Panama Whitewater Kayaking Report

Here's some video of Panama whitewater paddling from 2003-2006. The runs in Panama are spectacular, and so few people have ever gotten to paddle them. Much of the footage here on this video is from the Upper section of the Rio Los Valles and from the Upper section of The Rio Chiriqui, parallel drainages in the Chiriqui province. With the first descent of the Upper Los Vallesin in 2003 its seen less than 10 runs by three groups down it since. To my knowledge I've run along with each group that has attempted this river, which blows my mind because it is just so good. There is a hike in, and a hike out, and two big portages, its far from an easy run, dropping over a thousand feet in just over 2 miles, but this run is world class! Enjoy the video.

Husum Falls of the White Salmon!

After two summers guiding here in the North-west for Wet Planet Whitewater, I've gotten to raft on some awesome stretches of river. The People are great, the weather is great, and on a twice daily basis on the White Salmon River we get to run over this crazy 10 ft waterfall called Husum Falls. If you've ever wondered what it must be like to run a bunch of people over a waterfall in a raft, here's a few pics to help your imagination. The guide usually get the worst of it here as demonstrated by raft guide and kayaker extrodinare, Curt Joyce (Below) on one of his seven flips this year (Ouch those rocks look close). Cheers to the King of Carn!

Occasionally a passenger or two will go flying as well
This is my handy work on this poor family of five, I think its that little guy hanging on that closed the coffin on this baby, sealing my third ever commercial flip (all three here at Husum). Eleven year olds love rafting!!
Bald Maniac Boatmen... the rest of the line was about as ugly as these two mugs (below).
Even our Husum Falls Champion, Sara Cohen (below, out of sight), has a little excitment, she actually sat this one back down, but had everyone in the boat sitting in her lap!

Here's a fun series of a typical run over Husum Falls... Everyone hangs on for dear life as the raft goes vertical...

Going DEEP! Wet Planet uses 14 ft long self bailing Aire rafts, and they go all the way under water...

we spend life under water for a second or two, the raft begins to re-emerge, click on the photo below for larger images of what remains of the crew

Disheveled but happy to be still upright, it is not uncommon for the guide's disembodied head to hover behind the raft while the crew recovers

This backender (below) didn't work out so well for Dave Martin's crew, but at least the self bailing floor works well.

While most rafts actually stay up right over the falls, it still always feels like you got away with something when you resurface still up right. Always a crazy feeling. If you want to know more about Wet Planet and Husum falls check out the Wet Planet website at http://www.wetplanetwhitewater.com/.

The Little White Salmon

The Legend of the Little White Salmon river is spread far by paddlers and is largely responsible for drawing me away from the Blue Ridge Mountains, a whitewater paradise in and of itself. Its reputation for fast and steep emerald green water fed by deep cold aquifers year round had me hooked, and after a couple of years of drought induced dreaming I finally worked up the courage to leave the friends and rivers i love dearly behind in North Carolina and see if it really was all that great. Now at the end of my second season here in the North-west's Columbia River Gorge, I think the 'LW' might be the best, funnest steep creek in the world. But beyond its great rapids, what I've really come to appreciate about this river, and whitewater paddling in general is how other people are drawn to it, same as i was, in search of some greater fulfillment. Here's a few pictures of the Little White Salmon as best enjoyed, with some really good friends.

Photo: Curt Joyce

This is me, launching off boulder sluice rapid, the last drop in a half mile long boulder garden called gettin busy that starts off the run.

Photo: Drew Austell

Curt Joyce with classic form, late boof at Sacriledge

Photo: Drew Austell

Curt Joyce on the middle line of Wishbone falls, the beautiful 20 foot waterfall we get to run whenever we want to.

Photo: Drew Austell

Dave Martin and Ryan Copenhagan paddling together through Stove Pipe Gorge.

Finding nothing but air at Stove Pipe Falls Curt Joyce Photos

Photo: Dave Martin

Ahh, the gratuitous Spirit Fall picture. One of the prettiest places on earth.

Photo: Dave Martin

Curt Joyce and I regrouping and enjoying the Spirit amidst the froth and spray below the falls. I only run this waterfall when the moment seems right and there's a good buddy ready to go with me.

Vertical Challenge wrap up

It's been nearly a month since the Eddy Flower Vertical Challenge ended and a solid month of non stop kayaking has given way to the busy rafting season here in the North-west. Returning from Idaho spent but happy, I've since had the chance to travel down to southern Oregon to teach a couple of kayak instruction course on the Wild and Scenic Rogue river, Eddy Flower has just announced the top finishers from the contest and our Washington based team, The Off the Cowch Team, has taken the top spot by a landslide margin. Our total vertical feet paddled was nearly 150000 ft, or 28 vertical miles! The top four individual finishers were from our team, and I reached my personal goal of logging more than 40000 feet over the 32 day span. Over the four years of the competition this is now the most ever recorded! In addition and of incredible importance is the fact that as a team we also were able to raise $6470 for the First Descents Program, sending young adult Cancer survivors to week long kayak camps as part of their recovery. This also makes us the first team to lead both the vertical standing and the donation standings. Thanks to many of you guys, we have set a new bar for all teams that participate in the Vertical Challenge in the future. So again, to everyone, your encouragement and excitement about the competition was so valuable and appreciated. To those who were able to contribute financially; I got to help out a few days with the actual First descents Camps; your contributions are so valuable and mean so much toward the greater goal, i am honored that you were moved by my paddling to become involved in this competition yourselves. Thank you all so much.

View of the Columbia River Gorge from the mouth of the White Salmon after our teams 35 mile paddle from Trout Lake Creek to the Columbia, Day One Vertical Challange 2010

Photo: Curt Joyce

Idaho: Land of Giant Water

So California Plans were set aside as word rolled in that the late melt had led to too high flows across the Sierras. Not to be discourage and with other info suggesting huge water fun to be had in Idaho, I set off with Jeff Clewell toward Banks, Idaho, home of the North Fork of the Payette River. The North Fork is a unique river, big water and uniform steep gradient combined with road blast rock make for some of the worlds longest and fastest rapids. This awesome stretch of whitewater is usually run at flows between 1500 and 3000. However, with a late spring melt and some heavy rain, the North fork was on a slow fall from a record high 9000 cfs when we arrived. We met Cooper Lambla and Will Stubblefield, two NC boys livin the dream in Idaho for the summer and went for a couple of laps on the 'easier' lower five miles to get our big water legs under us. I can honestly say i haven't ever paddled anything so enormous and so fast, and we were only on the 'lower five'.

The Upper 10 miles of the North Fork would have to wait till Monday, our next stop was the Secesh and South Fork of the Salmon River, a classic overnight adventure that takes you twenty miles down a steep action packed creek, into a huge big water canyon, with rapids the reminded me of Granite, Lava and Crystal on the Grand Canyon for 35 more miles, and finally out 20 miles on the Main Salmon river, one of the largest drainages in the North West. Seventy-five miles of steep creeking, huge water, and fantastic company made for a great 1st time kayaking overnight.

Back to Banks tired and happy, and scared as all get out cause next in line is a Top to Bottom North Fork Run and it is still running huge! Its hard to convey what this run is like from the paddlers perspective. Take every one of the biggest big water rapids you know of; take the Grand Canyon and eliminate every inch of flat water, make the rapids bigger, harder, way faster, no eddies. Drive your motorcycle at 30 mph into a big breaker off the Hawaiian coast and do that over and over again. In any case, I've been looking for that threshold, that piece of whitewater where i could say, thats as big as I really will ever care to go, and i think i found it on the North Fork of the Payette last week at those high flows. I had the great fortune to be able to follow two of the greatest big water paddlers I've ever seen through the melee; many thanks to Fred Coriell and Ryan Casey for the good beta and solid lines. Check out this Link for a fun visual reference: http://www.vimeo.com/12563837.

Eddy Flower Update and California Bound...

These last weeks we have been going full tilt, running rivers day in and day out, our team, THE Off the Cowch Team, is the heavy leaded in both vertical feet paddled and Donations pledged. This is huge. never before has such a contender for the vertical title also been a lead contender for most donations received for First Descents. I personally am blown away at the contributions that have been made on my behalf and they all have inspired me to continue paddling as long and hard as i can. A week ago I was having a conversation with a friend, and in trying to explain the significance of this competition i came to the realization that over the course of my development as a paddler I have really only paddle for my own personal rewards and objectives. Now for the first time ever, my paddling has given rise to an excitement that is benefiting a broader purpose. It's an incredible feeling. Every donation i see arrive in my name, inspires me to paddle another river, do an extra lap, and not for myself any more but for everyone who is watching, contributing, and for the benefit of the First Descents camps. In any case, my goal for the remainder of the competition is lofty. I want to finish with 40000 ft of descent and $4000 in donations. With 10 days to go, the work has been cut out for me. I'll do my best, and if any one out there has the means, First Descents is truly an awesome program. Again, here's a great video about what they do: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPnRYc5p1e0&eurl=http://www.firstdescents.org/cms/. You can check the real time standings of the competition or donate by going here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPnRYc5p1e0&eurl=http://www.firstdescents.org/cms . Thank you to everyone for your support.

THE Off the Cowch Team members Drew Austell, Jeff Clewell and Curt Joyce along with Susan Hollingsworth from Femme 45 starting a lap on the Miracle Mile of the Willamette River. Photo by Melissa Wilder

Susan Hollingsworth, Drew Austell and Jeff Clewell on the North Fork of the Middle Fork of the Willamette in Central Oregon

And now, I am headed to California...

9 Laps of the Little White Salmon

We've all heard at some point, a friend, family member or co-worker griping about how the wish they had more time to do whatever it is they enjoy; maybe it's fishing or camping, soccer or woodwork or rock climbing. Why is it people across the world regular spend all day hard at work, often not really enjoying themselves, but when given the opportunity to do something they truly love doing they'll spend only a few hours at it and then return to everyday life wishing they had more time. With this mindset I've spend much of the last couple years trying to see how much whitewater can be fit into a day, week, year. If you love it, then do it! since first arriving in the North-west a year ago I'v speculated with friends on how many run one could possible get on the Little White Salmon river here in Washington in a single day. For perspective, the Little White may be one of the highest quality, action packed Class V whitewater runs in the world. Dozen of rapids literally come with out break as the river drops nearly a thousand feet over four miles ending at the Columbia River. With no hike in or hike out and a ten minute shuttle from put-in to takeout it seemed to me to be the ideal testing grounds for whitewater endurance. Just how much whitewater is possible to fit in to a single day? Plans started to come together a few days out; with six laps as a goal, good friends pledged to help out paddle a couple laps with me or run a shuttle to the top. I started to scribe out a schedule, how long would each lap take, who could meet me and when could they make it. As it all started to fall together the personal goal of six laps, began to give way to the realization that there was time in the day for a good few more than that; eight laps became my new goal.

Finally, on Sunday, may 16th I met Curt Joyce and Lauren Starcevich a 5 am; still dark out we headed to the river. Lauren dropped us off and headed to work. Curt caught the 2 dawn patrol runs and Andy Round met me for two more runs, and like that i was half way done with four laps in before 11:15. Feeling strong still, I was joined by Lance Rief and Jeff Clewell and got a ton of great encouragement from some of the other local paddlers and friends who were out for their regular Sunday paddle. Three runs later, now seven down, i realized i was enough ahead of my schedule that i could pack in an extra final run, a quick call to Andy who had spend his afternoon working and i had paddling partner for lap # 9. By this point i feel like i'm on fire, my mind was so tuned to the river and in the game that my body had no choice but to come along. Getting sore, but more fired up than ever I started Lap 9 and found what i was looking for. Call it a primal thresh hold, a place uninterrupted by distraction, a task at hand so practiced that it was accomplished with little thought. Lap 9 went by as the shadows got long and at 8:20 in the evening, I paddled up to the takeout. Fourteen hours of paddling the best whitewater on the planet, with so many of my best paddling friends will stand out as one of my greatest memories. I got exactly what i wanted, i tested my limits, and spent the entire day doing something i truly love. I could not have done it with out everyone who paddled with me, drove me to the top, clapped me on the back. Getting such good energy from so many people made the day possible, so thanks everyone, and go out and do something awesome all day long!

Curt and I at 6 am right before starting Lap 1 Photo: lauren Starcevich