Wind River (upper)

Photos by Nick Hymel

We ran the upper wind river at minimal flows (300). Everything was still runnable. We had two IK's paddled by Nick and my dad and they did fine. The put in is pretty and gives no indication of what is downstream. We headed that way and were greated by a couple of class threes before trout creek enters at the beggining of initiation.

 The view from the put-in

We got out to scout the beggining of initiation on a convenient gravel bar that are almost always present on low water runs. The first bit of this rapid was a good indication of what was to come. All of initiation was steeper than it felt with only one good route through each drop. We only had one portage around a manky ledge right above Ram's horn that a buddy of ours has run at this flow (accidentally) and made it through up right, but the chance of a pin is pretty high.

This is the beginning of initiation 

Next up was Ram's Horn which was the only totally clean rapid on the run. At this level there is no sneak on the left. My dad ran right, then got typewritered left for the bottom drop. I went right, then middle and Nick went left middle. At this level this was the only class 4ish rapid on the run.

This is the lead in to Ram's Horn and the end of Initiation.

Me, getting middle for the second drop after being moved left by the hole

My dad in the middle of his typewriter move.

Below here was a couple more class threes, then Climax, which was super easy at this level with no hole. It had a pretty fun boof though. From all the reports and talk I had heard about this run I was expecting the rest of the run to be pool drop 2-, but it kept moving and had a couple more class threes. In here was a surf hole that produced my only flip when I was run into by a big blue duck:)  It was a nice day so the rest of the paddle out was managable.

    -Jacob