North Fork Clackamas, V+(VI)

Flows were high on the North Fork Clackamas, causing some raised eyebrows at the put-in. We are usually shooting for 250 on American Whitewater's calculated gauge for this run. (The AW gauge is calculated to be 10% of the difference between the gauges for the Clackamas at Estacada and Three Lynx.)

The river peaked while we were running it on this day, putting our flows in the mid-to-high 300's -- definitely the high side of high. Too high, in many respects. Eddies were tiny, rare, and often guarded by tree branches in the water. With a group of six, balancing spacing and communication was a constant challenge.

There was plenty of amazing continuous Class IV from the put-in down through a mandatory portage or two and some challenging log sneaks. Wood was a constant threat, but the number and quality of juicy boofs was well worth the constant vigilance.

There is a nasty sticky ledge that comes up quite fast in the upper gorge that has been a common problem spot in the past, and this day was no exception. First, Tango Charlie took it to the mat and pulled himself out of the hole using some logs on the right bank. GRRRRR says the honey badger! Moments later, Diesel dropped in for a short and terminal ride to the deepest part of the pit, and was roped out while still in his boat. That Jimi Stik that floated off will turn up someday, we hope.

With our delayed progress through the upper gorge, the rising water was catching up with us, and things went very quickly down to the "15-footer" above the unrunnable big falls. (Oregon Kayaking's NF Clack description calls this drop "Speed Bump", and says it's ten feet.) Too quickly, really...

Speed Bump seemed closer to 20 feet on this day, especially when routing into it unawares. Due to the high flows, our probe service was quite loose. It's quite an unnerving sensation to be jamming down a long and fast Class IV boulder garden and realize that it is routing right off the lip of a flooded-out waterfall. A variety of blind lines were had, with the key commonality that the paddler went extremely deep and ended up on the left at the bottom, somehow clear of the maw and upright.

Looking back at this drop from below revealed that a forearm-thick tree branch was protruding from the right bank into the center of the flow. With the volume of water going over the falls on this day, it would only have been in play for someone going over the far right.

Without taking the time to frame the shot without foliage, I snapped a quick photo to document just how juicy Speed Bump was before we got to work on portaging the big one:



Two of our group were lucky and/or smart enough to stop well above this drop and use the nice-and-easy fire road portage that ends at Stairway to Heaven.

Those of us that found ourselves below the fifteen footer were faced with a much tougher (but shorter) portage. (It's a damned good thing that Palmire gave Tendercheeks the beta about the portage route before our run.) In exchange, we got to see more of the river, including a good look at the rapid leading in to the lip of the big one. The last time I was in this spot was on a low-side-of-low spring day a few years ago, and I remember the lead-in as a series of relatively glassy pools divided by dry bedrock and twinkling in the sun. Not so on this day:



If a paddler were to swim out of the fifteen footer and fail to get to shore before entering the section depicted above, they would have a good chance of finding themselves dropping over the big no-no horizon line at the top left of this photo:



Such a swimmer would face death or dismemberment at the hands of the rockpile at the base of the big falls that are always portaged. Our portage on this day consisted of a steep scramble 50 feet up the left bank, roping boats up behind us, followed by a reasonable but steep traverse to the top of a steep ravine that heads down to the river.

The ravine back down to the river has a conveniently fallen tree whose rootwad marks the top of our route down, and also provides a handy anchor for the couple hundred feet of nylon rope someone has left in place. The lowering of boats and selves was plenty strenuous, but this route would simply not be possible without a rope. The entire ravine is an active erosion zone, made all the more active by four paddlers and kayaks making their way down.

Here you can see one of our group getting ready to launch from the base of the ravine we came down:



The paddler launching in the photo above is in the mist zone from the big drop, and is getting hammered with 20-mile-an-hour winds comprised of 50% water spraying from the base of this monster. When I was launching, I was sponging out my boat before ferrying across to take a couple of photos, and realized at one point that the spray was so heavy that I would need to just call it good enough and get somewhere drier to finish the job.

But, man! What a sight the big falls was on this day!







Looking downstream from the big one. Stairway to Heaven is literally around the corner:



This guy actually likes it when the water is a bit too high:



Stairway to Heaven was quite impressive to behold. As with lower flows, the left-to-right line was clearly the way. When Jer-bear and Loneman get there they know, if the stores are all closed, with a word they can get what they came for. And a new day will dawn for those who stand long and the forests will echo with laughter.

Jer-bear makes me wonder:



The stories don't stop below Stairway, but the Led Zeppelin lyrics do. :-)

By the time we got down to Storm Drain, three of our crew of six had gotten their fill, and opted for the scenic land-based egress to the takeout, while three of us polished off the remaining mini-gorges and boulder gardens. A notable moment came when a wrist-thick sweeper awaited out of sight right below the horizon of a random five-foot ledge. Jer-bear and Loneman made friends with it before proceeding downstream and I was the lucky one, having managed to boof my bow over it.

I've been on the NF Clack when the top part was good to go and this lower section was too low to float, and it sucks to choose between monkey-knuckling and just getting out and walking. It was quite a treat to have it be rowdy continuous Class III, but the blind channels and three short log portages right before the end demanded constant attention.

We made it to the takeout with minutes of daylight to spare, having spent just under 5 hours on the river. Shuttle got ran while the other half of our crew made their way out of the woods, and most of us proceeded to The Country in Estacada for food, drink, and a debrief.

The North Fork Clackamas always delivers interesting times, it seems. Lots of epics and lost gear come out of this canyon, and this run was no exception -- plenty of portages, a lost paddle, a swim, some blind runnings, and some hiking. Given the high flows, abundance of wood, noontime put-in, and six paddlers sharing tiny must-make eddies, we came out pretty damned squeaky clean!

The Story of Swimming Lava Falls

(a previous and successful run of Lava Falls on the Farmlands, at lower flows)
On Saturday, June 26th, the Husum gauge was reading around 3 feet, but the upper part of the Farmlands looked and felt more like 3.75 feet. (Apparently, a lot of water is being taken out for irrigation. The Class II-III stuff toward the end felt bonier than the top part.) I botched the line (1.5-2 boatwidths too far left) at Lava, and got worked under the veil after a decent fight in front of the curtain. I made like a zombie from the grave and pulled myself upright behind the veil for a quick half-breath before my hull engaged the veil again (it's tight in there!) and was quickly back upside down in the cave, with the downflow interacting with one side of my torso. I conservatively (breath-wise) swam from behind the veil and was under for a long time, being balanced underwater on the bottom of the main tongue for a bit before being barrel-rolled for a few rotations just in front of it (still underwater), as far as I can tell. Balling up only seemed to stabilize me in the subaquatic neutral zone, so I tried to tap the downflow and GTFO of there. My first attempt only succeeded in getting me to the surface for a quick breath and a whack in the face from a throwbag before I went deep again. I made a couple more rounds inside the hydraulic before I was able to straighten my body toward the downflow as I cycled back toward it, and tap into it for my deepest ever body mystery. I felt it accelerate me downward quite vigorously, and lightly bounced along the bottom of the river before coming up about 35 feet downstream, just beyond the boil line. As I swam to the bank, I urged my companions to get someone in the water to grab my paddle and be ready for the boat to come out. After a paddler went down to the next visible eddy and stopped without having found the paddle, I asked to be live-baited in to retrieve the boat (need it for the Idaho trip!), but no one thought this was a good idea at the time. They looked at me like I was insane, in fact. My companions were more shaken than I was at this point, for better or worse.

Witnesses said I was gone from sight for over 20 seconds during the extended underwater portion of my working, and I definitely remember a moment of realizing I would be holding my breath much much longer than I wanted, and that it was time to get calm and work the hydraulic. This thought sequence took place a couple of rotations before I was able to tap into the downflow. My paddle went downstream, was later recovered from an eddy river right 1/4 mile down, and was stashed on the bank by a clearcut. My boat remained behind the veil (hard to see since it is dark dark gray), and I made a rock climb egress straight up the cliff on river right, roped up another paddler's boat followed by that paddler, who managed to hitch up to the put-in to get my car. Can you believe the other guys were drinking beer at the takeout when we got there? Luckily, the sun had only just set, and my sweetheart and I had a lovely hike before it got dark, in the course of failing to find the paddle on foot.

Early in the afternoon of Sunday, June 27th, a group coming off the Farmlands told me that they looked for my boat but did not see it. I put on around 5pm with an esteemed local in his playboat, and me paddling my SCUD with a breakdown that Diesel lent me. (Thanks, Joel!) At Lava, the pool of froth behind the veil looked bigger/whiter, so I surmised that my boat was no longer being held there. The river was perhaps 3 inches lower in its banks, which made the weak spot in the veil a bit more transparent, though it was still a solid sheet of water. Downstream, I hopped out to search for my paddle two times, and found it at the second spot, which was as described by Saturday's crew. I stowed the breakdown, and continued downriver at a medium pace, looking for my creekboat at every turn.

Rounding a corner about 3/4 mile below Lava, where the river gets shallow on the left and current piles up on rocks and sticks to the right, at the base of an active erosion zone, I thought to myself, "this is where it would have stopped if it came through here," and (lo!) beheld my boat near the right bank, broached on a couple of rocks in shallow/slow current, upside down and perpendicular to me, with no apparent damage. I pulled it out to find that it had zero damage whatsoever, other than a few very minor scratches. Both handpaddles (with gloves attached) had come free, and my sponge was long gone. All other outfitting and equipment was intact. The Watershed stowfloats were bone dry. I made one of the burliest climbs in my life with my rope playing out behind me and attached to the SCUD, stopping halfway to yard it up for the final push, and left it hanging off the cliff, tied to a tree on the edge of the mad cow pasture, which was mercifully unoccupied by malevolent bovines. The egress here was so burly because the geology just plain sucked for climbing, with crumbly rock aggregated into loose dirt for 60 feet of vertical, before some vegetation and more solid rocks made it manageable. The descent back to river level was just as harrowing, and I can safely say that I personally accelerated the pace of erosion in this spot quite a bit. In retrospect, I should have floated the SCUD down to a better egress point, and brought a cockpit cover or sprayskirt+camstrap for that purpose. I paddled the Magnum out the remainder of the Farmlands, and met my companion at the takeout, where he presented me with one of my handpaddles, glove still attached. He had proceeded downstream during my paddle searches, waited for a while below Offramp before surmising that I'd had to hike out for some reason, and had been at the takeout for 5 minutes when I arrived. It was truly a great experience to take my time down the 2nd half of the Farmlands on a solo basis in my recently recovered creekboat. What a beautiful canyon!

The trespassy hike in to retrieve the SCUD was a sweaty affair in the evening heat, but with no cows or landowners to assault me, and such a great outcome, I was in good spirits. I made calls at the pair of wild turkeys I startled on the edge of the pasture, but they only clucked back. I guess they don't gobble back if they can see that you're not also a turkey. Some of you might beg to differ with their assessment on that, though.

So, there is a handpaddle with my name/# on it somewhere below Lava on the White Salmon, that may or may not have a glove still attached. The sponge was near the end of it's life anyway, so I consider myself lucky to be down one handpaddle, with no damaged gear or injury to myself or my parties. I do not recommend swimming Lava Falls.

Willie

Oregon Kayaking: Chelan Gorge

(Entrance Exam - photo by Chris Arnold)
Chris Arnold has finally gotten his Chelan Gorge trip report up on Oregon Kayaking. There are a couple of pictures of me. I still need to finish my report for that trip, but it's getting close.

Upper Upper Cispus: Behemoth from above

I'm still pulling together media and words for my Chelan Gorge trip report, so here's a clip from a Cispus run we did in the meanwhile.


(video by Travis Lee)

White Salmon: Green Truss: another day, another cave rescue

The Green Truss in summer can be a real treat. This weekend, we had sunny weather with temperatures pushing 100 degrees F. You know it's a hot day when you can sit safety in the mist coming off Big Brother in total comfort, wearing shorts and a lightly-insulated drytop. My lines were good this weekend, so I got to be the rescuer in the scenario below.

Steve and I yard Eric out of the cave at the base of Big Brother
(photo by Chris Arnold)

Northwest Creeking Competition: East Fork Lewis River extreme race

The second year of the newly-reincarnated NW Creeking Comp went off with a bang April 11-12, 2009. The race, party, huckfest, and camaraderie were sick, as expected. The Columbian wrote an article about it, featuring a photo of me doing an old school pirouette whilst waiting at the hole by Oly's house for some other kayakers to come down:

PDXkayaker Film Fest 2008: Semi-Pro Spotlight

Luke managed to get 2nd place in last year's PDXkayaker Film Festival, with Semi-Pro Spotlight:



I shot much of the footage used in the film. Luke and I were going to co-produce our effort for the contest, but he just had more spare time in the week leading up to the contest. I'd say he represented, for sure. The Johnny Ott BZ Falls carnage clip was a huge crowd pleaser. Ahh, memories.

Pictures on Riot Team website

Luke made a trip report of a Canyon Creek (Washington) run from a couple of weeks back, and a version was posted on the Team Riot website. I'm in a few of the pictures. This one, at Big Falls a.k.a. Big Kahuna, is probably the best one:

Lake Merwin

Johnny of the lake. Test of Picasa "Blog This" feature.

Lower Wind: two laps

Met Mike Long at Lewis & Clark at 8:00 a.m. Well, 8:25, anyway. Our Little White plans were dashed by the lack of a third -- this situation owing to a misinterpreted text from Luke. I wanted a third paddler for my second time down the legendary Little White, so we opted to traipse down the Lower Wind to kill time before some Portland friends were due at the Green Truss in the afternoon.

So Mike's delightful shuttle bunny (ring and a contract) helped us set a car at the bottom, and we put on around the same time as two other groups, one of which included Jacob Cruser and even some inflatable kayaks. We charged down to Shipherd Falls, with me trying the right entry line and spending a bit of elbow time in The Flume on the way. Sometime during our five laps on the falls, the phone rang, and the word came that our friends might be running the Lower Wind instead of the Green Truss, due to time constraints.

Later, whilst we pondered the meaning of it all over a cold PBR tallboy in the hot spring near the end of the run, the phone was heard to ring once more. Verily, our brethren had congealed into a critical mass of bro-brah-ness, which was converging on our location...eventually.

We killed some time at the store in Carson, where my rash guard got left and run over. Mike owes me big for this, and try to pay his debt by loaning me a playboat that was being brought especially for him from town by our impending crew. It was a ZG or some other archaic foot torture device, so I passed. When Mike spotted the shuttle bunny driving by, we engaged in hot pursuit, cutting her off at the pass at Hot Springs Road and Hwy 14. Jess drives slow, or we'd never have caught her. Thereafter, we made our way up the hill to the takeout, getting a call from Johnny when we were 100 yards away, wondering where we were, as he had just arrived himself.

So it was that our timing was perfect, and we were grateful to be with good friends Luke, Deek, and others, for another round of Lower Wind goodness. This time held no laps of rapids or falls, nor a hot springs stop. Nonetheless, a good time was had by all, and many sick boofs were executed with cold precision, to the extent which that was possible on the only "LW" that we paddled that day.

We went our separate ways, and as dusk neared, I boogied to the vicinity of the Green Truss put-in to find a camp spot, and found a pleasant unimproved site up on a ridge to the west. It was on the border of a timber sale, and several trees had been felled to block the road, so dry wood and tinder were plentiful. I strung up a throw rope to hang gear on, gathered some wood, made a fire and a bed, ate a sandwich, washed it down with Ice Cold Beer, and settled in for a relaxing and peaceful night under the stars. Tomorrow was sure to involve the Truss, finally.

I did not take any photos or video on this day, but this video made by someone else is very cool.

Lower Wind River

I was still reeling from my bout with food poisoning, so I took it easy with another mellow run down the Lower Wind. I ran The Flume twice again -- it's getting less fun as the water runs out. I made just one pass at Shipherd's Falls, but I nailed my lines, so I was happy with it.

Dingo Dave swam the whole way, as he embarked on his virgin riverboarding voyage on a run that was probably a bit low for such undertakings. He said he'll bring kneepads and an athletic cup next time. Since he didn't technically have an out-of-boat experience, he drank beer sweet and pure from the can it came in. The same could not be said for all of our crew...

Cory had a swim at High Bridge due to a broken paddle, followed by a swim at The Flume due to a 190cm breakdown paddle. :) Kourtni got rodeoed in the first drop of Shipherd's before punching and earning a booty beer. The hot springs on river left below Shipherd's Falls make a cozy setting for keeping the booty beer tradition alive -- watch as Cory and Kourtni keep their river karma positive:



To Kourtni's credit, she hiked back up and ran the drop cleanly to make good on it:

Gorge Games on the White Salmon: safety, Truss, and Middle

Arriving at BZ Corner at 8:05 a.m., I found that I was the only safety boater there, so I chatted with Nate, Heather, and Austin for a while until more folks arrived. Our celebrity safety coordinator Sam showed up at 8:35 or so, and we soon had a critical mass of safety boaters, so we made ready to head up. On the way up to the put-in, one of the many unsecured kayaks in the trailer of the shuttle rig blew out and onto the road, bouncing and skidding to a halt. Luckily, it was a rental, demo, or somesuch.

This marked the first time I didn't use a rope to put on the Truss (and my second time ever on the Truss), which was a good experience. Takes more effort per paddler, but is so much more time-efficient. My safety assignment was Big Brother, and I ended up serving as secondary cave roper for the day, behind the big cannon rope-launching machine known as Luke Spencer. Ryan Youngs and Turin were on river left at the top of the falls with me most of the day, along with a videographer for Fox Sports News. Luckily, Garreth had volunteered to be the dope-on-a-rope, so he got to hang out in the shivering mist at the base of the falls all day, and spare us the suffering.

About half the racers went into the cave at the base of the falls, surprisingly, including local favorite Todd Anderson, who showed clear frustration at his less-than-optimal line. Luckily, there were no swimmers out of the cave. In fact, we had only one swimmer all day -- Dr. Greg had the best line of the day on the drop itself, but got worked against the right wall soon after. After a couple of attempts at rolling on either side, he punched. It was then that we realized there was no one in a boat at the bottom of Big Brother, which we rapidly remedied. Fortunately, his gear was gathered at Double Drop, though we really should have had a better plan to begin with, Sam. After the race was done, we packed up and fired up the rest of the run, after helping folks ferry equipment back across the river. It takes balls of steel to kayak a $10,000 video camera across the river without a sprayskirt, I should think.

Luke fired up the center flake and styled it, airing out at an angle and lightly touching down on the downflow on the face of the manky left side of the falls. He pulled his bow up a bit at the last second and greased across the pile, marking the fastest line I saw all day, and plenty of reason for the other racers to be glad he was on safety and not stealing their thunder. For my part, I caught both the flake and the boof stroke, and aired it good into the pile, landing with 10-15 degrees of upward bow angle. It felt really solid, and I think it was an improvement over my first line down this drop last year. The rest of the run was great. Only Johnny Ott had the cajones to fire up BZ Falls on this day, and he had to fight the tractor beam on the left for a bit before it mercifully let him go.

After we took out at BZ, we enjoyed watching the boatercross competition. Gorge Games staff stopped people from walking down the the shore to spectate after some arbitrary number had already gone down, so it was none too crowded. I only wish that dog would not have licked the scab on my leg quite so much. Here's a brief clip of Tao winning one of his heats:



After the boatercross, as the awards ceremony was starting, I got propositioned for a quick run down the middle section (BZ to Husum), and happily accepted, as they needed another safety boater for the crew. The six (?) of us had an uneventful run, with just one brief and painless swim. Luckily, Miss Adams had been saying at last week's Carnage Run that she was fully qualified to drink booty beers, having solidified her combat roll. I was happy to hold her to it:



She did us proud. If you're wondering -- yes, the booty beer is one of my favorite traditions in kayaking.

I ended up camping out up at Trout Lake with a bunch of PDX Kayakers and new friends, shutting down the campfire with Drs. Dey and Boyok. It was a good day.

You can read Luke's Gorge Games reports here and here.

White Salmon: the Farmlands

Hit the Farmlands at just below 4ft on the Husum gauge with Tony Bizone, Joe Stumpfel, and Allen Satcher. This was my first time down, but I can see why they say this is the perfect level for the Farmlands.

Sidewinder is the first big drop on this section:



After some generic Class III-IV rapids, paddlers come to Lava Falls:



Joe Stumpfel making Lava Falls pay (he was a hair right of where he wanted to be, forward to 0:48 for the action, I was too lazy to edit):



Tony Bizone killing it on Lava Falls (he was two hairs left of where he wanted to be):


Off Ramp is the last of the major drops on this section:



I boated well this day, with a flip and snap roll near the undercut on Sidewinder being the lowlight. The more I boat the Riot Magnum 80, the more I like it.

Little North Fork Santiam: Opal Creek and Upper Opal Creek

With all the water coming from the top in the form of snowmelt, we had a nice combined run of the Upper and usual sections of Opal Creek.

Breitenbush River

Great day on the Breitenbush with sunny skies and twice the flow of my first time down.

Hospital Rock: a taste of Cali carnage

Ah, my first Class V swim...full story to come, but check out the following media for a teaser:




view full screen

Falls Creek: I'm a lumberjack, and I'm okay

Falls Creek is a tributary of the Wind River in Washington. What a hike, what a massive waterfall, what wood removal work, and what a sick slide! More to come...

(photo courtesy of Oregon Kayaking)

Upper Trout Creek

Ran Upper Trout Creek with Luke, Tim, Dan, and Jacob from North Carolina. The water was about 4 inches below the cup, and the weather was mild and cloudy, with just a few sprinkles as we put on, making way for sunshine through the last third of the run. Mike L. forgot his sprayskirt and was not up to being a shuttle bunny, so he took off with promises to join us the next day for some expedition-style boating on another area creek.

This run is nuts! Check out Ryan Morgan's descriptive blog post from his run last spring. The run starts out flat and placid, then gradually cranks up the gradient through Class II, III, and IV rapids before entering a mile-long section that drops around 300 feet, all boulder garden. This is the steepest water I've run, by a factor of at least two, and little did I know when I put on that I would be running Class V mank that many people rate harder than Gettin' Busy on the Little White Salmon.

The drops were breezy and fun through the Class IV and IV+ sections for the most part, but I'll admit my eyes bugged out a bit as we got into the 300 feet-per-mile stuff. It's as if the world tilts forward gradually for the first part of the run and then something breaks inside the tilt mechanism and the creekbed keels forward violently. I flipped briefly early on in the long rapid that marks the crux section near the end, which had me winded and scattered the rest of the way down. Luckily, my line was good, even as I careened down the rapid backwards for several yards. I felt fortunate to not join the Upper Trout swim team just yet, and managed to avoid the many nasty pin spots and sieves as we tore down this sucker without stopping.

Well, we did stop once, when Luke found a new (to us) sieve and properly tested the bore of the thing by sending his Hercules through. The Herc flushed smoothly, broach-pinned on the next drop, and formed a big and deep lateral crease in front of the seat. Imagine my surprise when I came around the corner to see Luke standing on a rock in the middle of the mank with no boat in site. After we got the boat to shore, a couple of punches and kicks to the inside of the boat had it good as new, with no evidence of the debauchery it went through. That Prijon HTP plastic is some pretty magical stuff, to be sure. Luke narrowly escaped a bootie beer penalty by stepping out of his boat and onto dry rock -- technically, not a swim.

Dan and Jacob took off after the run to fire up the Upper Wind River, which was at a great flow that day. Luke and I called it in favor of heading back to Portland -- he had obligations, and I had a bit of a hangover that had me quite tapped by the end of the run. Running Upper Trout Creek was an amazing experience and a sizable step up for me. (Don't believe the print and web guides that say this run is easier than the Green Truss section of the White Salmon -- it's not!) I'm almost starting to think I'll be ready for the Silver, Feather, and whatever else this summer's No-Cal trip will throw at me!

Olympic Peninsula: short roadtrip

Headed up to the Olympic Peninsula after work today with Luke to grab some boats for Next Adventure. We'll stay with Kris W. at a cabin on a lake, and find some fun creeking tomorrow before heading back down. It'll be nice to test out Das Frankenboot (my stitched-together MAC-1) and see how The Plastic Mechanic's recent repair holds up. I should get an updated picture of the hull and post it here...it's more "Frankeny" than ever.

Update. We didn't plan far enough in advance to secure local paddling partners, so Luke and I ended up scouting some things, and taking in a couple of mellower classic intermediate runs in central Washington.

Sunday. Ah, Mother's Day. Originally started as a war protest. After a lovely brunch with Luke's family, we got to the business of picking a run for the day. Our eventual plan was to run the middle section of the Middle Fork Snoqualmie. Luke's brother Nate accompanied us to help with shuttle and get help for his own shuttle. Nate would mountain bike to the takeout, and we would kayak -- it would be a low-key race, of sorts.

We wandered about, looking for a suitable put-in, and eventually settled on a spot on the side of the road. We came to find out that we put in too high, as a couple of miles of Class II riffles and flatwater lulled us into complacency. There were some entertaining Class III+ boulder gardens and chutes to be had on the remainder of this intermediate run. We definitely charged this run, never stopping paddling and finishing in about an hour. At the takeout A nice woman named Renee, whom I had met on the Toutle (January 27th), recognized me and let Luke and I make some tasty turkey wraps. She was on the way back from the Wenatchee and had tons of extra grub. At this point, we saw a sheriff rig pull up, and Nate hopped out, grinning sheepishly...no bike, though. He had blown a tire a short way into his ride, and the deputy was kind enough to run him down to us. Renee and I talked river safety while Luke and Nate ran up to get the other truck and retrieved Nate's bike from where it was stashed in the bushes. Renee's two friends, whom we'd passed about 1/3 of the way through the run, were just coming off the river when we completed our shuttle back to the takeout. We definitely booked it down this sucker!

Saturday. We headed out for the North Fork Sauk, only to find that the road was blocked 0.1 mile from North Fork Sauk Falls, due to a washout. After extensively scouting the waterfall (an unrunnable 45-footer with Class VI and Class V+ lead-in drops that we plotted lines down anyway), we headed up the road on foot to see what we could see. This is the falls we scouted:


As we headed up the closed road on foot, we noticed six piles of bear scat. After about 1.5 miles with just one spot of river access, we decided to head back. On the way back, we saw a bear off in the brush and seven piles of scat. We were clearly in bear country, and decided against heading back in with our boats. We resolved to get a run in on the standard Sauk section. We put in near some campers who helped us set shuttle, and charged down this classic Central Washington intermediate run. Everything was boat scoutable, and we charged. Near the end, we wondered if we'd already passed the takeout, which resulted in some unnecessary bushwhacking and a possible first descent of a wood-choked tributary creek to get back to the river. Overall, it was a fun, if exhausting time.