. I was a little nervous because of my mediocre line at the first waterfall, so I took that opportunity to have a little "How to Run a 30-Footer" lesson with Toby Macdermott. Turns out he knows what he's talking about. I stuck my line beautifully.

Toby at one of the drops before the waterfall gorge

Me running the first 30-footer

Toby showing us how its done on the first 30-footer

Gareth below the second 30-footer

Besides being really clean, extremely beautiful and having two clean 30-footers on it, the next coolest thing about the Rio de Oro is that it finishes in ocean. So after finishing our run we all spent some time surfing it up in the ocean waves. Then it was time to celebrate an amazing day with fish tacos and beer on the beach. We finished off the night with a bottle of tequila camped out on the beach. Best day in Mexico ever.

The next day Toby, Gareth, John and I got up early for a sunrise lap on the Oro. It was just too good to do just once.

Gareth surfing it up on the coast

Beers and Tacos on beach

Paddling back to our campsite after our morning run of the Oro

From here the story gets less exciting... Rocky was writing a guide book and needed to do some exploratory runs. So as a group we decided to follow him along on his adventures. We basically drove all around, ran a couple class 3-4 rivers, portaged a 150 footer and then decided to drive even farther to do a multi-day on the Rio de Cajones.

It was on the second day of the Rio de Cajones that I fell while scouting a rapid and broke my hand. I grabbed a log that fell, and I fell with it, right on the backside of my left hand. I knew that it wasn't good, but at the time I wasn't thinking it was actually broken. I suffered through a few more miles of Class 4 just ruddering my way down rapids and doing my best to make it to the first bridge where I could take out. When we finally arrived at the bridge most of us decided to take out. John and I hitchhiked the shuttle back to the put in while Gareth and JJ hung out with our gear at the bridge.

Ben loading up at one of the put-ins

A local boy hanging out with us at a put-in

John waiting for a ride while hitchhiking the shuttle

A view from the back of a pick up truck on one of our rides on the Rio de Cajones shuttle

A tarantula we saw while shuttling

Once we got back to civilization after way too may hours of driving from the Rio de Cajones I got my hand x-rayed and confirmed that I fractured my index metacarpal. That was the end of paddling in Mexico for me... I spent the rest of the trip running shuttle, drinking and practicing my Spanish.

Our Mexican Thanksgiving

After about three weeks in Mexico Gareth and I were both running out of money, and with my hand broken we decided it was time to high tail it home (after a night of fresh seafood and drinking on Bourbon Street in New Orleans of course).

And in case you're wondering, I have one more week in a cast (and one week after that of "being careful") and my hand will be back in action and on the river again!

Fall Foliage on the Toxaway

2009-11-03T08:49:00.000-08:00

Gareth getting pumped for the day loading up at the take-out

Last week I checked off a new Southeastern classic from my to-do list. I had been wanting to do the Toxaway for a while, but was waiting until the right day to do it. I'd say that a late October day with sunny, 70 degree weather during peak leaf season could not have met my requirements for a perfect day any better. The level was -4" (medium-low) and the team solid.

The Toxaway fullfilled every expectation I had for it and more. Slide after slide after sweet slide we moved our way down the beautiful gorge, making sure to take the time to stop and enjoy the fall colors surrounding us.

Drew Duval at the put-in slide

Drew Duval at the bottom part of the put-in slide

Gareth scouting Energizer before firing it up

Chad Pickens in the meat of Energizer

Chris Baer entering the Feeding Trough

Gareth Tate about to launch into Landbridge

Jakub in the middle of Landbridge

Beautiful fall colors looking over the lip of Wintergreen

A spectacular view from the bottom of Wintergreen

Can't wait to go back next time it runs!

Make sure and check out the video Gareth put together from the trip below.

California Trip Report: Lower Tuolumne and West Cherry Creek

2009-06-27T14:46:00.000-07:00

Taking a "California Lunch" on the Lower Tuolumne

After picking Gareth up from the airport in Sacramento we were both fired up to get back on the water after each taking a week off. Our plan had been to head down to Cherry lake and get on Upper Cherry. Unfortunately, the weather/water did not cooperate with us and due to a heat wave, the water levels rose back up, making upper cherry out of the question, and even making West Cherry too high. So we were forced to wait it out and take another few days off the water. Gareth headed into Yosemite to hang out with some friends and I spent the weekend on the coast with my family who happened to be in town.

Following the weekend we were dying to get back on the water so with West Cherry still too high, we opted for a big water class 4 day on the Lower Tuolumne. After getting some questionable beta on the run/shuttle, we stashed our bikes at a rafting place half way down the shuttle and drove to the put-in to camp for the night. The next morning we were met by "straight charger" Tim Collins and we put on for what turned out to be a really great day on the river. Since all three of us generally opt for low volume creeking over any big water runs, it was fun to change it up a bit and bust through so huge holes opposed to the creeky verticle drops we'd been paddling for the past month. We were told it'd be really easy to hitch from the takeout to where our bikes were stashed however that turned out to be very incorrect. We almost got stuck at some sketchy bridge far from our bikes but fortunately the one rafting trip that was taking off that day finally decided not to leave us stranded and gave us a ride. Gareth and I then hopped on the bikes and rode the 10 miles down to the cars.

The next day consisted of doing our research and pulling together all the beta we could to figure out just what was going on with the water levels on the Cherries. Eventually we concluded that the water level on West Cherry was somewhere between high and good and the three of us decided to hike in the next day. Tim Collins had done the run once before and became our fearless leader for the trip, successfully navigating us to the trailhead and down the two mile mosquito fest hike to the river.

Taking a break from the hike

Tim hiking into the granite planet

Me hiking in

We arrived at the put-in earlier than expected, but instead of paddling down decided to simply enjoy our time taking in the beauty of the area. We spent the afternoon relaxing, fishing, hiking around, and scouting some of the rapids for the next day. As soon as dusk set in the mosquitos came out in full force and caused us all to retreat to our sleeping bags before it was even dark. That was the most intense mosquito attack I have ever experienced.

At the put in- campsite #1

Tim admiring the scenery

Exploring the gorge after our hike in

Sun set on West Cherry Creek

Using the nomads to set up the mosquito net

The following morning started off with lots of low angled slides followed by this sweet twenty footer that falls off with rock ledges on either side. The line is to boof off the middle narrowly missing the "goal post" rocks on the sides. Just below the that rapid is a big 15 foot drop with a meaty hole at the bottom that you would not want to be stuck in. After a few more class 4-5 rapids we arrived at one of the bigger runnable rapids on the stretch, known as Charlie Beavers Mega Rapid. Only Tim decided to fire this one up (which involves four big drops back to back) but after watching him style it I am fired up to run it next year.

Tim running the "goal post" twenty footer

Gareth at the same rapid from above

Tim stomping the boof below the twenty footer

Tim firing up the second drop of Charlie Beaver's rapid

Our lunch spot looking up at Charlie Beaver's Mega Rapid

Eventually we got down to what most people call "the big portage" on West Cherry which includes the Edge of the World slide. I can definitely see why the slide has that name because as you come around its edge, you get the most spectacular view of the Cherry gorges and Cherry lake in the distance. It was the most dramatic portage I've ever walked.

We decided that the scenery was too good to not stop to camp, so we ended up putting in and paddling down to the spine that separates Upper Cherry from West Cherry and camped there. This spot gave us a view of Upper Cherry creek and West Cherry creek as well as Cherry lake.

Gareth hiking around the Edge of the World slide with a beautiful view of Cherry lake

The crew

Part of the big portage

Gareth relaxing at camp #2

After a beautiful night at our second camp, we hiked down to the river and put on at the confluence of Upper and West cherry. The level was stompy for the Red Rocks gorge and gave us an early adrenaline fix for the day. Eventually we made it down to the final gorge which we decided was too high for us and did our final portage of the day around it before putting in again just above the lake.

West Cherry turned out to be hands down the most scenic run that I did in California. Its high sierra granite nature made it unlike anything I'd ever see before. And the whitewater wasn't so bad either...

The final rapid leading into the lake

California Trip Report: Hiking Yosemite with my Mom

2009-06-17T23:37:00.000-07:00

My mom and I at the top of Quarter Dome (right before the big push up to Half Dome)

After driving up to Sacramento from the Kern, I dropped Gareth off at the airport (he had to fly to Philadelphia to teach a swiftwater rescue course for a few days) and picked up my mom so that we could spend a few days exploring Yosemite National Park.

From the second I arrived in Yosemite valley I was blown away by the scenery. I was immediately surrounded by so many huge waterfalls and granite domes that I did not know how to take it all in. The first day we took a hike up to the Cathedral lakes (located at almost 10,000 feet). The hike was interesting as a good bit of it was in the snow and we managed to get pretty lost to the point that we almost turned around. Fortunately we found our way back on the trail and were able to enjoy the breathtaking views from the lakes (my camera was malfunctioning so no pictures).

The following morning we went for the most epic day hike ever, and the most famous in Yosemite- the Half Dome hike. The hike up to Half Dome involves over 17 miles of hiking and an accent and descent of 4,800 feet. My mom had been a little nervous about taking on such a hike, but was also the one that really pushed us to do it. Following the advice of others, we woke up at 4am to start our epic day in order to avoid the afternoon storms and masses of people also attempting the hike. The trail began without much warm up as we climbed up over 2,000 feet of elevation in our first three miles past two spectacular waterfalls.

Eventually we made it up out of the Yosemite Valley and across the Little Yosemite Valley, before starting to climb again, this time headed towards the top of Half Dome. Before reaching the infamous cable section of the climb, you must first walk up the steep granite steps of Quarter Dome. Because of her extreme fear of heights, this was extremely difficult for my mom, as the steps are not exactly lined with railings. I was very proud of her for making it to the top of Quarter Dome and approved of her decision to stop there. The climb up to the top of Half Dome looked steeper than I ever imagined, and I was nervous for myself, let alone my mom.

Deaths on the climb up to Half Dome are not uncommon, and there was actually a death there last Saturday (which was comforting to hear as we were about to start the hike). The climb involves a very steep granite grade, lined by cables which you use to literally pull yourself up the rock. It was full on to say the least. I cannot believe so many people do it, and I am surprised there aren't more deaths. I made it to the top without many troubles and took some time to take in the 360 degree view of Yosemite Valley and its surroundings.

A view from the top of Half Dome

Another view from the top of Half Dome

Me looking down into the valley from the top

The infamous cables (this is on a not so steep section, there was no way I was pulling my camera out during the steepest part)

A view from the hike down

After such an exhausting day, My mom and I decided to spend our final day in Yosemite a bit more relaxed. We started off with a drive to Glacier Point where we were granted some spectacular views of the park.

The Yosemite Valley including upper and lower Yosemite Falls

A nice view of Half Dome (the left most granite dome) and Nevada Falls

Following Glacier point, we drove a little ways and arrived at the trail head of Taft Point, a little 2.2 mile hike with relatively easy terrain. At the end of the hike we were given some great views of the valley from a different perspective.

Me hanging out at Taft Point

After an awesome lunch at the grand Ahwahnee Hotel (the most expensive hotel in the park), we decided to head over to El Capitan to watch some of the climbers do their thing on the world's largest piece of granite monolith rock.

Me free climbing the first twenty feet of El Capitan

El Capitan

The climbers slowly but surely making their way to the top

Eventually it was time to say goodbye to the stunning Yosemite rocks and head back to Sacramento to pick up Gareth from the airport. Upper Cherry here we come!

A parting view of Yosemite

California Trip Report: The Forks of the Kern

2009-06-17T22:36:00.000-07:00

Testing out the backpack system on the Forks of the Kern hike in

While camping at the Kaweah we met a nice couple (Rebecca and Eric) from Kernville that suggested Gareth and I go check out the Forks of the Kern run outside of Kernville. Because Gareth's shoulder was tweaked (he hurt it on the South Merced and aggravated it during his swim on the East Fork) we had been looking for a mellow option for the following few days and the forks seemed to be just what the doctor ordered. We were told it was an amazingly beautiful class four run that could be done as an overnight with some sweet side hikes. Sounded great to us so after taking off hospital rock we followed Eric and Rebecca south to Kernville.

Following a night camping out at the take-out, we were met by Bob (our shuttle driver) who took us the 20 miles up river to the put-in. The run had a two mile downhill hike in that Gareth and I decided would be a good opportunity to practice using our backpacking systems in anticipation of the 12 mile Upper Cherry hike in our near future. Turns out the carrying a loaded kayak on your back really isn’t as comfortable as one might imagine. I am glad that I got the practice using my backpack system but I am really not looking to ever putting it on again.

The river turned out to be just as beautiful as we were told and was filled with granite walls and tall peaks. We took our time moving downstream and managed to squeeze in some naptime by the river. After paddling over half of the total 18 miles of the run, we finally found a nice campsite and settled in for the evening.

A view from the hike in

Gareth on the hike

Gareth enjoying some of the 5 liters of wine we (aka Gareth) hiked in

Me hanging out in the hammock at camp

We spent the next morning relaxing at camp and catching up on some reading. When we eventually got back in our boats we only paddled for a couple hours before seeing a creek coming in that Gareth wanted to fish. After further inspection we realized it was the Dry Meadows creek side hike that had been mentioned to us. We decided to go check it out and man am I glad we did because it was absolute paradise. There were about ten teacup style drops, most of which were beautifully sculpted circular potholes. We probably spent around four hours just hanging out at this spot fishing and hiking and napping. The fishing was unbelievable considering we caught over thirty total trout within the pothole pools, one of which was over 13 inches (Gareth got that one). After catching four fish that we thought were sizeable enough to eat, we hiked back down to our boats and cooked them up over a granite slab fire by the river.

Thats me unhooking one of the fish I caught

Gareth fishing the pothole pools

Gareth reaching out for a fish that fell off the line at the last moment

Cleaning the trout

Fresh trout cooked over a granite slab...delicious!

Gareth cooking up the fish

Eventually we decided we had to keep moving downstream and finish up the river. It wasn't much further before we arrived back at the truck. We decided the best way to finish up such a great day was to hit up the Kern River Brewing Company, owned and run by Eric and Rebecca, the couple that brought us down to Kernville in the first place. We ate, we drank and we slept in the parking lot.

California Trip Report: The Kaweahs (East Fork and more Hospital Rock)

2009-06-17T22:05:00.000-07:00

Relaxing out on my bother's apartment's rooftop terrace in San Fran

After taking the weekend to relax and enjoy the beautiful city of San Francisco, we were antsy to get back on the water. Although we were a little unsure of the water levels, we decided to head back down to the Kaweah drainage with the hopes of getting on the East Fork of the Kaweah, said to be one of the best day runs in Cali.

Upon arriving at the camping area we talked to some boaters who ran the East Fork the day before and said it was low but going, so we decided to head up to the put-in the next morning. When we arrived we were excited to see that due to the hotter weather of the previous days, the river had come up to a nice low end of high level, which was absolutely perfect.

Gareth, Matias and I spent the day picking our way down the 4.5 miles of classic class 4-5 rapids. The portages were a bit epic but the abundance of clean rapids made up for them. The only carnage of the day involved Gareth getting thrown into an undercut pothole wall that after multiple attempts to roll (it would have been impossible to roll there) caused him to swim and lose his very important paddle. Knowing the paddle was still being recirculated in the wall, we decided to send me in after it. So Matias held a rope, which was attached to my PFD, and I jumped in and swam in the wall until I managed to knock the paddle out. Gareth still owes me a beer for that one….

Me at the bottom of a sweet East Fork rapid

Matias styling a big slide on the East Fork

Matias at the lip of another drop

Eric from Kernville perfectly hitting the line at Triple Drop

Matias scouting as Eric makes his way through the second drop

The next day we decided to take advantage of the higher flows and get back on the hospital rock section of the main Kaweah. Hospital rock is one of those sections that is so classic that it can be enjoyed over and over again. It was a beautiful day on the water.

Gareth and Katie coming through the 420 gorge

Gareth stomping a boof in the 420 gorge

California Trip Report: The South Silver

2009-06-06T09:05:00.000-07:00

Camping out with the truck

After spending a day in the big city of Sacramento getting some much needed errands done, I was ready to get back in the California wilderness. So Gareth and I decided to head up into the Eldorado National Forest to camp out for the evening.

The following morning we took a short drive up to the South Silver to check on the level. At first inspection it seemed low, so we relaxed by the lake for the afternoon hoping it would come up as the day warmed up. Eventually we drove back over to the takeout and hiked up the river to find a better level as well as couple of boaters out there that needed a ride back to the put in. This turned out to be very convenient for us because we didn't have a shuttle vehicle either. We made a trade and drove them up to their cars and they drove ours back down.

Chilling by the lake

The truck loaded down to the max while giving the other boaters a ride

The South Silver is only a mile long, but within that mile the river drops over 650 feet. Its hard to believe that a section of river that is 650 feet per mile would be good to go, but the South Silver is exactly that. The run starts off with a long series of slides before dropping into the teacups section, a series a waterfalls dropping down the bedrock channel.

Me at the top of the teacups

Me in another teacup drop

Gareth scouting

Gareth in the teacups

After finishing the teacups section (and the portage that follows) Gareth and I were set up to run the last big rapid of the day. It was at this time that I saw what is probably the coolest thing I have ever seen on a river before. As I was literally about to peel out into the class five rapid, Gareth started yelling at me to look at something. It was then that I looked up to see a big brown bear coming down the mountain side on the opposite side of the river. The bear then proceeded to jump across the river in the middle of the rapid! This all took place about 25 feet away from the eddy we were sitting in. Had I peeled out when I had planned to, the bear and I would have been hitting that spot on the river at the exact same time. We then decided to get out of our boats and see if we could sneak a peak at the bear and possibly get a picture, but no luck.

Gareth pointing to the spot where the bear jumped across the river

Me running the main drop of the rapid with the bear sighting

California Trip Report: The South Merced

2009-06-03T08:10:00.000-07:00

Doing the touristy thing in Yosemite National Park

From the Kaweah drainage we headed North to Yosemite National Park and the South Merced river. The South Merced was a river that we thought had dropped out on us, but a few thunderstorms put a little extra water back in it so we decided to go for it.

The South Merced is a 23 mile run, with over 15 miles of those being class five. We put on Tuesday afternoon in Yosemite National Park and began our two day trip down the river. The water turned out to be a bit low, but for those of us from the Southeast used to paddling in low water conditions, it seemed like a fine amount of water. Day one involved paddling for only about six miles but it seemed to take a lot longer than expected. There were lots of great rapids, some manky ones and a few sieves to keep us on our toes. We camped just below super slide, the biggest rapid on the river, which was a series of slides culminating in a big 30 foot slide to finish off the day.

Gareth packing his boat for the trip

Me at the beginning of Super Slide

Me in the middle of Super Slide

The final big drop of Super Slide

Dinnertime on the river

Hanging out by the fire

We decided to get an early start on day two because we had 18 miles left to paddle, half of those being class five. We were a bit worried about how long the day was going to take, so we all made an effort to keep moving downstream and not waste too much unnecessary time. That said, there were unfortunately really no pictures taken from this day. It actually worked out to not take as long as we had expected, and the day was filled with lots of amazing rapids and even a bear sighting. We were off the river by 4:30pm and celebrated with some cold beers at the takeout.

Gareth at a random South Merced rapid

California Trip Report: The Kaweah and Sequoia National Park

2009-06-02T11:09:00.000-07:00

The put-in slide on Hospital Rock of the Kaweah

After our epic overnight mission on Dinkey Creek we were ready for a bit mellower single day run and decided to head a bit more South to the Kaweah drainage in Sequoia National Park. Upon arrival we found the water to a bit high. Unfortunatley that meant that we would not be able to get on the East Kaweah anytime soon, but it did make the Hospital Rock section of the Kaweah on the high side of good which made for an awesome day.

Brooks Saucier getting ready to go

Brooks hitting his boof

Scouting the 4-20 gorge

Me at the bottom of the 4-20 gorge

Beautiful Kaweah rapids

The following day we decided to head out of town because it was looking like it would take the East Kaweah a while to come in, but decided to head back into the Sequoia National Park to check out the big trees and beautiful scenery.

The scene from the top of our hike in the Sequoia National Park

Hanging out on the hike

The big brown bear we ran into in the park