Saturday, March 25, 2006

Reedy River Race March 25, 2006

Raced in the Reedy River Race it was alot of fun. On the first rapid it was a bit sloppy but ok ran a bit too far left and ran into some rocks but just boofed over them. I HATE FLATWATER and on this river there is plenty of it with only 3 or so rapid and 2.6 miles it is kinda boring. I just kept on paddling my total time was somewhere near 35.5 min. but with the pentalty for my boat it was around 37 min. The winner was somewhere near 33 min. Without my pentalty I would of got 3rd place or so. I think did ok next I will do it again but next year i will bring a shorter boat so I will not be penalizied I did not no they added time to you if you had a longer boat. The lvl was 142 cfs or 5.06 ft and it was pretty shallow in alot of places.

Sunday, March 12, 2006

Nantahala PFD March 11, 2006

Traveled up to the NC state border with GA on Fri. and camped out.

The next day we traveled the rest of the distance to NOC put in at the regular Nantahala put in spot and headed down river no thing to exiting happened caught a few waves a few eddys and so on. When we got down to Lesser Wesser I ran threw the meat of the hole while my dad ran down the mid right of the rapid and was doing a high brace most of the way down it. I went up and ran it between the holes. We took out and decided to demo some boats. My dad demoed a jefe while i paddled a vision 44. We puttin at the top of Lesser Wesser. In the top of the pool I did some stern squirts and fliped twice. After deciding I could roll the boat we headed down I ran between the holes again, not trusting this boat to go over the hole, and my dad ran down the same line he did before but he felt much more stable. After trying and doing a few more stern squirts I decided to try to play in this boat, bad idea. I found a super small hole low angle hole and tried to surf it I found out i was way to heavy for this boat. The bottom of the boat was straight up and down before it stoped catching an edge in a side surf I eventualy fliped over and found out the water super shallow and not allowing me to do a roll a swam for the first time in about six months. Maybe I should try a 56 next time.

I decided to run the casades even though I just swam, get on the horse again. We scouted for a while and then I decide to put in below Horns of God because of its shallow and small room for error line at this lvl. I ran the top of Big Kahuna down the middle with a quick boof over to the left to get me set up the main drop of Big Kahuna. I ran from left to the middle and went super deep my whole boat was covered up, hit the bottom of the pool and either came out upside down and then did my roll or did my roll right before I hit the top of the pool and came out right side up ( I realy should of spent more efort on my boof stoke but I did stick my line I wanted which was a fairly small one). I portaged a realy manky rapid right beside a small landslide on river right. I put in right before Junkyard and ran it on river right (theres not a hole there at this lvl too). Next I ran Chinese Feet on far river left. I caught a micro eddy on river left in the middle of 1st drop which almost fliped me because the the slot I ran is not big enough to fit a boat right side up. From this micro eddy i slid down the rest of the slide on the left into the first sizeable eddy on river left. I ran the small little chute on river left. One of the next rapids I ran down the middle didn't turn quick enough for me to miss a boulder in the middle of my blind line my nose scooted up on that boulder and the back got caught buy another boulder luckily I just leaned back and pushed my stern back and out of that sticky situation. The rest of the run was fairly uneventful.

The lvl. was most likely near 90cfs for the cascades and 750cfs for the reg. run.

Monday, March 06, 2006

Chattooga sec. IV March 4, 2006

Ran the section from the Bull to Woodall. Put in above Bull and ran the middle route just left of decap into a soft foamy landing. My dad swam at screaming left turn and lost both of his handpaddles. Thankfully we left the extra set of handpaddles in the truck :( :. So my dad had to realy handpaddle the rest of the run. I hit all my lines I wanted to and every eddie I wanted to catch. I like my new sniper alot. Ran the Watauga line at Rock Jumble. Ran the sneak at Woodall and ran threw Reed's hole I caught maybe 8 eddies threw the rapid (counting the ones i got to by ferrying). Decided to hike up my boat to the top and run it again. Got to see a boater run the main line. Ran Woodall with the same outcome as before. Fun rapid :). Tried out Mike's canoe felt unstable compared to a kayak from being up so high and hard to steer. The lvl. was 1.65 and probably 1.4-1.5 on the bridge a fun lvl. even that low no where was scrapey.