West fork of the Satsop

The Gorge Run.

Ernies Canyon with Matt

I was able to take Matt Kurle down my favorite run while it had water in it and the weather was absolutly gorgeous. We got an early start and we had a shuttle driver so life was good.
Enjoy:

Boof Left! Ernie's Canyon

Wood in a bad spot

Big Nasty, Ernie's Canyon

Big Nasty, Ernie's Canyon

Matt Kurle comin through the entrance of Big Nasty

Matt Kurle in the second ledge of Big Nasty

Matt getting wild in Big Nasty

Matt Kurle put together a sick video of our day on the water:



Deer Creek

Right outside of Oso, WA, this gem of a "Creek" lays dormant most of the season. Deer Creek flows into the North Fork of the Stilliguamish river and is in when Robe Canyon is looking a little meatie (6.5' and higher in Robe). This monster is an under appreciated and seldom boated must-do if you're in the area and water levels cooperate.

I had never heard of Deer Creek before, so when Ben called and said that Adrian and I should rally out Saturday morning I said "Deer Creek? Tha hell is that?"

But the goods were in store. I partied a little too hard the night before and was not on my A-game in the morning.

Throwing up at the put in. Deer Creek.

I spent the Friday night before this epic in Bellevue, tasting the fine brews that they had to offer. When Adrian called me to tell me he was on the way to come get me, I couldn't open  my eyes. I thought I was blind for a good full five minutes and then I realized I had slept with my contacts in the night before and my eyelids where glued shut. I told Adrian that I didn't feel like boating as I started retching. He used some colorful expletives to make me question my manhood and then I agreed on the condition that he would let me stop to get coffee. He agreed. When Adrian finally found me at a friends dry cleaning business I could barely walk and had to empty my stomach twice on the way to the car.

Adrian and I met up with Ben, Joe and Kiwi Mike. Kiwi Mike opted to drive us up to the put in. The take out is easy to find. Right in the town of Oso where Deer Creek connects with the North Fork of the Stilliguamish river. There's an old railway bridge you can park next to and it seemed pretty legit ie, no broken glass.

Hudson. The only rapid name we knew.

We got lost a couple times trying to find a good spot to start hiking. No one in our group had actually been on the run before and only Ben had the beta. It was snowing pretty heavily and the body heat in the back of Kiwi Mike's van was making my head swim.The hike in is just as brutal as the logging roads you have to drive up to get to the put in. I would venture its about a mile from where we parked the truck down to the water. More than 50% of that is on a very steep, densely forested hill. More times than I can count I  lost my footing and tumbled. I heard a rumor than on a subsequent trip Rob fell and dropped his boat all the way into the river and had to swim to catch it right above Hudson.

You have a little bit of class III boogie before you get to Hudson. Hudson was the only named rapid that we knew and I think it was the biggest of the day. A decent lead in and a scout eddy up top allows a view. Two lines were apparent. River left and then a hard ferry back to river right above a massive hole. Or, a mank line down river right and then a straight shot through the right side of the bottom hole. Adrian and I took the right mank line the first time we ran Deer Creek and I would not recommend it at those levels. It was very pinnie and sharp. We both took the left line on our second trip, and while I got hung up in a stiff eddy line, I think the left line is much easier and more fun. The hole though...

Big hole.

Not my style son.

Lots of eddy service above Hudson.

Panorama of Hudson from the old growth lodged on the shore.

After you get past Hudson there is nothing but quality class V. Its all good to go, with lines all over the place and good downstream visibility. We got into a rhythm of one or two people scouting and then relaying beta until we got to this bad boy.

Big rapid number 5000...

We don't have a name for this guy, but its all good fun. I didn't get any pictures of the rapid above this but its a pretty straight forward slide(ish) into a moving pool. You need to catch this eddy on river left if you intend to scout as there's nothing on river right and this rapid is waiting. It looks a bit rough but its very manageable.

On our first lap we all ran down the left side the whole way down. Went fine. On our second lap, Ben and Joe Howard took the center most line and then fought left at the end. Joe got some ride time in a rather benign looking hole and I remember Ben smashing his face on the big boulder in the far left of the above photo. The current piles into that rock or feeds into a large hole just to river right of it. I took a more conservative line and started left, ferrying right above Joe's hole and then down the far right side.

Good times.

More amazing boogie and we came to this thing. A two teired ramp of Gnar. The whole river make a 90 degree left turn and goes over a broken U shaped ledge. The river left side is vertical while the right side is a slide with a 3 or 4 foot drop at the end. In the middle of the second tier is a large upstream facing pin rock. I wouldn't want to come anywhere near this thing. Our initial line was to take the slide right and then boof

The same rapid viewed from downstream. Notice dead center pin rock.

I went next and got off the slide, then went a little too far right and fell into a little slot up against the right rock that we were scouting from. I didn't stay stuck for very long, but it was long enough for my eyes to pop out of my skull. Stay off the right wall! I have a feeling that if I hadn't of had the speed that I did coming into that slot, it would have been a different story all together.

They stack up in Deer Creek. Rapid right below the Two Tiers of Terror.

Still looking downstream.

Another upstream view of the Two Tiers and the canyon.

The rapid directly below the Two Tiers of Terror.

I like my rapids with as much wood in them as possible. Well, not really. This rapid looked much worse from above than it really was. Once you got out and looked you could see that the hole at the bottom was deep and pretty un-retentive (we hoped). The line is river left all the way down.

Don't worry about the tree. Not in play unless you blow your line above.

The rest of the run is pretty much the same. Just awesome rapid after awesome rapid. Boof and hole after ledge and slot. This is a great run and another one to keep on the radar. I wish I had taken better notes after we got off the river as the memory is a bit hazy. If you're comfortable on Robe, you shouldn't have any issue in Deer Creek. That being said, its much more continuous than Robe Canyon. but it has the same claustrophobic big water feel.

Stay safe!

Check out this awesome video that Matt Kurle put together with my footage of Deer Creek.

Ernies Gorge solo lap

It was a cold day and I had nothing to do. I was feeling a bit froggy and decided to rally out to Ernies for a solo lap. I had run Ernie's Canyon many times up to this point, but never by myself. Ben always does and I used to berate him for it but something changed. I think I just wanted to see what would happen by myself, with no one else to rely on.

Contemplating at my line through Toilet Bowl.

When I left Port Orchard it was already a little late for an Ernies run. I usually like to be at the takeout by noon at the latest so that there is plenty of time to hike in and run shuttle. There wasn't much snow on the ground in Kitsap, but by the time I pulled off of I-90 in North Bend, you could hardly see the road.

Luck was on my side and someone had left the logging gate open at the put in. So, after stashing the mountain bike at the takeout I rushed down to the put-in and dropped off my boat and gear.

Driving to the put-in bridge

In the 20 minutes or so that it took me to drive back to the other side of the logging gate and then walk back in, my boat was completely covered in snow...

Unfortunately placed wood in Double Boof

I don't know all the names of the rapids in Ernies, nobody seems to know any of them, except the big four. This rapid usually doesn't have wood in it (and its gone now 12/18/11) but I had talked to Ben the week before this trip and knew that there were some new wood hazards to watch out for.

Double Boof

After scouting I decided to walk on river left. Sad, because this is one of the more interesting rapids due to its dynamic nature. You come in hot just off the rocks on river left and boof left into a little "calm" spot, then head hard left to avoid getting stuffed into the undercut on river right that the majority of the water piles into.

Panorama of Double Boof

Another awesome drop that was, at the time, ruined by wood: Boof Left. I love Boof Left because it scares the living daylights out of me. You come down some mank, trying to stay off the right wall (where 90% of the water goes) because there are multiple strainers, hit a small funky pool and charge hard towards the ledge. You boof left, diagonally between the ledge and a huge boulder that blocks the direct path of the water. I've never missed my line and I don't want to think about what would happen if you did on this one.

Boof Left. The wood is barely visible in the left third of the photo.

Ben actually found this piece while doing a solo morning lap while Rob and I were on our way out there. Due to complacency, we usually do not scout this rapid and neither did Ben. He took the standard line and boofed, landing squarely on a piece of wood lodged in the landing zone of this awesome drop. Luckily Ben was alright, could have been a very different story, but he was able to give us some beta before our own run. So I knew ahead of time that this stick was still in play and in the way of good times. 

The lead-in to Big Nasty

Big Nasty is the psychological crux of the run for me. This rapid just plain wiggs me out. No reason, I've never been worked in it, never swam out of it or had anything bad happen. It just scares the crap out of me.

The lead-in to Big Nasty

The wood in the lead-in to Big Nasty is new as well (and gone now 12/18/11), but you could get around this log. Little Nasty has two normal lines, far left and far right. I usually opt for the far left line but the log made the decision easy and I went right. Now all that was left was Big Nasty.


Shortly after Big Nasty is Toilet Bowl. One of my favorite drops on the run. Its just fun! This rapid has the most in play sieve, I guess. After you paddle through the toilet bowl and out the chute, you are in the main current which is going straight towards a large sieve. You have to be upright and have your mind set on a course of action as soon as you come out of the toilet bowl chute as you have about 20 feet or so before you're under a rock. I hate rolling here, but it happens.

Toilet Bowl

All in all a good day. Some carnage and missed lines here and there, but a good day. Got back to my truck before dark and made it home in time for dinner with my mom, who was in town for the Holiday weekend.

Solo boating probably isn't the smartest thing in the world, but then again, on a run like Ernie's theres not much people can do for you if you get into trouble. I've seen swims in Ernie's and I've seen boats get destroyed, but I knew I wasn't going to swim. And if I did, my boat was already cracked anyway I guess.

Either way, there was something magical about being all alone out there in the middle of the woods with no one around to gum up the peace. No other sounds except the gurgling and rushing of water, the background white noise of snow falling on evergreens and the pulsing of blood through my veins. Theres no sense of time. You're not waiting to run a drop or waiting for anyone else to drop into the eddy next to you. You just go, or you don't go. Its all internal impetus. It was a learning experience. A huge learning experience.  I was able to gauge my confidence level as well as find my risk vs. reward threshold. All too often you just "go for it" because your buddies are there with throwbags and chase boats, or at least I do. But stuff can still go wrong, even with everybody there to help. This was just another way of steeping up my game and finding out where I was at mentally.

A great day.