The Green Boat (codename TANK) is here...

Shes every bit as fast as I'd hoped!

Saturday I cruised down to the Dagger R&D Factory in Easley, SC and picked up this beauty.



I spent the majority of the day building it (welding on cockpit rim, drilling massive amounts of holes for seat, grab bars, thigh braces and bulkhead and cutting out all the foam i could imagine to put in this thing to help out with the structural integrity) with the help of Mark "Snowy" Robertson, and I was so excited to get it out on the water that I needed to remind myself multiple times that cops are everywhere. :-)

For a fitting virgin run, there is no better place for a boat designed for the Green Race than...the Green!

As of now, i've logged three training runs in this thing and I can safely say that I couldnt be any more stoked with how it turned out. Here's a quick run through of my findings
The hull is great, plenty of rocker to launch off any boof and plane over any hole
The slight keel in the hull of the stern really allows it to lock in and haul ass in a straight line, and allows for smooth, carving turns with the slightest edge transition.
The bow rocks and resurfaces fast and smooth, not blasting to the surface and backendering you, but moving through the water/hole like a torpedo, so you end up losing almost no speed if the boat goes deep.

I could go on and on about how great i think this boat is, but I'd rather you see for yourself.

The photos below are from the factory, when the boat just came out of the mold. So please excuse the lack of flash...

Click the link below to watch the head cam footie i shot on my third run...the camera i was using was messing up a bit and i had to take out a few frames. Hope you enjoy. If the link isnt clickable, simply copy and paste it to your browser

http://www.downstreammedia.net/pat/gb_web.mov

Cali Photo Dump
Photos by Nate Elliot

This post is for you, reader! Sorry its been so long since new eye candy has shown up on this page. Im working on it.
Please stand by for captions for photos and stories...its late and my eyes really would love to shut.

From the top: Tenaya post run low water scout, Yosemite Valley, San Joaquin's Mammoth Pool Rapid (some things just shouldnt be run), Upper Cherry Creek round #2, classic california dirt campin', Upper Cherry round #1 (notice the excessivly high, "Tommy flow" of Cherry Bomb-run by Charlie Center, Lane Jacobs, and Rush Sturges), West Cherry mission and finally some East Kaweah.

Coming soon: Grand Canyon Trip Report

&

The making of Dagger's answer to the Tornado: The Green Boat aka "The Tank"

Everything is in reverse chronological order (except for this first shot, of the West Cherry Falls) note toby and myself in frame, top left of shot...BIG slide.

Hope you enjoy.







































































California Dreamin
Oct 9th '06

East Kaweah/West Cherry/Upper Cherry

Its Green Race Time here in the Southeast, new boats are coming, racers are training and talking it up...and the countdown as of today is 26 days. Nov 4...where else would you want to be?

As the leaves are beginning to change in the higher elevations in Asheville, I think back to how amazing of a summer it was for kayaking this year. Names like Charlie Center, John Grace, Rush Sturges, Dave Garringer, Jason Hale, Billy 'Murf' Murphy, Billy Jones, Johnny KY, Ian and Evan Garcia, Tristan and Ian McClaran, Nate Elliot, Toby MacDermott, Lane Jacobs, Polk Deters, Tommy Hilleke, Josh Hill...Tons and tons of bros on a mission this year...and im proud to say we "got it done". Good Job Boys.

Everyone was stepping it up this year. Granted, all of even the biggest, scariest rapids (except one, the massive West Cherry Falls, run this summer by John Grace) Had been run by the likes of Scott Lindgren, Dustin and Brandon Knapp, the Kern Brothers, and all the bad asses that came before them.

What an incredible place! I feel like california was made to be a hair runner/kayak living/shit running paradise. I couldnt believe it...I was taking off one river, cruising into town to make a quick stop to the grocery store to load up for the next mission, making a phone call to the parents, and dropping back in to go do some more incredible kayaking.

Cali Update
July 6th 2006

Royal Gorge N. F. American





















Photo: Ian Garcia

The biggest, scariest rapid i've ever run...Scotts Rapid
The drops are even closer together than they look. Not to mention your at least a day of hiking away from anything. Lindgren ran it in Thirst back in the day and it hadnt been run till this year when Charlie fired it up followed 2 days later by yours truly.

Fantasy Falls
July 4-6th 2006
Photos by Lane Jacobs
Day 1

















Charlie Center stylin the "Willie Kern Rapid"

I've wanted to run this one since i was 7 when my dad got me my first kayaking video, Good 2 the Last Drop by Scott Lindgren Productions. There is a sweet shot from the same perspective of Brandon Knapp getting a watermellon seed effect coming out of the first pinch then boofing the bajesus out of the lower 6 foot ledge. Everything id hoped!

Charlie "Boofin the shit out of it" up and over a nasty spot

Capo (pronounced Kahpo) droppin into the first of two huge slides above camp 1

Camp 1 overlooking the two biggest rapids of the day.

Day 2

The manky and terrifying "Good Morning Rapid" Fantasy Falls style.

When we arrived here i got a kick out of the memory of a shot in LVM of Daniel flipping over on the way into this one. NOT a place i'd want to be upsiedown. His memory lives on in us all. "Hold on real tight to all the memories cause this guy is GOLD" -Johnny Kern

This drop was awesome! The water pillows up on this rock and forms the perfect mushroom boof...I just couldnt help myself...after 5 runs i finally let the group continue down.

Executing a "Flying DeLaVergne" same rapid

Again, same rapid, trying a different line. I remember watching a shot of Tommy in one of the LVMs boofing off of that slide and dissapearing under the veil of an oncoming drop...FOUND IT! I wasnt expecting much but it blew me away how much fun it was! On my last run and second on that channel, (shown above) i was able to get all the way thru into the tunnel behind the drop that is coming left to right in the shot and chill out there for a second or two before i was flushed down and out, back to reality.

Liz firing up the big one...the reason this run is called Fantasy Falls

We camped here on river right overlooking the second tier of Fantasy, positioned smack dab in between two huge granite domes unlike id ever seen! Spectacular scenery!

Day 3

The Big Slide

"California class 3" - DeLaVergne

Yeah right, i was scared shitless!

Lifting my bow over the huge curler... Stop here for a sec and check out the massive hole at the bottom, not the curler in front of it but the gaping maw of violence with no exit below, waiting for my arrival. (hint hint)

Everything was going perfect until just a few moments after this shot... I was right online trying to use the left to right curler im hitting just there to get me moving to the right and (hopefully) thru the weak point of the hole...no dice...I flipped as i hit the bottom hole, felt that awful slurping sensation followed by extreme violence... I didnt hang around long before i ditched my paddle, grabbed my loop and pulled, ending my nine year run of no intentional swims. After two cycles in the backwash i swam down and everything went black...after what seemed to be quite a while the buoyancy in my new Astral Rescue Vest brought me back to the surface, feeling 100% alive.

I knew from when i was getting in my kayak from the top that i would swim, but to not run something that big and fun with a huge pool at the bottom...Daniel would say "what the F^$#"

My motivating thought this year is What Would Daniel Do? and after seeing him walk back up to his beat down with a smile on his face...then take that thrashing proudly, i felt proud and honored to have my swim in the spot that bit D in the ass.

Lane's in there somewhere...the power of the river was shown to us when Lane and his loaded kayak were flicked to river right like a twig. As he hit the hole he was sideways, flipping into the hole...that stopping force hit the eject button for him and we had swim #4!

Charlie was the only one to fire up the big slide and not swim, he was able to hit it straight and stay upright...although the hole stopped him dead, he was able to muscle his way up and over the boils. We all thought he was in for a bootie too!

Thats it for me on the blog, hope yall enjoyed

So many things to experience, so little time

Cheers

Pat

Another trip...
Another waterfall...
Another injury.
This time it wasnt as pretty




Photo: Erik Boomer































Well, here i am again with a cast on my left hand. This time i broke my thumb while running 70 ft Koosah Falls on the McKenzie River in Oregon. I ran the falls from the right back in 2002 and had a great line. This year i hooked up with Austin Rathmann, Erik Boomer and Ryan Casey out there for spring break and after a few runs of the Little White we decided to go on a little waterfall tour. We hiked up and ran Punchbowl Falls on Eagle Creek which was a sweet 28 footer with a tricky move at the lip and a cool seal launch into the walled in pool before the falls. Downstream of Punchbowl is 82 foot Metlako Falls. That thing is massive. Props out to Dave Grove for firing it up...it scared the heck outta me. The next day we woke up 'early' and headed over to the most beautiful 40 footer that your not supposed to paddle, Celestial Falls. We ran it twice...but really quick.




Punchbowl
Photo: Erik Boomer
Seal launch is the creek to my right


















droppin in





















We had gotten word that Koosah was at a perfect flow earlier in the week. Austin, Boomer and I were really fired up to stand at the lip of it. I couldnt wait to get back because i was stoked with my line in 02, but after landing i said i probably wouldnt run it again. I was curious about whether i would want to say screw it and go against what i had said before.
Yep, fell for it.

This year there was a tree that lay over the eddy that i peeled out of in 02 on far river right, where i was able to surf across the diagonal wave just above the lip, then before i was pushed all the way into the hole on the left, i turned downstream and rolled over right to left and taking a final stroke on the right. If i wanted to come in on the right this year i would have to punch through the diagonal in just the right spot so i wouldnt piton the rock just underwater, go as close as you can to said rock, adjust angle last minute and fall. The other option was to start left, punch the hole the diagonal feeds into about ten feet from the lip, catch the eddy then peel out and ride the curler formed from a rock just underwater at the lip left to right and off. I chose the latter. I knew i didnt want to go over the top of the curler and fall left too early because there is a pretty big rock alittle left of the fall impact...not to mention greenwater hurts. I felt like if i peeled out and rode off over the highest part of the curl i would fall into and through the jet of current coming right to left after I had started freefalling. If all went right i didnt think the jet wouldnt mess with my angle much. What worried me most was to ride the curler too long and across to the right, causing me to start freefalling with a funky new current under my kayak, which would probably flick me funny...That, ladies and gentlemen, is precisley what happend. I wanted it a little too much and decided to go anyway. I caught the eddy at the top real quick and as i peeled out i was given one of my all time favorite mental images...the curler at the lip falling to oblivion...with my bow rising over the top of it and all the world coming into view...*shudder* As i was going off, i thought to myself...'ooh im right...oh bummer i took my stroke too early...oh crap i think im upsiedown...well, ill find out how bad its gonna hurt real soon...BOOM!




































Right about where i was thinking...oops im right. At the time the image was taken i wanted my kayak to be right about where my left elbow was.

I landed 100% upsiedown or as Daniel would say, 'on my head.' My bow was pointed straight downstream and im pretty sure my bow hit before my head which makes me feel a little better...but it created a flicking effect on my body down into the water. The hit was pretty violent on the back of my head and middle back, knocking the wind out of me and ejecting me out of my kayak. I remember thinking as i realised that my legs were wet, 'well, there goes that thing' I landed locked in the Oregon Tuck, where you put the paddle almost parallel with your kayak, setting your front paddle blade on your front deck between your feet, placeing your front arm on your cockpit rim and locking your head onto your forearm. In theory, that will allow you to pierce into the pool better. This also places your paddle as the first object attached to you that will hit the water and possibly go in a bad direction. Last time I landed perfect at La Paz and the force of the impact on the upturned and forward left blade was enough for me to hinge at the elbow and punch myself in the helmet, breaking my left hand and my paddle. This time (while upsideown) my right blade was forward in the tuck and i smashed my left thumb between the side of my kayak and my paddle, breaking it in 2 places.

My run at Koosah, this blog and everything i do this summer is dedicated to the life and times of Daniel DeLaVergne. He was the Man... the TDub team captain, a great mentour and my friend since i was 13. I found out he was in the hospital the night we got back from Celestial/Koosah. He died the next morning at 8:20 am. I will always remember following him down Ravens Fork for my first time...when we came up on wet willy he just looked back and smiled. I wont forget his calm calculating mind, who had a solution for every situation we came upon. His motivational talk of beautiful views and 'dancing fairies' up on the river right ridge as we decided to hiked out of Mosley Creek always makes me smile. The best memories of Daniel for me are his many smiles and laughs after running a rapid...(the laughs usually if the run involved a crash) . Good lines up there with Matt and Charlie bro.

I still cant believe he's gone.


Photo: Tommy Hilleke
D bringing some cheer to a grim and cold afternoon.















D 'kickin it' at the top of the hike into Middle Kings













The doctors say the cast will come off on April 3rd and i should be able to paddle around 2 weeks after that... hope to see all of you on the water soon!

Big Boy is Back!

Whats up all!?
Just had three amazing days on the Ravens Fork River...once again officially my favorite river!
I have a lot of history with the Ravens and this particular run means a lot to me. Its amazing enough being in the park and around the reservation but all the rapids on that river are just so awesome! The first time i ran it was when i was 14 (i think) and i've been trying to come back as much as possible since then. When i was 15, i ran Big Boy for the first time and the Mangler. In early 03 i tried running the Big Boy again at about 16 inches and ended up coming off in the wrong spot and landing smack dab on the rock at the bottom...Needless to say, that scared the crap out of me and i was amazed that i was not broken in many places. I let that beast lie for a while after that...nor did i want any with the huge trees that were in the landing.

All photos by Nate Elliot

What a beautiful place!

Back to the now, we had a great run on the Toxaway on wednesday so i was really feeling the groove...thursday i was locked down with school but went out to the Ravens on Friday with John Grace, Nate Elliot and Jay Moffat. I was really feeling the groove of the river on the way to the Big Boy and Grace and I were so fired up that we bombed straight thru from the top of Jedi Training to the bottom of Wet Willy...now THAT would be an extreme race! Anyway when the crew caught us at Big Boy we had already decided that we (grace and i) were both gonna run it.

Decisions Decisions

Since Grace was the man (along with Jason Hale of course) who cut out the wood from the landing, it was his honors to fire it up first. Nate and Jay walked around the next rapid, crossed the river and came up to the landing zone for safety...Big Boy is no place to screw up, not just because of the rock at the bottom but if you were to swim the next rapid (called Atomic-Supercollider) youd probably die. Grace came off a little right of where i was lining it up and boofed out, but had a great run.

Grace sticking the first run of Big Boy for years

Walking up to my kayak, i had some major heebie-jeebies going on in my brain due to landing on the rock. I was so freaked out that i had to calm myself down by going back and looking at my line up point. There is a curler going right to left at the lip and i wanted to merge with it right as it is falling off into oblivion. This would allow me to get my boat on the part of the rock that rolls to the left that will in turn catapult me thru the veil for a good landing away from the rock. I did my usual ritual for a big rapid while i was getting ready and shoved off. Peeling into the entrance, i could see grace shooting from the other bank and gave him the thumbs up. Coming in was perfect and a random quote from Thirst popped into my head. "The second that you plunge over the top of a drop, all else is forgotten" -Scott Lindgren. I smiled at this thought as i was thinking how true that statement is...i was completely living in the moment and nothing else in the world mattered. I met with the curler perfectly and it took me left just as i had hoped. With a big right sweep i busted thru the veil of water that tries to push you back to the right, where the rock lay waiting. As i was falling i knew i was in the perfect spot, but twisting to the left just a touch...I reacted by taking an air sweep with my left blade, landing with the right forward. The impact was soft and just underwater i grazed the rock with my hull slightly. Wheew! I popped up cruising towards the next rapid with the feeling of cold water on my legs... My skirt had blown upon landing due to the tremendous amount of water crashing down around me. I paddled my extra slow kayak over to shore and let out a tremendous yell. I was so stoked to overcome the mental challenge of that drop...I thought i would never run it again.

I'm in there somewhere...if you look about 4 feet off the landing you can see an orange blob...talk about soft landing!

I cant say which feeling is better...the moment of running the rapid or the feeling of accomplishment when your looking back at it satisfied

First drop of Atomic-Supercollider with Big Boy in Background

I was pretty fired up after that so i decided to run Atomic-Supercollider, which went well. Once i tried to run the second drop (the supercollider) on the far right, ending in a nasty piton into a sideways pin, facing into the oncoming flow...Fortunately Matt pulled me right up and out of that one. Friday, i knew better than to try the right line so i fired up the left side. I ran the first drop perfect and came in to the supercollider just right, but went flying thru the curler that kicks you to the left and around the rock. I had no option but to boof sideways onto the rock and hope not to pin sideways. I landed on it nice and cushy like then rode the current around and left...Awesome.

Boofing onto the Supercollider rock...this drop is a whole lot scarier than it looks...starts falling where nate was standing so when you do collide it tends to hurt

Mike Tysons has got to be one of the coolest rapids on Earth...what am i saying, all of the rapids on the Ravens are hard to beat...Tysons is just so big!

Very bottom of Mike Tysons...notice the boulder in top right?...the rapid starts 2 holes above that thing...thats some mad gradient!

Caveman is also back in full effect due to the horrible log flushing out of the middle of the rapid.

Bottom drop at Caveman, the log that flushed out was positioned right where my stern grab loop is...terrible! We're all stoked that that one is out of play.

One thing to note for any Ravens Fork paddlers out there is that there is a big log at the bottom of the slide below the Razorback Portage (rapid below Boof Right Head Right) at river level...going into the left of that thing could be disasterous.

Saturday we went back to find a great level of 14 inches. Didnt run Big Boy or the Supercollider but it was still super high quality...good to go mellow now and then.

Today (sun) we hiked in after the good ole Tacoma made it up the muddy ass hill for the third time to find another run of a perfect 10 inches. All the rapids up top were awesome as always and when i got to the bottom of Wet Willy i walked back up for another round on Willy. After everyone had come thru and was in position to scout the Big Boy i decided to give it another go. I was feeling great and decided to just stay in my kayak...Al G style. The boys gave me the thumbs up when everyone was ready and i paddled out. Coming in i was again staring straight at the curler and thinking of nothing else. Once i rolled over i knew i had it. I pulled on my big right sweep and dropped my left edge to help pull me further left. I had my eyes open as i was coming into the veil...Beautiful! For a split second, all there was was white. I fell further and all of the sudden i could see again! I had gotten a little extra launch off the kicker at the lip which pushed me straight thru the veil. I fully loved the moment of seeing the pool during freefall, and tucked up for the hit. I landed at about 60 degrees and G-d out softly but again, my skirt had blown. Now dont get me wrong here, Snapdragon skirts are the best... but with that much water falling on your head as your kayak is trying to slow downward momentum and begin upward momentum...stuff is bound to blow. I paddled over to the eddy on the left and set up safety for anyone else that may run it. Scott Harcke looked as if he was ready and raring to go, but he chose the wise decision and walked...nothing wrong with that. Heath and Jason Hale both gave it the thumbs up tho. Both STUCK it! I've never seen three people fire up Big Boy in one day! Good job boys.

My run today...you can just see my Werner paddle blade...Dosent get any better than that! Todays run bumped the Big Boy up to a three way tie for favorite rapid with Wintergreen (Toxaway) and Heath Springs (Royal Gorge North Fork American).

For what i got running thru my head right now, i can confidently say that today was one of the best days of kayaking in my life and the Ravens Fork is again my favorite river....hopefully ill be going back tomorow for number 4 in a row!

This Blog is dedicated to the man that makes it happen up at Ravens...Emanuel (sorry if spelling is wrong) ...from now on we're trying to get anyone that runs the Ravens to give him 2 dollars a head for parking...that way young buggers like me can pay him back for his kindness!

Grace and Jay posing with Emanuel at the take out

Good lines out there
Pat

Once again, the title of this here blog makes sense.
The hand is now back to 100% after a little over two months of being out. After the surgery, I was in an ace bandage/cast thing for two and a half weeks, and had to wear a molded splint for the remainder. After lots of time and physical therapy my doctor, Angelo Cammarrata said I was good to go to paddle and I was on the green within two hours of the good news.

It feels so good to be back out on the water. Yeah i know it was only two months but thats the longest i have not kayaked as far back as i can remember! The last time i had to take such a long break was when i had my ACL in my right knee fixed. That was only a month of sitting stagnant.

When i was out of comission i did a lot of thinking. One of my ideas on how i could make paddling (at least with my hand) better, occured to me when i realized Oakley had sent me a really cool pair of mountain biking gloves with carbon fiber knuckles. I padded out the underside of the knuckle guards with life jacket foam and cut the tips of the fingers off so i could feel the paddle better. That set up is awesome! I cant tell you how many times i've smashed my hands on rocks and that glove is solid. In the first few weeks of being back on the water my hand still hurt pretty bad if i tagged my paddle on a rock and i really didnt want to punch anything, so the glove helped with my confidence level.

The other day i went down to Easley SC and picked up a new orange Nomad 8.5 from Dagger and im really stoked about that kayak. Marck Lyle over at R+D cut the back of the seat out so now i've got way more room to fit all of my expedition gear inside no problem. And its orange! The last orange kayak i had was a Phat back in the day...good memories...so i've got a good feeling about this one.

Ever since i got the Nomad i've been doing lap after lap on the green...feels great. I cant get enough of that river...its so fun and running almost every day! what more could you ask?

Speaking of the green, there was a huge ice storm in there before christmas and it was scary how much wood fell in there. Six trees just from where you put in to the first main rapid! The worst ones to note were downstream and one of which almost created a terrible situation. When we got to Gorilla Christie D got out to scout and from notch she gave me the thumbs up. We all came barelling thru Gorilla and caught the eddy at the bottom. Chris Gragtmans was the last one to come off pad and he came out of speed trap with so much speed that he just kept on going to scream machine. This is where it almost went bad. Unknown to any of us there was a terrible tree that had fallen into the first hole at scream machine. It was easily two feet in diameter and extended about thirty feet across the river from the left. There was no way to see it from upstream. Chris came over the ledge and reacted quickly enough to charge right and ramp over the log where the hole meets the eddy. I peeled out next and did the same thing then stopped and yelled back up to everyone else about the death trap right next to me. The next morning, Dinver would have a life threatening pin/surf in that spot but come out ok. We heard of this as Parker, Jason and I were hiking into the gorge with chainsaws that same day to get the two worst trees out. The other tree of consequence fell in just below sunshine, completely blocking the run out of the rapid.

The day that Dinver pinned Parker, Jason and i arrived at gorilla with 2 chainsaws, 5 pulleys, 2 med kits, ropes and a whole lot of hope. Chris Stafford, Matt Dukes, Keith Sprinkle, Wilson Bell, Lee Timmons and a few others showed up to give us a hand and after much sketchy cutting, log roping in the flow while attached to a small rope, pulling on z drags, more cutting and more pulling we finally got the log at scream machine out. It had taken from 11:30 to 3:30. You can now see the remnants of the tree next to the wall on the far left between the 2 slides. With that one under our belt we moved on to the log below sunshine. We were just starting to feel grim due to the lack of good anchors to cut the log safely when a big group of boaters came down to help. Some of which were Nate Elliot, Chris Roberts, Christie D, Katie Hilleke and others. They pulled from the river right while i cut on river left and believe it or not we got that thing out! After doing some more minor cleaning, we headed back up and out. We were all beat, but Sprinkle dutifully cut nearly all the wood out of the trail as well with his brand new chainsaw. It felt really good to get those things out, like we were doing what needed to be done and the river and everyone who paddled it was thanking us.

I hope you all had a great new years and enjoyed doing whatever you were getting into. Chris Gratsmans and I had a great idea for what to do to kick off 06...at 11 o clock we hiked into triple falls for a starlight run of a really cool rapid. Scott Harcke and Toby MacDermott hiked in with us as our official firework crew. We kicked it off by hiking up to High Falls to warm up. Once there we were treated to a beautiful silouette of the waterfall with brilliant stars overhead. With about twelve minutes to spare we all hiked back down to where the trail branches off from the river between High and Triple falls, where Scott and Toby broke off from Chris and I. We finished putting on our gear by headlamp, slipped the headlapms around our legs to light our kayaks from the inside, wished each other good luck, and slid in to the blackness. It was so dark we couldnt even see when we were going to splash into the water as we slid in! As we were paddling thru the flats to the first of the Triple falls i had to laugh about the sillyness of what we were about to do. There we were, couldnt even see a rock till we hit it...all we could tell was where the river was going in relation to the amount of stars we could see from the gorge. As we were approaching we could hear the roar getting louder but we still couldnt make out the lip.

The first of the triple falls falls in two parts...the first being about 9 feet of vert and the second being about 5' far left and 17' far right. For the first one you need to be left center, but not too far in either direction...far left and you scrape slowly off the lip, and fall the 8 feet of the first step into a very shallow pool. Just 4 feet too far right and your in for a hard bounce on a nasty rock then an out of control plummet down the second part of the first falls, which dropps onto a flat slab...ouch. Left of center for the first step is good with a rolling lip and one final kicker where you can get a good boof and stomp it down before you land in the greenwater. Then you turn right and power as hard as you can into the water bouncing off the nasty hit. There is one spot really far right (practically in the veil) where you can drop the 5 footer and not kill your back...the water pools up just slightly there and if you land at about 45 degrees you wont take the huge hit you would if you were to fall left or center. Here the water moves right along the landing of the second one and you can paddle thru the veil of the second step as it gets taller and taller. Above the second of the Triple Falls (the best one to run) is a small eddy where you can pause and get your bearings. There are two lines to the second drop, one on far left driving left and the best being right down the middle. All in all it drops about 27 feet and random kickers explode the water around you as you run it...there are two left of center and one big one on the right. If you thread perfectly between them youll usually have a smooth nearly vertical run with a good g out at the bottom which will allow you to plane into the eddy at the bottom...just line up and enjoy the ride.

Our problem was that we couldnt see....anything. I could barely make out the rock i line up with for the first one, so i creeped up to the edge where i thought i needed to be...perfect. I shouted back to Chris (the green blob of light behind me) that i was lined up just right and slid off. Since i had no way of really making out where the final kick was, i went fully by feel. As i felt my boat bounce up i boofed and flicked my elbows up (my little sneak way of getting more air) with a big stomp just before i landed to soften the impact. I love the feeling of flying thru the air and being one orange blob of light surrounded by a sea of blackness and a touch of white was a moment of perfect zen. I was so immersed in the moment that when i landed i felt like i was coming out of a dream. I looked back up and i could just make out the waterfall and the stars above. I yelled as i saw the green blob of light get a perfect boof and end with a big stomp. We both shouted to each other, "This is so COOL!" and i charged to the right and off the second step. I enjoyed the frigid water landing on my head as i floated toward the second falls and paused in the eddy just above #2 to wait for Chris. Once i saw the green blob appear i peeled out and started my search for something...anything to help me line up for the middle line. I got my usual paddle length away from the rhodo on the right and really started getting nervous about hitting the big exploder kick on the right. As i rolled over the lip i could make out the first large kick on the left and i knew i was in the perfect spot. Again i just enjoyed the moment as much as possible when i detached from the rock and flew through the air a good 15 feet or so before smoothly reconnecting near the bottom and getting the classic plane out. I looked back just in time to see Chris's green glow fly out of the bottom, to where i was. I believe we were running the first falls right at the stroke of midnight...how cool is that?!

Neither of us wanted to run the third one (which is highly dangerous and not recommended to anybody) so we just hung out at the base of #2 and shot off all kinds of fireworks. It was so beautiful how the reds and greens of the TNT lit up the falls...We even ran them a few more times and tried to time them with the firework blasts...which allowed us only quick pulses of visual conformation on line choice between the utter blackness....What a way to spend the new years!

After we got off the water Chris whipped out his Yeti mask and we had lots of fun scaring passers by with Scott walking across the road with a white jacket and then ducking behind the guard rail, watching them as the car drove by...I wonder what they thought about that!

Just a reminder...It is never smart or safe to paddle in the dark! If something were to happen out there it would be really bad. We know triple falls like the backs of our hands and we were still scared!

Good lines and be careful out there all!
Pat

I almost forgot, photos taken by Lucas Gilman. Thanks for sticking the shot!

My personal fav

Broken! well the update is the hand is worse off than i thought...going in today at 2:45 to get a metal plate put in. Apparently the fracture started to drift out of alignment. Hope you enjoy the pics. I'll be back in december...