Last Weekend - Tumwater Canyon

Oh Snap! Tumwater is good to go!

I was fortunate to catch a bunch of the Leavenworth locals while they were out having a good time and screaming down Tumwater Canyon at mach speed. 

Tumwater was around 2500 on Saturday and by Monday it was down just under 2300cfs.

It pains me to say, but with how quickly it was dropping; Tumwater will be out fo the season pretty soon.

Where are they? Sorry guys, we're slow like that.

Doctor Pat aka Popeye.

Here we have some chargers showing us the lines through Last Exit. This rapid is tough at any level, but 2000+cfs and it feels like you're riding a railroad boxcar down a ski-slope. Intense!

Kiwi's always boat a little strange; Mike Nash decides to playboat his creekboat.

John Fuqua in Exit.

Willie Kern

Adrian Wigston in Last Exit:





Jah Himself takes the meat line:

Ellie Wheat jumped out to grab these shots of Scott Waidelich and I.

This guy was crushing marriage vows less than 24 hours prior to the shot. 

Alternate lines happen:

Afternoons in Tumwater are the best. Every drop is backlit and your view as you drop over pour over after pour over is perfect.

On our last lap of the weekend; the team was down to two. Jeremy Bisson and I went skin to the wind and rallied down The Wall while Adrian and Scott shot the next series of photos.

Until next time.

Last Weekend - Clear Fork Cowlitz & The Ohane

Clear Fork of the Cowlitz.

For as long as I've been interested in hiking through Devil's Club and carrying my kayak immense distances on my shoulder, I've heard about the Clear Fork of the Cowlitz.

I was able to get a lot of footage out if this mission so I will do an entire post on the CF Cowlitz later.

There was a lot of portaging on this trip...

... and a lot of getting sick.

The next morning we were able to bang out a quick Ohane lap on our way up to Icicle and Tumwater Canyon.

Caught up with the Portland crew as they were putting on for their first lap of the day.

I didn't get any photos of Icicle or Tumwater this weekend, but I was able to shoot a bunch of video so I'll try to get that online soon.

Another solid weekend in the books.

Video: The Cooper River, WA

 The Cooper River, just outside of Cle Elum here in Washington state, is a late summer resource that starts to come in as everything else is starting to drop out. It's also a great place to start scratching that creeking itch.

I spent a two day weekend on the Cooper, last July, with some awesome people. Old friends and some new friends came out to show me the lines and generally have a great time. Theres a decent amount of CaRnAgE to be had on the Cooper...

Music Credit:
Pretty Lights vs Summertime  &    Latyrx - Lady Don't Tek No


This is a quick edit to get the footage off the hard drive and into the internets.

Cheers

Random People on Random Rivers

Adrian Wigston put together this great clip of some of last season's adventures.

Check it out:

Video - Top Tye Creek

Top Tye Creek!!!





Top Tye Creek is kinda like those ice creams that I used to get at Dairy Queen as a kid. They take an ice cream cone and dip it in molten chocolate that instantly hardens into a hards(ish) shell. You’re taking awesome and making it AWESOMER. This is possible with some things in life; ice cream first and foremost, then cars I guess and finally Creeks. Top Tye is one of these.

Top Tye Creek is AWESOMER.

Back in the day, this was considered a beast and is in one of Tao’s videos: ‘Twitch 2000’. They make it look pretty intense but this creek is definitely in the boatable range for anyone who is decently confident in their ability to hit a delayed boof and doesn’t mind a little beating now and again. I would say a solid class IV boater who feels good on CC Lewis would be fine in here.

There is an entire section above this portion of the run that is even bigger. No one in this day’s group were feeling froggy enough to jump, with the obvious exception being Rob.  Rob McKibbin ran every major drop on the river this day and while I don’t have it on film; it’s the first top to bottom, no portage descent that we know of. I could be wrong, maybe the older crew has beaten him to it, but I kind of doubt it.

Top Tye is a great place to tie your creeking shoelaces. It’s steep, with must make boofs that will teach you the error of your paddling ways. It’s also very much a pool drop run though, so even if carnage happens there’s a good chance you’ll stay in the eddy below the feature.

There’s a fine line with flows here. Too little water and the F* you rocks are out in force, screwing up the best intentions. Then there’s the high water days that take all the fun out of your heart and fill your stomach with dread. But those days are good too, sometimes. This weekend the river level in the Skykomish was around 8800 cfs and dropping. The sapling, that we use as the gauge down at the takeout, was about 4-6 inches out of the water. This is a low flow, perfect for first timers and veterans alike.

I apologize for all the POV but it’s so hard to get out on the bank for a run like this. It would be like stopping at the bottom of each hill on a rollercoaster. Not gonna happen!

Enjoy:

Stay Safe

Snow Gnomes - Robe in January

Yup, more Robe pictures.

A group of us made it into Robe when all else was too low. Snow on the ground, Ice in the trees and bright blue sky made for a memorable day on the water.

We used an alternate putin:



The forest on the trek down to the river was gorgeous.

Signs of man.

The boys breaking the frost off of their sprayskirts

Theres quite a few small hot springs in the area, none are large enough for full immersion though.

Sean Lee in T1.

Garbage.

Brett Barton in Garbage rapid.

Christian knight in Garbage rapid.

Icicles at Catcher's Mitt.

Good day on the water.

Stay Stoked, Stay Safe.