The Upper Wind Festival

Last weekend marked the start of festival season in the Pacific Northwest. The Upper Wind Race features a mass start format and consisted of around 50 competitors this year, with several divisions. I competed in the Mens K1 division. There was also a Womens K1 class, a long boat class, and a r2 class.

The event is organized by The Oregon Rafting team, namely Tim Brink, and is heavily supported by Next Adventure, along with several other paddling related entities in the Portland area.

Seeing as this event was initially designed as a 'raft race' the course is quite long and a rather large portion of 'flat water' class III after the initial mile and half of IV+ whitewater. All combined, the course is just over 3 miles in length and takes over 20 minutes to complete. Needless to say, by the time you're at the bottom, everyone is pretty tuckered out.

The week leading up to the festival had been uncharacteristically warm for this time of year, but right on cue, we woke up on Saturday morning to rain and cold temps. Spring is in the air! The rain did bump the water level up to approx. 5.8 feet on the Stabler gauge, which made for a nice flow for racing.

After the long boat class took off, the K1 Mens Division was up. All 30 of us lined up along the banks above the bridge at the Stabler put-in. This year, someone decided to have us start with our bows towards the bank, so the first paddle stroke that everyone took was actually a back stroke. We were seeded based on a poker card we had been issued upon registration. Naturally, I had drawn a 7 of hearts and was towards the back of the pack to start.

The whistle blew and the river erupted into a flurry of boats and churning paddles. This was by far the most challenging part of the race for me! Trying to keep myself in the current while avoiding the serrated fiberglass blades of the guy next to me, the first 1/2 mile of the race was overly tiring and seemed to go on forever!

Just as the racers began to thin out and fall into line, we entered the meat of the run. Initiation down through Climax features a nice blend of class III and IV boulder gardens with one obvious crux at a rapid known as Ram's Horn. Having only paddled this river a few times in the past, I focused on keeping an eye on the guy in front of me as we dropped through the goods.

By the time we came to the last real rapid on the run (Climax) I was overly tired and kind of forgot the line through this often sticky ledge hole. Luckily, I was able to orient myself at the last moment and came through the hole in big stern squirt. Just another mile of flat water to the finish line!

I spent the last mile of the race jockeying for position with Jesse Becker and Michael Freeman. Jesse ended up winning the duel and I came in just a nose in front of Michael. After it was all said and done, I finished in the middle of the pack (9th place) and was a full minute+ behind Dan Rubado (1st Place) and Trevor Sheehan (2nd Place). Times were unofficial and haven't been posted as of today, but you can view the standings at http://www.wwchampionship.org/k1-men

In the Women's class, which featured 7 racers, Kim Becker edged Heather Herbeck for 1st place and had a pretty exciting duel at the finish line with Nicole Mansfield and Katrina Van Wijk, who were charging in the topo-duo. I believe Kim held them off in the end.

Below is a collection of photos taken by Eric Adsit, Nick Hymel, and my girlfriend Claire, who was kind enough to hike all the way into Ram's Horn in the pouring rain to watch the show. I've also put together a video of my headcam footage.

Hope everyone can make it our next year! And remember, the Northwest Creeking Competition is only a month away!

Until next time,

Nate

Dan Rubado, way out in front at the start of Initiation (Photo: Nick Hymel)

 The front pack getting into the goods. (Photo: Nick Hymel)

 More K1 Men routing through Initiation. (Photo: Nick Hymel)

 Dynamic Duo. (Photo: Nick Hymel)

 R2 Class (Photo: Nick Hymel)

 More rubber. (Photo: Nick Hymel)

Nicole and Katrina rocking the topo below Ram's Horn (Photo: Claire Rothstein)

 Jesse Becker, Leif Anderson, Harrison Rea, and Nate Merrill in the middle. (Photo: Claire Rothstein)

Random chargers below Ram's Horn (Photo: Claire Rothstein)

Dan Rubado trailed closely by Lewis Hooker (Photo: Claire Rothstein)

 Christie Eastman in the long boat division. (Photo: Claire Rothstein)

Harrison Rea and Nate Merrill (author) routing through the top of Ram's Horn (photo: Eric Adsit)

 Follow the leader. (photo: Eric Adsit)

The video!

2012 In a Nut Shell

Things have been pretty mellow around the Into The Outside Headquarters for the last few weeks. Matt's been paddling down in Ecuador and Argentina (reports to come) and weather hasn't really be cooperating here in the PNW. The abnormally dry January and February did allow for some nice days on the Little White, but there just hasn't been enough water to bring in anything noteworthy. I did have a fun day out on Hagen last week with a rather stompy flow, but that window closed nearly as quickly as it had opened.

The lack of water has left us at Into the Outside with a proverbial paper jam. PC Load Letter, what the %$#@ does that mean? With that in mind, I began going over some of the trip reports that I started, but never got around to finishing. After searching for awhile, I decided to combined a few of the highlights from 2012 into one gift wrapped photo dump and treat you all to a casual Friday send off.

disclaimer: This is really mu personal summary of 2012. Both Jacob and Matt were able to get on some amazing rivers of their own.

The year started off in fine form:  Punch Bowl Falls, Eagle Creek, OR

Before too long, heavy rain brought the Little Klickitat up to an amazing flow. Dan Rubado demonstrates how to punch a hole at 1400cfs. 

In what would become a theme for 2012, I found myself on McCoy at a juicy level. 

The morning after at the NW Creeking Competion. Racers keeping themselves in peak physical condition with the breakfast of champions. PBR.

Given the crummy snow-pack in California, we headed South earlier than folks usually do and were rewarded with perfect flows on the Middle Feather and South Branch. Late April in Cali!

Late spring means Little White Salmon! Rubado basking below Spirit.

We managed to catch a late season Robe lap on our Northern Exposure trip in July. Brett Barton runs Catcher's Mitt while I get ready to sneak to the right.

After Robe, we decided to make for better weather and spent a day on the Cooper River in Central Washington. JD Gaffney checking out from Norm's Resort.

Somehow, we decided it would be a good idea to hike into Salmon River Canyon from the bottom up. Poor decision, next time we'll bring two cars and do the long shuttle. Alex Kilyk mid-suffer-fest.

Final Falls to the Left and Vanishing Gorge to the Right

 Late summers means it's time to head up Highway 12 into the Gifford Pinchot National Forest. Two of my favorite rivers in the world come in just as everything else is falling out: The Ohanapecosh and the Upper Upper Cispus.

A bustling secret camp on the Ohane.

A random hero dropping through triple drop on the Ohanapecosh.

Jacob with a perfect line on the Upper Upper.

Fall/Winter boating is always means cold temps and obscure rivers. John Edwards on the hike into Silver Creek near Salem, OR.

That about sums up my kayaking in 2012. I was able to get on quite a few new rivers (which is always the best part of kayaking) and kept the carnage to a minimum. 2013 is already well underway and I can't wait to get into the thick of boating season. So many rivers remain on my list and with any luck, I'll be able to knock a few off by the time 2013 comes to a close. I'm looking at you Hoffstadt...

Until next time!

Best regards,

Nate

Ecuador Update: Hollin Chico

I've been down in the jungles of Ecuador for the last month, aprovechando los rios, getting after it pretty hard.  My buddy Mr. S Baker came down with me (he's more of a veteran than me, been down 4 times and went to school for a bit in Quito), and we've bounced from Baeza, to Tena, to Banos, to Tena, to Banos, etc, chasing the water where it's good.

More on that later, at the moment the focus of the story will be the Hollin Chico, a rarely run jungle mission that's right off the highway, but remote enough that even the locals were saying "no se puede ir al rio, es impossible."  That is until we met the right local, who said "Si, tengo una finca al lado del rio, el sendero va desde aqui mismo"  and proceeded to describe to us exactly how to get down to his farm from the highway, on a somewhat confusing network of trails down steep muddy slopes, through crazy bogs where a mistep meant being waist deep in mud, down tiny tribs, until 3 hours later we reached the river.  I didn't get many photos on this mission, mostly because we were very worried that we'd run out of light and sleeping in the jungle kinda sucks.

Joining Scotty and I on this mission was our buddy Charlie from New England and Joni, another Pacific Northwest boater making the most of the winter boating opportunities.  Scotty and Charlie are very familiar with jungle missions like this, and the difficulty of access and work involved came as no surprise. And while Joni hadn't been on missions like this, if she was surprised, it certainly didn't show.  She was however very thankful to have just worn some thin pants rather than her farmer jane, as Scotty firmly suggested.  Hiking around the jungle, you want to be fully covered for the bugs and the unfriendly jungle flora, but it's hot and humid, so you have to wear thin stuff, a tricky balancing act.

In the end, Joni killed it, we got down to the river with time to spare... and found super low flows.  We manked down the river for 5 miles or so, with only this one sweet bedrock gem interrupting the endless boulder gardens.

Finally Some Bedrock! 

With more water, the run would be sweet, but with the flows we had, it was just a lot of work.  But work often comes with a reward, and the end of the run soon arrived, where a sweet folding 40 footer awaits, right before the confluence with the Hollin Grande, which also serves as the takeout.  Considering the low flows, nobody was too fired up but me (it's been on my list since last year) and considering that my trip was nearly done, I decided to give it a go anyway.  The line when super smooth, soft hit despite the low flow, came out upright, did some hooting and hollering, took a right stroke, then tried a left, then realized that I had broken my left blade off!

Coming in smooth.  This falls has an eddy right at the lip, so you can peel out right into it, and just hold the stroke all the way through to your tuck.  Pretty sweet.

No roll?  Sweet!

Well I'll be darned, me blade be gone!

I was quite bummed, knowing that that waterfall had just cost me $150 bones.  But better my paddle than my body, and I C-1'd the boat across the pool, thanked the friends for setting safety, and we all walked up the stairs to a small cafe and grabbed a beer.  Given that this waterfall is an easy park and huck, it does get run somewhat often, most recently by a river boarder, but it felt really good to get a top to bottom decent of the Hollin Chico.  Parking and Hucking feels like cheating almost, but on this day, I sure as hell earned it!

More to come on Ecuador later, but for now, adios!

Mateo

3 stooges being unmajestic on Mcdowell Creek

Silly little rapid that got the better of Micheal and I.  Anna did just fine though.

Happy Valentine's Day all.

The Big Ditch in December

As told by Anna Herring.

The Corvallis crew took advantage of student schedules and an easy lottery to land a December 9, 2012 Grand Canyon permit. Nate has a write-up on his August-Sept 2010 trip here, and there is plenty of information around the web on the Grand Canyon in general, but there are a few things that make a winter trip in the desert unique. So, here are a few tips for cold weather boaters:

• Several of us applied for a cancellation lottery in October, and we actually pulled three different launch dates. We picked our favorite day and it was on! Only having a month and a half to plan the trip was stressful, but perhaps less daunting than planning for a year and a half in advance. We were able to borrow enough gear for three fully loaded rafts, and only had to rent groovers, a sat phone, and a few other odds and ends from Moenkopi. Also, big thanks to Rob Herring and Riley Weathers for shuttle help!!
  

  

  Alan the TL looking suave and festive on xmas day

• Daylight hits at about 7:30 am and is gone by 5:30 pm. It was hard for us to get out of camp by 10:00 am. That said, we easily made an average of 16 miles/day with 5 layover days scattered throughout our 21 day trip, and we were still able to do most of the hikes and site-seeing we wanted to check out along the way.
  

  
  

  
  

• Sunny camps are not always possible, but a camp on the north end of a North-South oriented straightaway is a good bet. Examples of good sun spots: President Harding, Unkar Delta, Racetrack. Hikes in Hermit and Tuckup canyons had awesome sun, even though the campsites themselves didn’t. 

A sunny group picture at Unkar Camp. The next day was the coldest, rainiest, windiest day of the trip. (photo: Nick Chambers)

•  The rapids themselves are pretty straight forward, but as with any cold weather trip, the consequences of a flip or an extended swim are much higher (this is compounded on a 21 day trip). Fortunately, the tide effect due to variation in dam releases allows a range of water levels -on our trip, flows varied from 8,000 to 16,000 cfs. With this in mind, we scheduled our days to hit Hance at high water (Hance canyon has recently flooded and flushed some new sharp boulders into the left sneak line, so we aimed for the duck pond line), and also Horn rapid at high water (go between the horns!). We also hit Granite at peak flows, resulting in my most chaotic and exciting raft line of the trip. We had a zero raft carnage trip! In terms of kayaking carnage… well, you know how kayakers are.
  
  
  

  

  Lucas

Meghan and her scrubbies

Our three boat captains: Lucas Reitman, Meghan Johnston, and myself (photos: Alan Bergman)

• As with any rafting trip, bringing enough beer is important- but for this trip, whiskey, hot chocolate/apple cider, and a thermos were far more crucial. Pack the same amount of beer you would expect, double the whiskey.
• Avocados do not ripen in cold dryboxes. We had rock hard avocados at the take-out.
• The night float is not just a summer activity- It's an awesome way to do the last, flat 40 miles of the river, and it definitely wasn’t too cold.
  
  
  And with that, here’s some very artistic and scenic photography by Nick Chambers (unless otherwise noted):

  

  Camp at Shinumo Wash our first night in the canyon

  

  Aili showing off her mad Frisbee skills in Redwall Cavern

  

  Geology is fun!

  

  
  

  Lead climber June Marion showing the boys the line up to Thunder River cave. Climbing into the mouth of the Thunder River cave was a highlight of the trip.

  
  

  

  Thunder River

  

  Snow on the rim provided some epically scenic views

  

  I'm not sure if elves wear drysuits, but we sure did

  
  

  
  

  
  

  

  Stormy evening in camp (Photo: Lucas Reitman)

   Lucas also put together some footage of a few of the big rapids from a rafter’s perspective here: 
  
  
   
  Grand Canyon from Lucas Rietmann on Vimeo.
  
  
  In short- the Grand Canyon is a fantastic Christmas break trip, and permits for this time of year are far easier to land than other times of the year. Bring extra socks, extra whiskey, and remember to zip up the relief zipper on your drysuit!
  
  
  Here’s the link to apply for Grand permits. You can also sign up for email notifications and they will let you know when cancellations are available!
  
  
  -Anna