Cooperfest!

The Cooper River - WA

Sunshine, warm water, friendly locals and fun drops.

 

The Cooper is a fun class IV creek right outside of Cle Elum, WA. It's also one of the few places in Washington where you can creek in a shorty or a paddle jacket and one of the last creeks to run into the summer/fall season.

Adam Ales and I drove up over the pass for the day, to see what was happening in Cle Elum, I didn't know that I would be spending the weekend at Cooperfest 12'!

We thought we would start the weekend off right with a nice flat tire...

The Cooper starts off with an awesome slide and then it just turns up the volume and shoots you out the other end.

Entrance Slide:

Phil lines up for the next ledge immediately downstream.














A couple fun rapids and then you're in the pool above S-Turn, one of the larger drops on the river.



S-Turn has a cool entrance move: starting middle with right angle you can boof onto a big pillow and then ride out a huge brace to the finish line.

There is a super fun boof right above the last ledge in Norm’s Resort.





Norm’s Resort always has vacancies and would love to valet your creeker for you.

You come to the very end of the run, feeling happy and satisfied. You see locals sunbathing on the sandstone rocks creating the river left wall. From the pools above Wall of Voodoo, if you’re fortunate, you get to hear the “oooooohhh’s” and “ OHHHHHHHHHHH’s!!” of the crowd that always forms around carnage.

Good and bad lines in Wall of Voodoo:

Phil Kast likes to get rowdy.

Rob drops in to help out.

Then Leif cleans house:

 




 
Just two dudes make'n out. No big thing.

 

 

There's shuttle rigs, and then there's shuttle rigs...


Stay classy Seattle.