Boaters:
8 Catarafts (Aaron Williams, Dave Allen, Dave Becker, John Miesaloski, aka Puma John, John Meier, Mike Babcock, Mike Horner, Shelly Becker),  1 IK (Eric Klein), 1 Hardshell Kayak (Leif Kirchoff)
Level: 800cfs and dropping @ Naselle, approx 1000cfs in the Grays itself
Date: Nov. 14, 2009
Watch the Video

John Meier wrote this brief but very descriptive summary statement so I will start with that:
“Wow….what a run. 8 cats, 1-Ik and one hardshell kayak. 4 1/2 flips,
multiple pins and a couple of swims. A couple of portages, 2 broken oar
towers, 1 broken seat, 1 cracked frame and maybe one cracked leg.” — John Meier

Saturday morning Nov. 14, 2009 found us driving South to the Grays River, a tributary of the Columbia located in the Southwest corner of WA. Dave and I had run the Grays two years before in 2007 and we remembered it as continuous, steep and technical Class IV-IV+ in the upper section, a small break before the 3 major rapids of Superbowl, Picnic and Broken Paddle which were all solid Class IV+ followed by braided Class II the rest of the way to the takeout.  The Grays is one of those out of the way rivers and has a very remote feel when you are in the canyon.

We stopped in Tacoma to pick up Puma John who would be running his new 12’x20” Sotar Legend and continued South on I-5, down the Columbia and finally winding around through small towns and logging areas until we reached the put-in to the Grays. There is now an actual gauge on the Grays river but when we ran in 2007, we used the Naselle gauge.  Currently, the Naselle gauge was 800cfs and dropping and we estimated that it would be within 50cfs of what Dave and I had previously (and at the time thought was a bit low).

The upper part of the Grays canyon contains several drops that are steep and stacked with few eddies and places to stop.  The first big ledge is within hiking distance of the bridge just downstream of the put-in (where the whitewater section starts).  Dave and I both remembered this drop as being fairly significant in 2007 complete with a catboat aerial display, some near backflips, several blown oars and very little recovery before the next Class IV drop which requires a must make move to the left.  Today, we would have a total of 10 boats which is a lot for a river of this nature.  Out of the 10, only Dave and I and Mike Horner had ever run the Grays before so erring on the side of safety I said that I wanted to hike down and scout the first drop before launching and suggested that it might be a good idea for everyone else who was new to the river to do the same as I remembered lots of potential for bad things to happen there. Hiking in to scout meant getting a later start to an already short day but it was daylight well spent.  Dave and I and almost everyone else scrambled down from the bridge and bushwhacked our way to the first big horizon line.  What we saw was much different than what we had remembered.  it appeared as if the large ledge with the riverwide hole had broken up and was now shorter with a clean chute right of center (at this flow).  The rapid below still required the mandatory right to left ferry.

The first ledge, somewhat smaller than in 2007

Happy with what we saw, we hurried up, ran shuttle and launched.  It did not take long at all to get down to that first ledge, which was preceeded by a super narrow passage at the bottom of a Class III slide.  Nobody had any trouble with the first ledge or the rapid below.  After a short pool, the river drops over another significant ledge, probably in the 8’ range.  Mike Horner was the lead boat and I was next. We both knew this rapid should be boat scoutable but it was difficult to see a clean route.  Mike had just been on the Grays the week before at a much higher level and this section of river gets a lot steeper with less water.  Mike was in a one boat eddy on river right and I was in water that was moving slow enough where I could row in place.  I wasn’t close enough to see if the right was good or not, there was also what looked like a possible chute on the left but neither of us could tell if it was good or if it landed on rocks.  I asked Mike if he wanted me to ferry over to check out the left, all the while wondering if that would commit me to running the left since stopping options were not good and the river was walled in.  Mike inched a bit closer and announced the right was clean but totally vertical “point right to left” he told me as he disappeared over the edge.  I waited until I could see him emerge from the bottom, happily, right side up then I approached the lip, spotted the right to left tongue and dropped over the edge.  My 12.5’x22.5” boat is made for drops like that and it was big fun.  The river below was narrow and fast and relatively flat but walled in.  There were not many good eddies  – I heard Mike yell that Puma John was upside down.  I eddied out as best I could and rowed in place until I could see what looked like John’s boat secured by the shore and in the process of being re-flipped.  Figuring that John was OK and that lots of other people were in a better position to help than me, I focused my attention on the next twisting and somewhat blind drop just downstream.  It looked pretty read and run but disappeared around the corner so I used the time to scramble down and take a look.  The rapid ended up being straightforward Class IV with multiple options.

John's Flip in the 3'rd Ledge

Everyone regrouped in the large eddy where I was pulled over and I learned that John had gotten knocked off his cat in the process of trying to re-flip it. His cat then became wedged in a dicey spot between a boulder and the right bank.  Dave B. was able to get to John’s  cat and dislodge it using his own boat as a forklift of sorts while John was able to get to shore and eventually reunited with his boat.

Beautiful Scenic Narrow Canyon on the Grays

The river mellowed out a bit after the next drop and we floated through an incredibly narrow scenic canyon.  I had remembered this part of the Grays from the first time as it is not that often you can float in so narrow a canyon with catarafts and oars. Presently a respectable horizon line appeared above a drop that would have been read and run except for a large vertical piece of wood on river left that we could not tell if it was in the river.  We passed the “eddy out” signal back through the line of boats and this time, Dave B scrambled down the bank and gave the all clear signal. I stayed in the eddy with Dave making sure that eveyone knew to go left and then Dave and I ran the fun little twisting drop.  Shortly thereafter, eveyone again eddied out on river right. It took me a minute to realize where we were but then I quickly recognized the unmistakable huge rock and logjam on river left that marks the entrance to Superbowl.

Dave Becker in Superbowl

The last time we ran, we had scouted Superbowl on river left so Dave and I headed over there and got out.  I grabbed my video camera and scrambled up on top the rock for a good vantage point for both scouting and shooting video.  Dave and I noticed that the entrance looked a little different. Instead of being able to go down the middle and gut the big hole at the bottom, it looked like you were going to get surfed to the right off a 3’-4’ ledge and shot into a jet of water going just past a large flat rock and then through the large hole at the bottom.  To me, it looked if you squared up to the 3’-4’ drop after being surfed, you could very well not have time to square up the larger and gnarlier looking bottom drop. My plan was to enter center, get surfed right, take the hit, and then be straight for the bottom. Dave said he wanted to run first so he could film from a good spot at the bottom on river right.  The plan then, was Dave would go first and I would go last and we would get video from two different angles.  I got ready with the camera as Dave entered the drop.  He started out in the center and then to my horror, I watched as he was sucked to the right by a sleeper current well above the first ledge and where he intended to go.  His boat became lodged between two large rocks at a precarious angle.  All I could do was watch and hope that he didn’t pull the boat over in the process of getting unstuck. Dave was the probe and he was all alone with no safety and not a ton of extra room between Superbowl and Picnic (the next big rapid).  Dave kept his cool and was able to figure out how to weight the boat and get off the rocks right side up.  He then highsided off the flat rock and through the bottom hole which validated my theory that if you surf off the top ledge, the water will take you where you want to go.

Mike Babcock Aces Superbowl

Thankful that Dave was OK, I waited on top the rock with my camera for other people to run the rapid.  Several people made the ferry over to river left where I was and started portaging their boats.  Mike Horner had portaged this rapid the week before at high water because the holes were terminal at that level.  I was pretty sure my idea would work – I didn’t know why Dave had gotten blown off line at the top but it looked to me like if you drove hard you would cross the current and enter where you wanted to be. I told Mike and John M  (who were also thinking about portaging) that I was going to run the middle and was met with a skeptical look.  Dave and I had even communicated from across the river after he eddied out and I pointed at the original route and gave him the “good to go”??? question?? signal and he gave me two thumbs up. Mike said that he would run but wanted to enter far left instead of out in the middle.  Far left was a safer route but super rocky and manky and looked like lots of places to get stuck.  Mike did succeed in finding a place to get stuck but luckily not that far out from shore.  I waded out in water that was past waist deep holding on to rocks and was able to grab his rear tag lines.  I pulled as hard as I could and yelled for him to climb on the far front of the left tube all the while taking note of all the new places in my drysuit where water was coming in. Eventually the boat became unstuck and Mike disappeared into Superbowl.

Shelly Becker in Superbowl

I continued up to my boat as I was not in a good place to see his run.  That was unfortunate because Mike had the best run out of all of us.  He didn’t have a previous run in Superbowl to skew his thinking and must have figured there was enough time to square up to the drop after the edge of the top ledge and pivot to meet the bottom hole and it worked out great.  Had I seen that, I would have attempted the exact same thing.  Instead, I did exactly what I had planned to do entering center, driving hard across the current surfing right, taking the hit and being straight at the bottom.  It worked, but not for so many style points.  All in all 5 boats ran (Dave B, Mike, myself, John Meier and Dave A) – there were a couple unintentional surfs and pop-ups but nobody had any major issues.

John Meier in Superbowl

Dave Allen in Superbowl

The next big rapid shortly downstream is Picnic.  The general layout of Picnic in both 2007 and this run is a maze of rocky mank leading into two back to back significant ledges which flushed into a tight narrow steep walled chasm.  On river left at the bottom there is a small eddy and beach, otherwise, the current moves in a hurry toward the final large rapid, Broken Paddle.  That is where the similarities end.  In 2007, the “normal”? left entry was blocked by wood forcing an entry on river right through rocky shallows, occasionally getting stuck while making one’s way to the 2 bottom ledges which actually seemed larger (yet cleaner) at the time.  I would give the 2007 Picnic a strong Class IV+ rating.  Now, we found ourselves staring at what can best be described as a Class V+ mess.  Instead of trees on the left, we now had a death sieve with a few pieces of wood tossed into strategically bad places for good measure.  All of the water in the left channel was heading directly toward this.  On the right side of this channel was an “island” of sorts and to the right of that was a very technical, very narrow channel with fast moving water that was barely a boat width which I later named “The Poop Chute” for multiple and obvious reasons.  To the right of that was more impassable mank.  The one redeeming factor about the Poop Chute was that the water coming out of it was flowing past the large rock that marked the right boundary of the death sieve.  If you somehow made it that far, you would bypass the death sieve and get fed violently into the first ledge.  We scouted for quite a while and discussed various options.  There was a group of people who felt they could start left and make a death ferry above the death sieve.  These were Class V boaters with Class V skills and small boats that were well suited to a move like this.  In my mind, I saw the death ferry as being technically possible but gave myself less than a 50% chance of actually making it.  You had one chance to get to one place that was deep enough to use your oars to initiate a move to the right.  ALL of the water was working against you and the channel was extremely rocky, extremely shallow and there was NO plan B.  If you messed up this move, you were hosed with what looked like zero options.  When I looked at that move, I pictured in my mind a similar type of situation in a rapid called “Starts-With-A-Bang” on the Cascade river.  This rapid has since changed and the move is no longer there but it used to be a tricky entry move to avoid a large ledge and had the same kind of rocky shallow fast moving water that was not helping you get where you wanted to go.  The major difference is the move on the Cascade afforded an alternate line far left if you blew it – and – even if you ended up running the ledge it was not a death sieve.  I’ve probably blown that move more times than I made it.  At the time, I judged the death ferry not to be a good idea (at least for me) and decided I would deal with the Poop Chute and everything that entailed actually getting to it.

Picnic - the large rock at the bottom is the right side marker of the death sieve

Dave B. and Aaron had already started over to the right side of the river.  While we were scouting the death ferry, we saw that Aaron was lining his boat down the left bank of the “island”.  I made my way over to the right bank and started negotiating the many obstacles between me and the Poop Chute whose entrance was marked by a small log perched on a rock.  Eventually, I got to where Dave had pulled his boat over a little nuisance tree.  There was good current going around the end and at first I thought it would be easier to row rather than drag my boat over.  That’s when Dave told me Aaron had tried that and the current was deceptively strong and he had gotten carried too far left and over to the “island”. Dave and I lifted my boat over the tree and he said he was going to stay behind to help any others who were going this way which meant that I was now the probe if I was OK with that.

The first time I ran Picnic, I had been the probe and things worked out fine.  This time was much harder.  I slowly and deliberately worked my way through the mank toward the marker log taking extra care not to get caught in currents that were going into bad places.  I remembered the time when I “probed” a center route in a similarly manky rapid on the Cascade called Bridge Wreck that did not go as planned.  I then had to carefully pick my way through the rocks and find an escape route without flipping.  I was in very much the same situation here, sometimes I could get an oar in the water and pivot, sometimes I had to use the rocks to angle my boat so things would work out in my favor. It was a mentally and physically exhausting game of chess I was playing and my boat was 160 lb chess piece. Puma John with his much smaller and lighter boat eventually caught up with me as I was nearing the entrance to the Poop Chute.  I was making progress at the pace of a glacier but knew in about two minutes I would be entering a steep rock filled autobahn with probably no place to use my oars.  “Keep the boat straight at all costs when entering the chute” was the only thing on my mind.

When at last I did reach the entry I spun around and was able to enter straight, however, my left oar immediately caught in some rocks.  I gave it a good yank and it momentarily came free only to be sucked under and caught again.  With supreme effort, I was able to once again free the oar but noticed it was bent at angle where it would not be of much use. I shot down the chute as the large rock at the edge of the death sieve rapidly got closer and closer.  Even though I knew the water was going past the rock it was still a scary feeling. I swept past the rock and INSTANTLY my right tube shot high into the air.  I truly felt that I was going over and hoped I would be able to self rescue in time above Broken Paddle yet a voice inside my head was screaming “CLIMB”.  I instinctively started climbing the high side. The boat felt vertical and my efforts felt futile. It lurched a second time and somehow I found footing and climbed even higher, the little voice saying “keep climbing, you’re not done yet”.  It seemed as though I had climbed all the way around my tube when I felt the boat start to stabilize and momentum shifted the other way.  I slammed down right side up, slammed through the bottom hole, quickly got on the oars and eddied out at the little beach.  Somehow, by the Grace of God I had made it and that is my only explanation for why I did not flip there.

There was no time to lose, I needed to replace my bent blade so I could be safety for John who I knew was close behind me.  I had just barely gotten my spare blade on when Puma John  came through the bottom of Picnic on his upside down cat.  He knew that Broken Paddle was imminently downstream and was able to self rescue before running it but not in time to scout.  I shoved off and gave chase rowing as hard as I could and yelling to eddy out.  John knew that Broken Paddle was downstream and at first thought he was alone on a boat he did not yet have full control of after self rescuing.  He later told me he was glad when he heard my voice and knew somebody else was there but there was not time to eddy out. An absolutely HUGE horizon line was looming ever closer on the left side.  I believe what happened is the double drop in the Broken Paddle of 2007 turned into what is now a big ledge in the 10’-12’ range.  I watched John line up, start rowing very hard and disappear off the edge of the world.  Seconds went by and I did not see him and did not know what happened to him. Finally I saw John downstream and right side up.  I have been boating with John long enough to know that he is not going to blindly row into an obvious dead end.  There was a line there and now I too would get the opportunity to figure it out on the fly.  The drop was easily as big as my boat and I could see a nice tongue kicking out so I aimed for that and dropped in.  The landing was baby soft and Catalina and I shot out the tongue at the bottom.

John Meier in Broken Paddle - you cannot see the 10' drop on the left from this photo

John and I eddied out on river right and waited for what felt like an eternity.  We both knew there wasn’t much daylight left, there was serious scary stuff upstream, people may or may not be in trouble needing help and at that point we were walled in with absolutely no way to get back. We also did not know what the right side of Broken Paddle looked like and were fairly certain that nobody in their right mind would take the line that both of us had just run blindly without scouting – potentially a 3’rd portage?  We sat there for at least 20 minutes and probably more like half an hour.  All Dave Becker knew was that John flipped at the bottom of Picnic – he did not see my run and did not know my fate.   He had no way of knowing that John and I were waiting safely in an eddy discussing how this was the hardest “Class IV-IV+” run either of us had ever done.

I scanned the walls looking for a way up.  Not only were they vertical, they were overhanging in places and looked altogether slippery. Realizing there was no way I was going to be able to get back upstream without risking major injury, I resigned myself to waiting and hoping things were OK. I took stock of the extra fleece and food I had with me figuring I would soon need it to keep warm as I was soaked to the bone from a combination of water innundating my leaky drysuit and sweat from the exertion of Picnic.

Finally John decided to try and ferry out in the Class II’ish rapid downstream to see if he could see anything or anyone or ANY boats.  He yelled to me that he saw Aaron and there was also an upside down cat.  Dave Allen was on top of his orange 14’ Wave Destroyer and Aaron was yelling at me that Dave was hurt bad and I needed to help get the boat over.  Dave was screaming in agony and Aaron and I were able to get the boat wrangled over to the side and John and I tied it off to a large tree.  Dave was in a lot of pain and thought that his leg might be broken after it had gotten crushed between his frame and a rock.  He had flipped at the bottom of Picnic, rode through most of the bad part of Broken Paddle on his upside down cat and had gotten his leg badly crushed somewhere near the bottom.  We got Dave stabilized, and re-flipped his cat.  Both oar towers and the seat were broken.  The right tower was hanging on by a small piece of metal while the left was able to be made useable.  I figured out how to “fix” the right tower by running a strap from it to the outside D-ring so the boat could be rowed out.  Everyone else was still upstream and we were burning scarce daylight.  The rest of the river was Class II and Dave was wondering if maybe he could try and row his own boat out.  We didn’t think that was a good idea, I offered him my boat so at least he wouldn’t have to deal with his boat in the condition it was in.  Still, there were a lot of braided shallow areas, if Dave needed to stand up to flintstone the boat he wouldn’t be able to as he could not walk.  We knew we needed to get downstream, the drivers to both of our rigs were still upstream with the keys, and more importantly, we wanted to know if everyone else was OK.  We were discussing our quickly changing options when Eric Klein (our IKer) came down.  This was very fortunate as Eric also drives a cat and we could strap his IK to the back of my boat as a seat for Dave and Eric could row out the broken cat.  While we were in the process of doing that, the rest of the group made their way down.  We learned that many people had portaged Picnic and the right side of Broken Paddle was Class IV and everyone ran that.

Shelly's boat doubling as ambulance service

With rapidly falling temperatures and fading sun, we quickly ran the remainder of the river and got to the takeout at dusk where warm vehicles and cold beverages were waiting.  I didn’t find out until the drive home that I was the only person who ran Picnic that did not flip.  Dave Becker told me that he stayed upstream helping everyone around the tree who was not already portaging and he ran last.  Dave A. was in front of him and Dave B. watched as his “safety” violently flipped at the bottom just moments before he himself flipped.  He said it was nasty and that he breathed a lot of water but knew he had to self rescue ASAP. Dave was able to pull off a lightning fast re-flip and therefore was able to get all the way over to river right and eddy out above Broken Paddle in the scout eddy.  Dave also told me that Aaron had run into some kind of dead end while lining down the “island” and tried to get out and row around a rock and was swept into the current leading into the death sieve.  Keeping his cool, he was able to stop his forward momentum in a very tiny eddy on river left where he and his boat were able to be pulled with a rope up the vertical rocky bank on river left and out of the river. At least one of the people who was portaging had a front row seat to the unfolding carnage.  There was little glory in “running” Picnic that day and although the portage was long and arduous (on the heels of another long and arduous portage at Superbowl for those who portaged both) I’m not entirely convinced it was that much more work than dealing with getting to the Poop Chute.  Superbowl was a fun rapid, the left line in Broken Paddle was big and clean and fun (probably more “fun” if you scout it first).  Picnic was a ton of work no matter which way one chose to get around it.  I would go back to the Grays and do it all over again but next time would want more water.  Talking with Mike Horner who has run it much higher, it seems there is probably a window where Superbowl and Broken Paddle are still runnable and Picnic gets less manky.  Mike portaged both Superbowl and the entrance to Broken Paddle at high water so too much more water would not be good.

Grays River from Shelly Becker on Vimeo.

Read the Trip Report

Boaters:
Dave Becker; Shelly Becker, Eric Klein
Date: Fri and Sat  – June 19’th & 20’th
Level: Rising to 1300 cfs at Kernville
Dates: 6/18/2009 – 6/20/2009

About 5:00 Tuesday evening, Dave and I left our house in the Seattle area and drove South.  The goal was to pick up Eric in Portland that night and hope to make it to Grants Pass.  We were headed  to CA for what promised to be a week of epic whitewater and adventure.  Our itinerary read something like this:  Forks of the Kern, Kings Canyon, Cherry Creek and Burnt Ranch Gorge.  I had picked up a June 18’th permit  for the Forks of the Kern and we banked on a long shot that we would be able to run the Kings and the Kern in the same week.  Normally, the Kings would still be way too high but this was a drought year and it was dropping very close to our high water cutoff of 2000cfs at Rodger’s Crossing.  The forecast however was for extremely hot weather and there were already seeds of doubt in my mind that the Kings would be low enough.  Regardless, the Forks of the Kern was a sure thing as well as what we thought would be Cherry Creek as they had already turned it down to 1300cfs the previous Sunday.  We were hoping there would be enough water in the Trinity to run Burnt Ranch on the way home (hoping).

The weekend before we left I weighed everything that would be on my boat for the 2 overnight hike-in wilderness trips. We would be going backpack style and my personal gear weighed in at 11lbs.  However, by the time you add food,  video equipment, rescue gear, repair kit, 1’st aid kit etc. AND my Cat Carrier (my means of transporting my boat and gear down the trail to the river) I had almost 50lbs of gear added to my 170lb boat.  Knowing that we would be running a lot of Class V, I test loaded my boat with everything that would be on it and went to the lake to see what re-flipping a boat with an extra 50lbs would be like.  Happily, I found that I could still pull the boat back over pretty quick with just an inside strap (using a  thwart).  We timed one of my re-flips and it took 16 seconds from hitting the water to oars in hands ready to go.  I know I’m faster than that in an empty boat but it was a good thing to know when looking at recovery time after a large drop if it was my turn to be the probe.

DAY 1 – Thurs, June 18, 2009
After a very long, hot, dusty, FOREVER drive we arrived in Kernville on Wed evening. The next morning we drove to Kern River Outfitters to say “hi” to Will Volpert and pick up our shuttle driver, Paul.  I also wanted to get some beta about Vortex rapid as I read that it had changed (for the worse at low water).  I was told that on the most recent run, rafts were portaged at a flow of about 1300cfs.

The Good Luck Sequoia

Having Paul with us on the way to the put-in was great!  We drove along the Upper Kern which was currently a bit too low for the Class IV-V section but Paul showed us where all the Class V rapids were.  We could see that with a bit more water it would be an awesome run.  Also along the way is a HUGE sequoia tree where it is traditional for boaters bound for the Forks to touch it for good luck.  I had no idea what would be in store for me over the next couple of days so I was happy for all the good luck I could get.  Finally, before the turnoff for the put-in there is an overlook where you can see two of some of the bigger Class IV+ rapids from above the river – WAY above the river.  The river looked beautiful and inviting and my thoughts were turning to the ever looming undesirable task in front of me – hiking over 220lbs of my cat and all of my gear for over 2 miles down what I was told would be a very narrow trail using a small cart originally intended for sea kayaks.  Most people who run the Forks hire burros to help get their boats and gear to the river.  Since we were at the time planning to run the Kings (which also has about a 2 mile hike in) we wanted to do a shakedown hike at the Kern to see how it went.

We arrived at the put-in and began the process of loading our boats and gear on the wheeled carts/carriers that we had each brought.  This was not my first time hiking with my boat. Two years ago I hiked the 2 mile trail into Giant Gap using a single wheel that mounts to the frame. Tubes and gear are loaded inside the frame and the oars become the handles of a “wheelbarrow” of sorts.  My load hiking into Giant Gap was significantly lighter as we were only doing a day trip, still it was a fairly epic and horrible experience as my load outweighed me by more than 50lbs and I would take about 5 steps and it would tip over.  With supreme effort, I could right it again only to have it tip after about 5 more steps.  My hands were way too small to use the brake and there was a point where I seriously wondered how I was going to hike over 2 miles in that manner.  Luckily, I figured out that if I just grabbed the frame (not the oars) I could keep the weight closer to me and more centered so it didn’t tip over as easy.  Using that method, I had to walk down the trail backwards while digging the corner of the frame into the side of the hill as a brake.  When that didn’t work, I found that the boat running over my body also worked as a brake.  Although it was far from ideal, I was able to make reasonable progress and get my boat to the river.  Knowing that this trip would involve hiking in to 2 different rivers, we had to find a better way for me to hike with my boat.  Over the Winter, Dave made a custom bracket for an NRS C-Tug (cart with two wheels) so I could strap my frame to it.  Initial testing on the steep hill in our backyard was promising – it was so much easier to hike with the boat than using a single wheel.  I also figured out that I could wear my rescue pfd and clip the waist harness to a strap on the frame so I could use more of my body to hold back the load on a hill.  If I needed to cut away, I just simply pulled the release on the rescue vest.  I tested everything several times with a lot of weight and it worked great!  We named the device the “Cat Carrier” and I looked forward to trying it out in the wild.

Our loads, ready for the trail

Just after 1:00pm we were loaded and ready to start hiking down to the river.  We thanked Paul, said goodbye and he drove off in our truck and we started wheeling boats down the trail.  Dave and Eric were each using a single wheel like I used on Giant Gap.  Eric’s frame and load was very narrow because he was using a separate cargo module/back end while my frame and Dave’s frame were all one piece and fairly wide.  This would prove to be a huge factor when hiking down this narrow trail. Another thing that would prove to be a huge factor is the single wheel has a full sized bicycle tire while the Cat Carrier’s wheels are small.  The single wheel has a LOT more clearance than the Cat Carrier which is crucial on a trail that is full of rocks and roots.

Me and my Cat Carrier

Not more than 5 minutes down the trail, I encountered my first “obstacle” – some rocks that were too big to wheel over and Dave and I needed to double team. Next, the trail got very narrow for a section and Dave and I had to double team both rigs through there.  We were hoping to make it down to the river by late afternoon. If there was enough daylight we would launch and camp a couple miles downstream, otherwise we would launch in the morning.  Progress was much slower than originally anticipated, already, the Giant Gap trail seemed like a paved highway compared to what we were hiking on now.  Also, I was beginning to slowly, realize that no matter how good of a system you have if you are trying to hike downhill with lots of obstacles with a load that outweighs you by more than twice, gravity is NOT your friend.  Not only was the trail narrow, it was evilly sloped in the wrong direction and very dicey in places to keep the boat from going over the edge of the cliff.  I had already needed to cut away several times in places that were just plain scary.  Many times, I would inch the boat down little by little so as not to lose control.  Eventually, I came to a particularly bad place and gravity won.  The boat veered sharply toward the edge taking me with it.  I was able to cut away just in time sliding on my knees under the frame.  The boat came to a stop precariously balanced just at the edge and I was still hanging on to the frame.  Eric was a good ways in front of me and Dave was a good ways back, I could either sit and wait for help or try to pull the boat back onto the trail by myself.  I decided to try but as soon as I changed position, the boat front flipped over the edge and landed in some bushes.  Well, now there was NO WAY I was going to get it back without help so I walked back up the trail and told Dave I needed some help.  Eric had also heard the crash and hiked back up hoping that I hadn’t gone over the edge.  With the three of us and a rope, we hauled the boat back to the trail, none the worse for wear and continued on .  Trail conditions became worse and we all had to double team boats for a while.  It was slow, hot and exhausting work, we could neither hear nor see the river yet and the afternoon was getting on.

At one point, we encountered a pack train coming up the trail.  This could have been disastrous as there are long stretches of trail with no place to pass.  LUCKILY, we were close to one of the very few true switchbacks and could get off the trail enough so the mules could get by.  The mule packer seemed  less than pleased that we were on the trail. We learned we were maybe a quarter of the way down which was not encouraging, hopefully the trail would get better (it didn’t).  About 10 minutes later, Dave and I were double teaming my load over a rock when it happened.  A sickening CRACK.  The axle to my Cat Carrier had snapped in half with no way to repair it.  I slowly assessed my situation in disbelief – I was only about a quarter of the way to the river, the truck was no longer at the put-in, and I now was left with two arms and two legs to get 220lbs of gear THREE times further than we had already gone.

My broken axle trying to still function as a single wheel (not so much)

Dave and I unloaded everything except for the oars and we moved the wheel to the center in the hopes that it may still be somewhat useful (it wasn’t).  There was no way I would now be able to haul everything at one time and needed to ferry loads.  The wheel and remaining piece of axle in the center of the frame functioned more like a skid plate than a wheel.  My frame, oars, and couple of smaller bags probably weighed about 80lbs and I drug it down the trail as best I could.  Since the wheel was very small, I got hung up on something about every 10 feet and had to wrestle with the frame to free it from the obstacle du jour.  When I tired of dealing with the frame I went back for a tube, then I went back for the other tube, then I went back for the rest of my stuff.  Repeat until dark.

After my axle broke, Dave also unloaded his tubes from his cart because it was just too wide and unwieldy for one person on that trail.  It also had gone off the trail more than once and ferrying more manageable loads made more sense now for him considering our new circumstances.  I told Eric, who was having a somewhat easier time with his lighter load and narrower frame to go on ahead and start rigging his boat so we all wouldn’t be waiting for the pump once we got down there.  By this time, I could now see the river but it was still very far away.  For several more long hours I half carried, half dragged my extremely awkward load of frame, oars and bags that was now way too close to the ground. Every few feet was a new “problem” of some kind that would consume most of my energy lifting and wrestling and inching first one side and then the other.  Carrying the tubes and other gear was my “break” from carrying the frame.  I started looking forward to dropping the frame and getting the tubes. All too soon, my “break” would be over and I returned to the loathsome task of hiking with the frame.

Digging out headlamp seems like a good plan at the time

Hours turned into twilight, twilight turned into darkness — at least now it wasn’t so painfully obvious that I wasn’t getting much closer to the river very quickly.  During one of my trips between carrying frame and tubes, I had deemed it fortuitous to dig out my headlamp and put it in my pocket.  Dave and I ferried loads into the night exhausted, dehydrated, starving and being eaten alive by thousands of mosquitoes.  About 10:00 Dave called it quits and said we had to find a good place to leave our stuff, hike down to the river, get water and set up camp. Reluctantly I agreed and we carried what we could all the way down.  We each drank about a gallon of water – I was too tired to be hungry anymore and just went to bed.  Morning would come much too soon but we now knew exactly how much further we had to go.  Mercifully, the closer you get to the bottom, the better the trail conditions became.  We had one more horrendous rock jumble and then there were some long wide sections, however, even stumbling in the dark on our way down to the river I distinctly remembered a good section of trail that was UPHILL.

Easy hiking with a single tube

DAY 2
It’s 6:00am – do you know where your boat is?  Unfortunately, we knew that ours were quite a distance back up the trail. By 6:30, Dave and I had set out on a mission to get the boats and remaining gear down to the river as quickly as possible so we could rig and launch optimistically by noon.    We found Eric before we left and he told us he had not had a particularly easy time either with the hike in and didn’t get to the river until at least 7:30pm.  I told him to just hang out for a while and hopefully it wouldn’t take us too long to get our stuff.  By 7:00am it was already getting hot and Dave and I were working hard but making good progress.  By 10:00am everything was finally down and we could start inflating and rigging our boats.  Against many odds, we made our goal of launching by noon.

Me in need of a bath after lots of hiking

The Forks of the Kern is a 17 mile Class IV-V run.  I had planned to allow at least 2 full days so we could have time to explore some of the beautiful side hikes in the canyon.  When we finally did launch, I could honestly say I wasn’t feeling the need to do any more hiking.  Our plan was to go about 7-10 miles downstream to the “camping district” by Poker Flats.  That would give us all day Saturday to run the meat of the river with a nice warm up section.

Floating down the river ON my boat proved to be highly preferable to dragging and carrying it.  The heat and dust of the trail was replaced by crystal clear cool water, beautiful canyon walls, spectacular vistas and a few playful riffles as the Kern made its way slowly yet purposefully downstream to harder rapids.  Dave, who felt bad about the Cat Carrier breaking, asked me if I wanted to be the probe.  That sounded excellent to me and life was good as I took the lead and focused on an upcoming horizon line downstream.

We were expecting a bunch of Class IV, IV+ and one Class V (Lower Freeman Falls) that day.  The gradient picked up and numerous large obstructions now appeared more frequently.  The Class IV turned out to be a whitewater wonderland of super fun read and run.  I was up front having a great time – we knew we should be getting close to Lower Freeman and kept looking for the creek coming in but didn’t see it yet.  The next rapid was a degree trickier than everything else so far, it was still read and run but a solid IV+ (at least the way I ran it).  I figured that had to have been Upper Freeman but we still didn’t see the creek.  Downstream was a completely blind boulder choked horizon line .  I didn’t know if it was Lower Freeman or not but I did know it was time to get out and scout.  We scrambled downstream over the boulders on river right and found ourselves looking at what was clearly a Class V rapid.  The best route looked to be entering center amidst some very large boulders, work right, work further right to avoid a large pourover ledge just eating enough of it to use the backwash to help slow down to surf off the big hump of the shoulder of a huge hole that was backed up by the right side cliff.  All in all it looked pretty straightforward and very doable.  The plan was for me to go first, followed closely by Dave while Eric watched our runs from the scout point to make sure things went as planned and then he would go last.  It turned out to be a fun rapid, the pourover was bigger than it looked and you really didn’t want to be in the hole — I had to give a good pull to surf and stay out of it.  Everyone did fine and we figured if that wasn’t Lower Freeman it missed a good chance.

Looking upstream at Needlerock Falls

More fun read and run Class IV+ rapids followed in quick succession that eventually gave way to Class III and mellowed out further from there.  I suspected we were at the beginning of the 2 mile quiet stretch and we started looking for a place to camp.  Shortly afterward, a huge flat bar appeared on river left.  Wondering if this was Poker Flats we pulled over to investigate and as soon as I looked upstream, I was awestruck by a stunning view of the Needles.  That decided it, this was home for the night and the view was incredible!

Awesome view of The Needles from camp

We quickly set up camp and as I was walking over to the “kitchen” area something shiny on the ground caught my eye.  Further investigation revealed that it was a beer can that had been torn apart.  A few feet away lay another can and just beyond that, another.  I went about gathering up all the cans I could find so I could carry them out on my boat and realized that none of these cans had been opened in the normal way and all were completely shredded.  Since we already had camp set up we resigned ourselves to being on the lookout for a potentially very drunk bear who prefers Heineken.  After a dinner of mac and cheese, we strung a line, hung the food and hit the sack.

DAY 3
Day 3 dawned bright and sunny, we ate a quick breakfast, packed up and got an early start as we were expecting a full day of boating, scouting and shooting video.  Floating on the gentle current past Durrwood Lodge I basked in the morning sun soaking in the idyllic setting of babbling water, beautiful granite and blue sky.  Such a sharp contrast to the 6:30am death march I woke up to the day before. It wasn’t long until we came to Little Bean which signals that Big Bean is coming up next.  I was still on probe duty but Dave and I were planning to trade off on the four Class V’s.  We pulled out to scout Big Bean which looked pretty straightforward for the part we could see.  The  large “bean” rock at the bottom divided the river into two options.  The left looked like a beefy ledge while the right looked like something we weren’t sure if it was big enough to get through.   Dave and I decided to scramble down to the bottom to get a better look while Eric waited up top.

Dave probes Big Bean

When we got to the bottom it became clear that the catboat route was on the left as the right side would almost certainly result in a pin and rock flip in the too narrow slot.  The ledge on the left was big but flushing.  Sometimes it’s hard for me to tell if “flushing” means a right side up or upside down exit.  “You can have this one” I said to Dave.  Dave hiked back to his boat and I set up with the camera.  I took video as Dave ran the long lead-in, set up for the bottom ledge and popped right through.  Eric who was just behind did pretty much the same thing.  Dave hiked up for the camera and I hiked up to where I had parked Catalina. My run through Big Bean was the same as Dave’s and Eric’s – there was a good jet of water flushing you through the bottom ledge.

Eric in Big Bean

Shortly after Big Bean is The Vortex.  This rapid is rated as Class V-VI and is commonly portaged at the flow we had.  I had read that this year it had changed for the worse, making it even harder to run the right side at lower levels.  We quickly came to a large horizon line and huge boulders and eddied out in the scout eddy on river right. What we saw looked fairly bad but not entirely terrible.  Just below the Vortex is a long Class V section called The Gauntlet.  A bad day in Vortex will quickly lead to a worse day in The Gauntlet.  The Vortex hole at the top looked bad and there was another large hole just downstream that also looked bad mostly because it had a tree in it.  There was a sketchy mank-fest route where you could straddle and weave your way down the right avoiding both holes if you purposefully beached yourself on a flat rock between the two ledges enabling you to rotate and lowside your boat through a small slot.  The right edge of the bottom hole looked runnable but there was the issue of the tree.   It was my turn to probe so I quickly volunteered.

Me just after lowsiding through the very small slot after the flat rock

Dave and I were working out a system where he would probe the Class V’s that contained large holes or ledges that were “flushing” and I would probe the Class V’s that contained highly questionable rock sieves and other sketchy places of a technical nature.  I entered the rapid, looked at the current and calculated the precise amount of left angle I needed to drive past the first big boulder and then immediately put on the brakes.  That part went well as I approached the flat rock I needed to get “stuck” on.  The next part went just fine also – I was able to put on the brakes and get “stuck” on the rock — VERY stuck on the rock but with a bit of effort got rotated and through the slot successfully avoiding the bottom hole (although seriously, it really did not look that bad and there was room to avoid the tree).  Eric went next, shooting past the flat rock and biting off a chunk of the right side of the hole.  He went right through without being sucked dangerously close to the tree.  Dave, who watched both our lines decided Eric’s line looked like much less work so he went that way and also came through fine.  Looking back, had I been the 3’rd boat instead of the1’st boat I would have done the same thing.  We headed off into The Gauntlet which was steep and technical.  We had only scouted the entrance and read and ran the second half.

Dave in Vortex just after the entry

About three miles of read and run class IV followed Gauntlet and then we eddied out to scout Westwall.  Westwall is a long, technical Class V rapid with a tricky lead-in that eventually culminates in a dangerous undercut rock called “Whale’s Tail” which needs to be avoided either right or left via running a sizable ledge. Since this was a long complicated technical rapid it was decided that I would be the probe on this one.  There is more than one possible route in Westwall, I selected a line that started left and worked right.  I would run the 2 middle ledges on the right and then stay right and run the bottom ledge staying right of Whale’s Tail.  The ledge to the right of Whale’s Tail was taller than the left and also, the exit current was feeding into a house sized boulder.  Still, it looked easier than ferrying above Whale’s Tail at the flow that we had. If you were on the oars and in control at the bottom of the ledge, the rock wouldn’t be an issue. Dave stayed behind with the camera and I hiked back to the top where Eric was waiting.

Me probing Westwall

The scout at Westwall was quite long and the sun was blistering hot – Eric elected to stay behind and follow one of us.  I explained the general layout of the rapid and where I planned to go, hopped on my boat and headed downstream.  Westwall was a fun rapid with lots of fun technical moves among the boulders and ledges.  Eric and I eddied out at the bottom and I hiked back up to where Dave was with the camera and Dave hiked back to his boat to make his run.  I sat there with the camera and waited, and waited, and waited and wondered what could possibly be taking so long.  I waited some more and started to get concerned.  Just as I was about ready to hike upstream and go looking for Dave I saw a flash of blue boat and quickly scrambled back to my video post.  Dave also had a nice run in Westwall.

Dave in Westwall

A little over a mile downstream is Carson Falls, the last big Class V rapid. We were told to expect about a 12’ drop at the flow we had. We were told to expect it to look big. There was no mistaking the very large horizon line and we eddied out to scout.  Traditionally, many photos at Carson are taken from river right but we chose to scout and film from river left and that worked fine too.  Possibly the scout on the left even afforded a better river level downstream view of a large boulder that we used as a marker rock. At any rate Carson looked burly.  There was a 10’- 12’ drop into beefy main hole followed closely by a second hole that also looked pretty stout.  The holes were flushing but still plenty big enough to flip you in the process.  This one was looking like a “Dave” probe.  I set up with the camera and Eric set safety while Dave hiked back to his boat.  While waiting for Dave, it was hard not to focus on the power of the river as it thundered over the falls and churned back on itself in the powerful hydraulic at its base. “Definitely big enough to flip a boat” I thought to myself.  “I really hope Dave doesn’t flip”.   Soon after, I was filming Dave as he made his way down the lead-in waves and from behind the camera I saw him nail the entrance perfectly.  There was a green jet of water just off the right side of the large boulder that marks the left boundary of the main chute.  Dave shot right the hole and then through the second hole sans oars and quickly grabbed his right oar to steer past the large boulder at the bottom.  Nice Job!

Dave probes Carson Falls

Now, it was my turn.  I handed the camera to Eric, he would film my run while Dave stayed in his boat for safety.   I slowly hiked up to my boat, stopping once again to look at the downstream view of the marker rock.  The water was surging over the marker rock – I wanted to put my left tube just to the right of that rock with lots of downstream momentum.  I did not want to lose the marker rock and kept turning around to see it from lots of different angles as I hiked upstream.  Once in my boat, I was easily able to negotiate the entry waves and spot the marker rock.  I drove hard for it aiming to slide my left tube just to the right side.  In the next instant I was on the big green tongue with the gaping maw at the bottom coming at me very fast.  Just like Dave, I popped through the bottom hole and then the second one sans oars and quickly grabbed my right oar to steer around the rock at the bottom.  Dave was hooting and hollering and I eddied out — a happy camper.

Me in Carson

Dave then climbed out of his boat and hiked up to Eric to film his run while I stayed in my boat for safety. I watched Eric as he set up above the marker rock.  He entered the drop about two feet further right than Dave and I and got a monster tailstand exiting the bottom hole.  To me, it looked as if he completely sailed over the second hole before his boat landed in the water pillowing off the large boulder at the bottom.  The right oar had popped out of the oarlock but he was able to use the left one to surf the pillow around the boulder.

Eric mid-tailstand in Carson

About a half mile later, Johnsondale Bridge came into view which would probably be our takeout unless there was an available space in the very limited parking at Fairview Dam three miles downstream yet a MUCH easier takeout.  We eddied out at Johnsondale and found our truck parked there in a primo spot, right next to the ramp.  The Johnsondale takeout is a long arduous carry up a very long steep concrete ramp.  We took everything off the boats including the oars to make them as light as possible.  The work of carrying loads up the ramp was made somewhat easier by virtue of cold beverages in the cooler!  Eventually, the truck was packed, the boats were loaded and we headed off toward Kernville in search of beer and pizza.  On the drive back along the Upper Kern, we noticed there was much more water than there was a couple days ago.  Over the past three days as the mercury rose, the last stubborn pockets of snow had succumbed to the forces of heat and gravity and were now racing down the Upper Kern toward the more peaceful waters of Lake Isabella.  Tomorrow was my birthday and I was going to get to spend it on a super fun roadside Class IV-V run – life was good.

May 9, 2009

Boaters:
Fish and Hans (R2)
JP, Ben, Ian (Kayak)
Dave and Shelly Becker (Cataraft)

Friday afternoon as I was leaving the takeout of the Green river I got a call from Fish.  “Icicle Creek tomorrow – the level will be PERFECT!”.

Dave and I had run Icicle Creek 2 years ago at very very low water – most would consider it an ELF flow – the Wenatchee at Peshastin was almost 800 cfs higher this time and I knew that this time would be a little different.  The last time we ran, it was a second Cat descent.  To our knowledge, it hasn’t been run since in a cat so this may have been the third Cat descent.

JP and Ian on Limbo

Normally, I eagerly look forward to “Cat Missions” but I had been sick all week with the flu (literally ALL week –  and I never get sick) Dave had it the week before and I was feeling about 75% at best. I knew that Icicle was one of the hardest most technical runs I have ever done — still — Dave and I have been wanting to go back for a long time so I figured I would just have to cowboy up and boat smart.

Ricochet Rapid looked scary and terrible when we scouted it that morning – full on solid Class V+ for over a quarter mile – there were about 5-7 absolute must make moves and 9 or 10 highly recommended ones.  With the extra water it looked to have the push of the North Fork Payette – at the time I really really wasn’t feeling it because I was still kind of sick.  I figured we would go up top and run down to the portage at Bridge Creek and see how we felt.  On the way up we scouted Limbo Log (another big Class V) and Roadside Attraction.  The entry ledge to Limbo Log (with water in it) actually looked better than the time before and Roadside Attraction looked fun.  We launched a little bit above “Roadside” and right away I knew I didn’t have my “A” game, I dealt with it and was able to make all the moves I needed to but I definitely would have preferred my timing to be what it normally is.

Fish and Hans Looking Good in Ricochet

When we got to Limbo Log, Dave ran first over the big entrance ledge.  The previous time I ran this ledge, there was very little water and I got stuck and had to crawl out to the end of my tubes (over a 7′-8′ drop) and bounce until the boat came through which was a bit scary considering the good piece of Class V water directly below.  I watched Dave run the ledge and the next thing I saw was his cat go sideways and then I saw his entire right tube as his boat was almost sideways vertical.  Hanging on to a boat in that position is extremely difficult, let alone highsiding to prevent a flip – yet somehow, Dave probably made the highside move of his life and stayed on the boat and brought it down.  I ran the ledge next and was a bit further left which enabled me to stay much straighter – still my cat popped up pretty hard on the landing.  Both of us successfully negotiated the Class V below and eddied out to set safey and film JP and Ian.

Fish and Hans Setting up for the Move at Ricochet Rock

The next big thing is the portage at Bridge Creek. Dave and I ended up taking out at Bridge Creek and loading the boats. Fish was the only one truly fired up about running Ricochet, Ian was taking out there which would leave JP as the solo kayak if he ran. Secretly, I really wanted to look at it just one more time hoping it wouldn’t look as bad as it did in the morning – it wasn’t very far downstream – we could always drive back up and put on if we really wanted to. Fish and Hans decided they were going so Dave and I helped them carry the raft down the very long portage at Bridge Creek – we had 2 cameras and 4 throwbags and went to set safety as best we could. About this time, JP hooked up with another kayaker, Ben, who had carried up for another “lap”.

JP in Ricochet

Dave and I hiked down and set up on two different rocks for Fish and Hans and JP and Ben. Ricochet is one of the most unforgiving pieces of whitewater I have ever seen.  You can set minimal safety but you are really really on your own for much of it.  I knew that at any time I might need to quickly trade the camera for a throwbag.  Fish and Hans came down first and literally styled it – they nailed the move at Ricochet rock and had a great run.  JP and Ben came down next and both had successful runs.

Ben in Ricochet

Everyone hiked back up from the eddy downstream of the long Class IV+ runout hooting and hollering and rightfully so. Dave and I were very happy that everyone had done well (there really is no other choice here).  The little voice in the back of my head had been talking to me “you can do this — you did it once before”.

Dave and I in the Upper section of Ricochet

Dave Runs the Entrance Ledge in Ricochet

I knew Dave wanted to run — I figured we could maybe launch just upstream at Eight Mile Campground instead of dealing with the long portage at Bridge Creek. There is 1-2 miles of busy water (Class II-III) between Bridge Creek and Eight Mile but no big drops. Fish and Hans said the entry had gone really smooth for them and not to worry about the towering breaking wave because it was soft……. (we still needed to scout the entrance on the way down from river right).  Dave and I handed over the cameras and quickly drove up to the super easy put-in at Eight Mile.  I was about as scared as I’ve been in a long time, I knew I could do this, I knew I should probably do this — I just wasn’t sure if I should do this NOW.  We put our cats in the water and I said “Please God, let both of us have our A game for the next two minutes”.

Me in the Upper Section of Ricochet

We very quickly got down to the entrance and pulled out on river right to scout from the normal place.  We saw the monster breaking wave that Fish and Hans told us about. We also were very grateful to see…. Ben!!  on a rock for safety.  Ben had hiked up again and this was his 3′rd run of Ricochet that day.  Dave wanted to run first and I was more than happy for that on this day – I watched him disappear over the large entry ledge and then started rowing downstream with a crystal clear picture of the sequence of the next 7 moves.  The entry ledge was big, the breaking wave in the next drop was big but it was all good to go and for the first time all day I felt good in my boat and fired up to be right there right then.  I could see Dave was totally in control through the next section and I followed suit.

Dave and I Heading Down Ricochet

The move at the Ricochet Rock was enormous but if you are in control and driving hard forward, the water will take you where you need to be next.  We both did well here, the water was incredibly powerful but incredibly smooth – I felt like my boat was softly deposited at the entry to the next move.  It was still Class V and technical here – there was still quite a bit more to go.  Eventually it eases to  Class IV+ and you can see the bottom eddy which we were both happy to see and happy we made the decision to run.

Dave in Ricochet

Me in Ricochet

Dave just after the Move at Ricochet Rock

Me in Ricochet near the Move at Ricochet Rock

Instead of taking out at the footbridge (like every other cat run in the past) Fish thought there may be a better eddy a little further downstream.  If you go too much further downstream you will encounter Class V+ rapids that are NOT runnable in cats and rafts for various reasons.  After that, you are into the Class VI / Unrunnable section at the Fish Hatchery (and it is very continuous).  We continued downstream reading and running some very stout rapids (Class V moves in places), the road was getting further away from the river and I was absolutely positive there was not going to be any kind of takeout.

Dave in Ricochet

Me in Ricochet

We came to a huge horizon line with something that looked very bad below.  This was the first big one, called The Sieve (seemed appropriately named).  Downstream was zero recovery and disappearing huge horizon lines as far as you could see.  Dave and I unanimously decided that this was our takeout and the road was about 40 vertical, boulder strewn feet above us.  We may or may not have been able to get our cats through that rapid, if there was a huge green pool at the bottom, I may have tried but there wasn’t AND the takeout options were worse.  Fish and Hans did make it with their 13′ raft but had boat width issues and had to do some very creative highside/lowside work to get through the narrowest place. They took out immediately downstream from that and had a harder carry out than what we were looking at.

Toward the Bottom of Ricochet

A rapid on the section below the takeout bridge

Dave took his oars off and the two of us were slowly making progress getting his boat up — we were looking at a lot of work between the two of us.  THANKFULLY, Fish, Hans and the others had hiked back up and helped haul the cats out so it ended up not being all that bad.  We are not completely sure but we think that Dave and I may have the first Cat descent of that last mile and so it was totally worth the effort of dealing with the gnarly takeout (especially after lots of people showed up to help).

Next time, we take out at the bridge.

Another rapid on the section below the bridge

Boaters: Dave and Shelly Becker
Video and Support: David Chatham, Don, Jerry and Capt Ron – THANK YOU!
Date and Time: Sunday, 4/26/09 Approx 3:30 pm
Flow: 3750cfs at Goldbar

Lowering the boats

After two years of scouting Eagle Falls numerous times at various levels Dave and I decided that this weekend we would attempt it.  We drove up and looked at it on Saturday at a flow of about 4200cfs at Goldbar and thought  the  bottom hole looked a little too big but by Sunday it would probably be about perfect.  We made plans to go back Sunday morning and run the Main Sky to warm up and then attempt Eagle.  Eagle Falls is a huge Class V/V+ drop that can be seen from Hwy 2 just outside of the town of Skykomish  and is very rarely run.

Getting Ready

After scouting on Sat. I had decided that I wanted to take my big boat ‘Feliner’ (a 15′ Wave Destroyer). Dave at the time also said he wanted to take his big boat (15’ Wave Destroyer) as well.  Later when we got home he second guessed that decision and said he would rather take his regular everyday boat because he is much more used to it than a 15′ boat.  I played out the run several times in my head in both Catalina (my 12.6’ everyday boat) and my big boat.  I had a good idea how each boat would deal with the entry move. My decision to take my big boat was primarily based on being able to run the entrance move (a large rooster tail) as smoothly as possible as it was absolutely critical to be in control to miss the boat flipping rock on the right.

Dave in the entrance rooster tail

The entrance as it looks to Dave

My second reason for taking the big boat was the enormous hole at the bottom, chances of being on line and straight were not all that good.  I have had both boats in very large holes and even though my 12.6’ cat can do a lot, at the end of the day, size matters.  Dave put as much thought into taking his small boat as I did into taking my big boat and he had good reasons for making the choice that he did.  He jokingly told me that we would know at the end of the day on Sun which decision was the better one.

Me in the entrance rooster tail

I had called Dave Chatham that night and he immediately volunteered to go with us to offer his services as camera operator, safety person and observer of potential carnage.  Sunday morning we met and ran the Main Sky with a rather large crew of boaters.  At a flow of just under 3800cfs, Feliner felt more like the Queen Mary out there but I was happy to get a chance to get my big boat timing down.  After taking out on the Main, Dave and I and Dave, Don, Jerry and Capt Ron all went up to look at Eagle one last quick time and make a go / no go decision.

The Support Crew

When we got there, the bottom hole did look better than the day before but still big and ugly – the entrance was a bit steeper and more defined and the right side rock was in play.  We had a great support crew, a perfect level and the sun was starting to come out – still it was hard not to feel really nervous and wonder whether or not this was going to be a good decision. Eagle Falls would be the biggest drop either of us have run and it is not to be considered lightly.   Dave and I made the decision to go and got the cats ready to be quickly hucked over the guardrail above the Falls.  We zipped up drysuits and pfd’s, put on helmets, checked camera equipment, did the “throw and go” with help from our friends, and lowered our boats down to the water.  Dave really wanted to go first on this one and since I had probed the last several large drops it was agreed that it was his turn.  We knew that running completely separate would be better for video but running closer would be safer and we chose safety.  Jerry was in the water at the bottom of the drop in an IK as a rescue boat, Ron was positioned on the rocks on the right with a throwbag and Dave and Don had throwbags and video cameras.  Dave did a final check to make sure that everyone downstream was in position and pushed out into the current.  We wished each other luck and said we would run close enough to help the other person if it was needed.

Dave dealing with the right side rock

I waited for Dave to get most of the way down the lead-in to the rooster tail entry move before slipping out of the eddy and pointing my boat toward the huge horizon line and mists coming up from way below.  I stood on my scout bars and saw that Dave was right side up and in decent position below the entry – the next thing I saw  was him getting pasted onto the rock and quickly scrambling to the high side.  He washed around the rock backwards and in the blink of an eye I watched as his cat rocketed out of the water (way out of the water) in a spectacular flip.

Dave flipping in the bottom hole

That was all I saw and the last thing etched in my mind as I looked at the huge rooster tail that was now in front of me.  I straddled it exactly like we had planned and slid smoothly down to the bottom.  Feliner handled the drop perfectly but I was still getting pushed very quickly toward the rock.  I didn’t get pushed quite as far as Dave but still had to deal with the rock.  I did not have to deal with as much of the rock as Dave did and did not get turned backwards but was still sideways heading into the absolute meat of the gaping maw at the bottom.

Me pulling away from the rock (too sideways)

In my mind, flashes of Dave’s cat (blue and yellow and yellow and blue higher and higher)….. I grabbed the left front of my frame with a death grip, weight forward, waiting for the inevitable – but then, something completely different happened, something I would have never expected.  I was surrounded by a wall of water but Feliner and I were still going forward, it was soft and aerated and I did not take the huge hit I was expecting.  Still moving forward and downstream, we popped out the other side – I was missing my right oar but could not BELIEVE what had just happened.

15' Wave Destroyer completey disappears in the bottom hole

I emerge right side up (somehow) from the bottom hole

I went fishing for my oar and my boat immediately washed onto the rock downstream and started climbing.  I abandoned my oar retrieval effort and started climbing also. Eventually, I was able to get my oar back in and was re-united with Dave and the bottom.  Dave had stayed with his cat and had quickly self rescued.  Jerry’s services in the IK were not needed but we both were sure glad that he was there.  It made a big difference psychologically.

Afterwards, Life is Good!

We pulled our boats out and everyone helped us get them up the hill and back to the trailer (grunt).  We in turn, supplied carnage and cold beverages for the safety and camera crew.  Dave said that in retrospect running the big boat was a good idea and that next time he would definitely take his big boat as well. Having a smaller more maneuverable boat does not help with avoiding the rock – you are simply going too fast and there is simply no time at this level. A better plan is to bite off more of the left of the entrance move.  The best way I can describe the bottom hole (the place where I went through) was like perfectly hitting the “V” wave on the right side of Lava Falls.  Towering walls of water yet buttery soft in the weak spot where all of the current is flushing through.

Afterwards

April 4, 2009

Me on Sunset

The EF Lewis has 2 large waterfalls, 18′ Sunset Falls and 22′ Horseshoe Falls and a beautiful Class IV mini-gorge section with easier mellow stretches in between.

The fist big falls is Sunset, we scouted on the way to the put-in, it’s 18′ and completely vertical except for the right which had a log in it at the time. The preferred line at this (somewhat healthy) flow is the center line and that is where the kayaks went.

The center line in Sunset

The center line had a very tricky entrance and high probability of cats being sideways so it was decided the left would be better for cats. The entrance is still tricky, there are lots of rocks to mess you up, including a very large boulder to your immediate right (which means your right oar will be shipped from that point forward) and a really beefy hole at the bottom. We were told that occupants of most boats that flip at the bottom on the left either end up behind the falls or in the cave on the left (large cave, not a death trap). I honestly had more reservations about running Sunset than I did about running BZ Falls, I knew it was too vertical and I knew I would get hammered at the bottom. Getting violently separated from Catalina was a very real and very scary possibility. However, Sunset Falls is still considered a generally safe waterfall and our kayaking friends said they would go first and paddle into the cave and set safety. The R3 team went first and all three paddlers got as far to the back of the boat as possible – to no avail. They had very little speed and the boat nose dived hard, disappeared entirely and ejected all occupants. Boat stayed right side up and occupants quickly returned to boat. Any reservations I had about running Sunset quickly multiplied after seeing that. Still, I told Dave I wanted to go next. Plan A was “stay with my boat”. Plan B was “stay with my boat”. I negotiated the tricky and technical entry and dropped over the edge fairly straight (actually) but kept rotating more and more to the right and landed sideways at the bottom with all of the water falling on my right tube the boat very quickly and violently flipped sideways upstream into the maw of the hole.

Me, unsuccessful at the bottom of Sunset

I got violently ripped off the seat and was quickly being sucked to the bottom but luckily, Plan A was working. I still had one hand in a death grip on my frame, my body was vertical and the river was pulling me hard down and away from Catalina but I (somehow) was able to hold on with one hand – maybe at last all those pull-ups have paid off. Anyways, after what felt like forever, I floated away from hydraulic still holding my frame and was able to climb back up and self rescue. I very much hoped that Dave would not have to go through that.

Dave on Sunset

I looked upstream at Dave and briefly, he looked like he was in a great position but something happenend and his boat spun 90 degrees to the right just after going over the edge. It looked horrible but Dave told me later that the landing was actually quite soft and instead of getting beatdown in the falls, he got shot into the cave on the left to a quiet eddy and quickly self rescued there.

Dave, not quite the right line in Sunset

The mini-canyon section was beautiful and user (aka “cat” friendly) Class IV, the only regret is that it was too short. Sky Pilot was one of the neatest drops I’ve ever run.

Ryan on Screaming Left

Zach on Dragon's Back

Before long we were at 22′ Horseshoe Falls. Dave and I pulled our boats up on the rocks in the center of the river at the lip of the falls (because that is where the preferred line is).

Ian on Horseshoe

Horseshoe is 22′ feet but if you run the center line, the fist half is a glassy slide (albeit very shallow) into about a 10′ vertical falls. Kayaks can thread through a narrow slot at the top but rafts and cats need to pull up and over the rocks and launch from the eddy behind them.

Me at the top of Horseshoe Falls

Dave and I and the R3 team were ‘beached’ on the rocks. The drop looked totally clean and good to go. It looked fun! – not scary like Sunset. The R3 team went first while I held them in the eddy with a line until they were situated. They slid down the auto-boof launching pad and landed cleanly 22′ below. Dave said I should go next and he would hold my tag lines while I got into position. “That’s great” I said, “Who’s going to help you?”. Dave said he didn’t need any help but I really wasn’t OK with that. Regardless, SOMEBODY had to go next and my boat was in front of his. Dave held my rear tag lines while I climbed in – after I told him I was good, he let go and I rowed over to the little hump that marked the entry I wanted to the launching pad. The best way I can describe Horseshoe is “Super Happy Fun Slide” – yeehaw! I went sailing over the edge at high speed and at perfect angle, dropped ten feet and touched down gently in the river below.

Dave getting ready to run Horseshoe

Afterwards, I quickly pulled my boat up on some rocks, grabbed the camera and scrambled upstream to catch Dave’s run on video. Dave jockeyed his boat perfectly into the eddy and launched over the drop with grace and style and a perfect landing.

Dave styles Horseshoe

What I DIDN’T know and didn’t see (as I was making my way upstream) is that the handle of his cat completely ripped away while he was pulling his boat over the rock causing him to fall backwards into the river on the LEFT SIDE (aka the Suicide Line) and potentially swimming over the falls. Luckily he landed in waist deep water and was able to climb back onto the rock. OK, that was just plain SCARY.

Oregon Rafting Team on Horseshoe

Photos from Zach can be found here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nwrafting/sets/72157616275607019/

March 15, 2009

On Sunday, March 15, 2009 something truly remarkable happened. A large and diverse group of boaters and boats including kayaks, paddle rafts, an oar raft and two catarafts successfully ran the Green Truss section of the White Salmon river. The Green Truss is a steep, tight Class IV-V+ run that was long considered the realm of kayakers due to the vertical walled canyon, extremely tight slots and very large drops including the 28 “Big Brother”.  This day saw three R2 teams and three oarboats attempt the run with a large group of expert kayakers whose support and assistance was a huge contributing factor to the successful day enjoyed by all.

This is a collection of trip reports and thoughts from different members of this group as they lead you down the Truss as it was experienced by them.  None of these stories had any prior collaboration and none of the content has been altered by the editor beyond fixing typographic errors.

>>READ THE TRIP REPORT<<

Video Links

Huckin Huge
Oregon Rafting
YouTube

Sunday November 16′th, 2008

Dave and I got up very early and drove out to the South Fork of the Skokomish. The run is out on the Olympic Peninsula near Shelton and we were looking at a flow of about 850 cfs. We were hooking up with Fish and 2 other kayakers as well as Mike Horner and Aaron Williams in cats. At the time, Fish thought it would be a 1’st cat descent but we found out later that it had been run at least once by a pair of catboaters — anybody we know ??? Another kayaker showed up and asked to join our group so we had 4 kayaks (Fish, JP, James and Ned) and 4 cats (Dave, Mike, Aaron and myself).

I had done my homework and was familiar with the layout of the run and where the FS roads were located in case we needed to hike out. Hiking out was not a realistic option in a lot of places and even if you could climb out of the canyon you were miles and miles from anywhere. There are 2 canyon sections on this run that contain numerous Class IV and V rapids – the second canyon is the more difficult of the two. Dave and I got to the put-in early and waited over an hour and a half for everyone else to show up. We both knew that daylight was going to be an issue, we knew there were at least 5 major scouts and 1 mandatory portage.

We were tested on the very first rapid, a tricky entry to a slot narrower than the boat. You had to finesse/lowside and hang on over about a 6′ ledge into a beefy hole. I probed the catboat line — the catboat line all day long was the same as the kayak line — I was a little too cautious in the entry and got spun around, not happy with myself, I got Catalina straightened out ASAP and had a nice clean line through the chute. Dave and Mike ran without problems but Aaron pinned and flipped in the chute. JP had safety set and got a rope to Aaron. I was able to get out of my boat and climb upstream with a 2′nd rope and we were eventually able to free Aaron’s boat.

Me at the top of the 1'st Drop

We read and ran and followed the kayakers through the first canyon. One of the final drops is a huge steep multi-ledge Class V. The kayakers knew the run and would get ahead to look for wood in blind drops and eddy out and shout directions. Dave and I took turns “probing the catboat lines”. This one was my turn and I could tell it was huge. I got through the entrance ledges, Fish was eddied out yelling to go left “row hard!” he said – and then I dropped off the edge of the World. I could see what was coming in enough time to line up well and push hard but I knew the front of the boat was going to come up fast and instinctively dove to the front of my frame. Catalina skyrocketed out of the hole, probably the biggest ride of my life but I was able to keep the front down. At that point I was the lead boat and there was another blind horizon line directly in front of me, I was very happy to be right side up. I gave Dave the “highside” signal and he did the same move I did but his cat came down for a brutal landing on a flat rock but he stayed on the boat. Mike’s boat subbed out through the hole because of his asymmetrical tubes. Aaron got the biggest air I have ever seen and was ejected from his cat. Luckily, both landed in a good eddy and he was quickly back on his boat.

Next up was an unexpected log portage that took a fair bit of time. By then, you are mostly out of the first canyon but it was already 1:30 and dark comes quickly this time of year in deep canyons.

The only way I can describe the entrance to the 2′nd canyon is ominous. The walls are completely vertical and the entire river is almost completely blocked by 2 huge boulders – portage would be impossible and the runnable slot on the right looked impossibly small. This is the entrance move to a large, blind, complicated, very technical, must-run Class V rapid. The kayakers went first and all we could do is see where they disappeared to and go that way. Dave went before me and when I got past the point where I could see where to go I saw kayakers eddied out, people yelling to go left. I was on the oars and in control and still, getting left looked hopelessly impossible, the alternative looked worse. I made the move — everyone did well there – another huge horizon line was right in front of us and Fish said this rapid was bigger. We did the same thing with the kayakers eddy hopping/scouting in front yelling directions and pointing. There were so many moves where you had to just let go of the oars and lowside / body english the boat to make a move and then get right back on the oars to pull a must- make move.

Aaron in a 2'nd Gorge Drop

We were not yet down to the named (i.e. hard) rapids. I looked up and saw the tall bridge that marks the entry to High Steel Falls. There are some tricky lead-in rapids above the main Class V drop. The kayakers had gone ahead to scout a very narrow slot going over about a 7′ ledge (we couldn’t tell how big the ledge was or what was below it). At some point, Ned’s kayak slid into the river and was carried downstream. James gave chase but Ned was upstream above some really gnarly Class V in a walled-in canyon without a boat. While Ned was contemplating his situation, Aaron asked Dave for a screwdriver so he could move the oar collar from the cataract shaft he had snapped in half in the previous drop to his spare oar which did not have a collar. Fish and Ned were trying to figure out the best way for him to hike out. I looked at Ned’s face and I knew that hiking out wasn’t an option. All he was wearing was his river gear, it was going to be dark in a couple hours and even if he could climb up the mostly vertical walls, we were miles from anywhere. “I can take you” I told him. I knew that the three remaining big named Class V’s were portageable, maybe his boat wasn’t very far downstream. I was running with my flip thwart so there wasn’t a ton of room for a passenger but we made it work. I asked Ned if he knew how to highside and he said yes. I said that was good because I had been doing a lot of it that day. I was also thinking I had no idea how I was going to run that kind of water with a passenger/loaded boat and majorly tail heavy but Catalina and I would find a way. I made the first technical Class IV move and lined up for the hopelessly narrow slot against the right bank into a ledge I did not know how tall it was or what was below. Fish was yelling encouragement from the rock where he was scouting. I knew I was tail heavy – I had a good line and hit the slot perfectly. I could see the bottom (this was good), we took a big hit but stayed right side up. Ned got knocked off the boat but stayed with the frame and was instantly back on. Everyone was hooting and hollering – there was another large ominous horizon line right below us and then we saw — Ned’s boat!!! James had made a heroic effort to chase it down. We were all very happy, especially Ned.

Me in a 2'nd Gorge Drop with Ned as Passenger

The next 2 rapids, High Steel Falls and Bobbing for Butler are the 2 biggest Class V’s on the run. The kayakers scouted for wood and then described the line. We read and ran the next 2 drops based on verbal instructions only. High Steel Falls is a series of stacked up 4-5′ ledges. Aaron fell off his boat halfway down the rapid and did an amazing swim back to the boat and climbed on.

Mike in High Steel Falls

JP in High Steel Falls

Below Bobbing for Butler is the mandatory portage – there is still a lot more river left including Class V Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. We did not have much daylight. The best way to describe the portage was an amazing team effort. James figured out how to portage at river level saving a brutal hike up hill and tons of time. We got the portage done as quickly as humanly possible. There was a burly ledge directly below with a lot of water feeding into rock outcropping. Mike’s tube got shoved under the rock causing him to be pinned for quite some time. There was no way to get a rope to him and no other way to run the ledge. He was eventually able to free his cat. Dave went next and didn’t get stuck. I went 3′rd and immediately figured out what happened to Mike and it looked scary. I stayed far right of the outcropping and banged my way through the slot and around the corner but bent my left oar blade in half. The quickest thing to do was have Dave jump on the blade and try to straigthen it – we got it good enough and boogied down river. Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride was exactly that, it was at least as tall as the Helicopter drop on the MF Feather. Fish said start right and drive left. I found it amazing that it really is actually possible to drive a cat while in the vertical position. You can still use your oars and the pillows on rocks to change your angle enough to keep bad things from happening. Dave and I successfully ran Mr. Toads Wild Ride. Mike came down and his cat went airborne into a spectacular back flip at the bottom of the drop. Mike stayed with the boat and got it re- flipped and Aaron ran the drop without incident.

Mike mid-flip in Mr. Toad's Wild Ride

That is the last difficult drop – the river is Class II for the final 3.5 miles. What is usually a relaxing float out became a full- on race against the clock. It was getting dark fast and we all knew it. We pushed hard the entire way – I don’t think I have rowed that hard for that long, ever. We were losing our battle with daylight, it was now too dark for me to see the boat behind me. My night vision is virtually non-existent and there were lots of shallow places, there was wood, and we had no idea how much further the takeout was or even if we could find it in what was now dark. I was rowing on autopilot, I realized the small half sandwich I ate for breakfast before we launched was long out of my system. We rowed on through the dark – Dave said he could smell cows, that meant we were now in the valley and getting close. Eventually we saw the lights of houses – that meant we had less than a mile. Finally, out of the blackness came hoots and hollers from the kayakers that they were at the takeout. The takeout is mercifully easy – the river is about 10 feet from the road. All that remained was to wait in the dark and the cold for the shuttle (which we estimated would take an hour).

Dave and I went prepared to spend the night out – we had extra food, dry clothes and some emergency gear. Still, it was not a pleasant proposition. We also would not have made as good of time as we did
on the river without kayak support. In the end, we (the catboaters) only scouted 2 rapids. If you go with a group of all cats without someone who knows the river be prepared for a long day. Many of the scouts would be difficult but not impossible to get to in a cat. Be prepared to shore scout most of the first canyon and every drop in the second canyon.

8/24/08 – 750 cfs (2.25′ on the Stick Gauge)

BZ Falls is a 16′ Class V / V+ drop, depending on who you talk to.  On Sunday Aug 24, 2008 a group of three IK’s and two catarafts successfully ran this drop.  The level was about 750 cfs and we estimated the height of the drop to be about 16′.

Dave Chatham on BZ Falls

Paddlers were David Chatham, Steve Munk and Eric Klein in IK’s and Dave and Shelly Becker in catboats.  All three IKers had previous runs on BZ, for Dave and I, it was the biggest vertical drop either of us have ever attempted in a catboat.  We warmed up by running a quick lap on the Lower White Salmon and Husum Falls and then on to BZ.  We figured we had about an equal chance of running it as we did of deciding to ghost boat and portage – that decision would have to be made once we saw the falls.

Eric Klein on BZ Falls

We found BZ Falls to be every bit as big and burly as we were told it would be, I really wanted to run the drop but found myself somewhat on the fence after staring directly into the bottom reversal long enough to wonder exactly how hard I was going to get pummeled if my boat didn’t clear the hole.  Quite a bit of water was flushing out but the prospect of getting violently separated from my cat and chundered at the base of the falls was not a pleasant one.

Me on BZ Falls

David Chatham and Eric Klein volunteered to run first in their IK’s so Dave and I could get a better perspective and see what the currents were doing.  Both of them totally styled the drop. I have been boating more than long enough to realize just because one person makes something look easy doesn’t mean that it is easy, and IK’s and cats are completely different animals but I was able to determine that the hole was probably not going to keep me.

Dave Becker on BZ Falls

That got me off the fence, fired up and ready to go.  Dave and I decided that I would probe the catboat line so Dave set safety at the base of the falls. Running BZ was a ton of fun and a huge rush.  It did about the same thing to both Dave and I, we each got a respectable tail stand but stuck the landing.  Steve Munk ran last and aced it.

Steve Munk on BZ Falls