Hello All!
Discovered this website today and thought it had some interesting stuff!
http://www.womensadventuremagazine.com/index.php
An update on life so far:
Work, snowboarding, pool sessions, video games, and hanging with friends!!!
Good times, but I still can’t wait to get out on the water and surf!!!
Till next time!
Cheryl
We left on the 15th of January at 6:00 AM to go to York Pennsylvania to go and visit some friends. The day we got there Stuart and Jessica were not home, they had gone snowboarding. So we only found Hua and Steven. We unloaded and Zachary and I played with Steven until Stuart and Jessica came back, then I played with Jessica. That night Jessica and Steven came into the room where Mom, Daddy and I slept [Zachary slept in the basement] and they started to scream and run from bed to bed. Very entertaining!
The next day we all went to Baltimore to walk in the harbor. There we went in a light house then we walked some more and we found an old tractor and Steven did not want to get off. Then we went to eat, we ate seafood!:)After we went to play on a big propeller. Later, we went back to their house and I played with Jessica.
The next day we all went to the Air and space museum in Washington[IT'S HUGE]. I went in a simulator with Daddy he drove and I was the gunner and we spent most of our time UPSIDE DOWN!!! We were there for the hole day and when Stuart, Hua, Jessica and Steven left we went to see the monument, we also tried to see the white house but we could not get close. Before we got in the car we went to Starbucks for a yummy hot chocolate. for super we ate shrimp, it was good except mine were all stubborn, the shell would NOT come off!!! I also taught Jessica and Steven how to use shrimp as puppets. the only downside of the day is that we all went to bed at 10:00!!!
the next morning we left them and went to Philadelphia to see Daddy’s cousins, on the way we stopped at a toy train museum but it was closed but right next to it there is a motel called The Red Caboose where you can rent a caboose for a night. A bit farther there is a train museum so we went there, we looked around and there was a fun zone where you can control a toy train, all in all we were there for 2 hours.When we got to our destination we unpack and chatted, then we took a walk and then we went to eat super, we ate really good pizza.
the next day we headed for home and as usual, the drive home is very boring,you don’t stop very much and blah blah blah and you just want to go HOME.
Emily
The Ottawa river was not very good. Although the boys had fun on Horseshoe,mom,Cheryl and I did not have very much fun because Babyface was not in, so we went back to the cabin and went for a bike ride and we saw two dead snakes and a dead something else, very gross looking. Later we made a fire,ate a very nice Thanksgiving canned supper and went to bed after it started to snow.The next morning we FROZE so we waited a bit but we still ended up going home. 
The end of the trip!
Emily
We drove for at least 2 to 3 hours,we ate lunch, than we climbed on a dune, they ask you not to climb on the side with the parking lot because it will make it move faster. The dune moves four feet a year. We jumped down a steep part of the dune to the beach which you are allowed to do. We saw a power plant and the water was warm. On our way to the dune we saw a whole whack of dead trees! We listened to a lot of music in the car, we also played this bingo game where you look outside for things that are on your paper, mum won and Zach lost because he had thrown out his papers. We stayed at a hotel for the night.
Emily
on our way to Texas we hit traffic and the car did something weird, so daddy fixed it. Then we made a detour around the traffic. When we got to our cousin’s house, Al and Zane were just leaving to go to Zane’s football practice, so we unpacked and found out the house is HUGE!!! They came back sooner than we expected because Zane’s football practice was canceled. Then not long after that Elisa, Zack and Zecke came back from Zack’s soccer practice.We played together and after we ate supper, we went to bed, Zach and I slept in a bunk bed, I slept on the top bunk and Zach slept on the bottom bunk. 
The next day Zane and Zack went to school and Zecke went to day care while Al and Elisa worked. We went to daddy’s uncle Fred’s house for lunch. Later we went back to our cousin’s house. Zach and I played on the trampoline and with their Nerf guns, then we went with Elisa to go get Zane and Zack at the bus stop (the bus stop is not far). Later she went to get Zecke. Zane, Zack, Zach and I played on the trampoline, Elisa came back with Zecke and he played with us, after that we talked about going to the state fair, we ended up going, we did a lot of rides and I debated on going on a giant swing, I finally said no, looked a bit too big for me. When we got back to Al’s house we went straight to bed. The next day we went to watch Zack’s soccer game and then to watch Zane’s football game. Later we went to uncle Fred’s house for supper. We stayed there till 11:00 or 11:30, so when we got back we went to bed. The next day we played all day other than breakfast , lunch and supper, the next day was the same other then the fact that uncle Fred came for supper. the next day the kids had to go to school we had to leave, so we said goodbye to them, then we packed and said goodbye to Al and Elisa and headed back north!!!
Emily
There’s no discreet way to say this, so here it is…It’s never been mind boggling to me before on how I would pee!! For the first time ever this has been my major one concern on a purchase!!! (I would suggest, that if you do not want to read about someone trying to figure out a pee solution for a dry suit, you stop reading now!)
I’ve decided that in order to extend my paddling season for as long as possible, it would probably be best to suck it up and just buy a dry suit! Now…I don’t know if anyone else has had this issue, but my one major buying factor is the relief zipper! My 3 major clothing company choices were Kokatat, Peak UK, and Level 6. Peak UK and Level 6 offer a unisex option and Kokatat has a women specific style.
I tried on Level 6’s option of the dry suit and I found that the fit wasn’t just right (my hips are too big and my arms are to short!) and that the idea of pee’ing standing up with a device, just wasn’t really an ideal solution for me.
Kokatat…I had to visualize this one! And I may be wrong on how I visualized this but basically there’s a flap that would be unzipped which is fine. The issue for me would be that after it’s been unzipped…again, no clue how to be discreet in saying this… how in the world do you pull your inner layer pants down!? Wouldn’t the leg/crotch part of the dry suit be in the way?
The most innovative option would be Peak UK – they offer a one zipper solution that goes from one ankle to the next – so you would put it on the exact same way as a dry top! The downside, they do not have a retailer in Canada so trying the product on before making the initial purchase is non-existent. =( Also, it’s unisex like Level 6, so I may run into the same issue of my hips being to big and my arms to little!
So…if anyone has any thoughts, comments, reviews…or even links – please let me know! You can e-mail me at cheryl @ cornwall white water dot com (no spaces)
I don’t want to be the person on shore doing the pee dance while trying to get out of a dry suit!!!
Till next time!
Cheryl
Halloween has past (I dressed up as a Shadow!) and we’re already in our second week of November…it is a very upsetting time of year for me!!! In-between seasons is not very fun! It’s starting to get to cold to paddle…but not cold enough for snowboarding!! I normally use this time to catch up to my non-paddling friends, which I think I’ve done a better job of this year than last!!! But it’s still a sad sad time. I’m determined this year to extend my season as long as possible though! Valleyfield is great for this too (the car is right there the whole time, so if it gets to cold, its not a huge issue to get out and get warm!).
Yesterday, Zach and I went to Valleyfield for a late afternoon paddle and it was awesome!!! We definitely enjoyed goofing off and Zach was providing tons of laughing opportunities!!! Oh, and on Saturday I joined the Carleton University Kayak Club (CUKC) pool session and had the chance to teach rolls! (Both guys were showing huge signs of improvement and should be rolling in no time!) I even got some personal time and worked on getting a bow stall! Still no there, but it’s getting a lot better!! After the pool session, a group of CUKC’ers and I went to the Kayak Video Premiere where 3 videos were shown: Just Like You Imaged, Valley High, and Stakeout. All 3 movies were awesome and definitely got me pumped for another season of paddling!!! I may even need to get a creek boat sooner than I thought!!!
Till next time!
Cheryl
So, I think it’s about time I actually wrote something about the West Virginia/Tennesse Hullabaloo! (it’s a hullabaloo because saying hullabaloo is entertaining…much like the trip was!!!) And actually, my trip also went into North Carolina once I departed from the Z’s!!!
Well, I’m not going to bore you with another recap of all the things that happened…Zach did an amazing job at explaining all the things that took place, and Sylvie even highlighted parts of the trip (and yes…I really did tell her to smell a bug…) So, I guess I’ll just mention the things that stood out for myself!!! This is in no particular order!!! And just a warning, I did not reread this after posting!!! Sorry for sentences that run on or just don’t make any sense whatsoever!
Gauley Fest – Gauley Fest was awesome! Seeing all the vendors and paddlers was very cool!!!
Running Lower Gauley – I ran the Lower Gauley on the Saturday of Gauley Fest with Rob, Zach, and a few others (this was all lead by Colin Kemp who organized the WK Throwdown! Which was definitely a success!!!)…Diagonal Wave is now one of my favourite play spots!! I’m definitely going to go back and spend a lot more time there!!! At one point during the day however, I did have a swim…and it wasn’t planned!!! From it, I’ve learned the importance of staying focused and pushing all the way! After an awesome day on the river, I started to slack and get more relaxed and confident, which is good, but I shouldn’t change my paddling style all that much when that happens!!! I’m also used to following a 13 year old boy who is a bit shorter than I am; who I’ve also been able to focus on his paddle strokes so if he paddles super hard to hit a line or something, I can compare how hard I need to paddle in return…now, when you switch that 13 year old boy to an older guy, who’s probably closer to 6’5 in height, obviously (at 5’7), I do not compare! My brain didn’t register that…so let’s just put it that I was way off my line and hit a pour over (should have gone with my first instincts and tried to boof, rather than try to ferry to miss it – another lesson learned!). So…now I’m stuck in a pour over…I ended up windowshading onto the ledge that created the pour over and gave my head a good whack! At that point, it was either keep trying to hold on…or swim…I chose to swim! I remember being proud of myself that I remembered to go into a little tiny ball! I had to try that 2-3 times though before it actually spit me out and kept my boat! (I also need to thank Sylvie for keeping my brand new level 6 socks with her – couldn’t wear them due to poison ivy! So they did not get lost! woohoo). So I swam…Rob got me back to shore, someone saved my paddle…someone else saved my boat…and Zach saved my yellow Croc!!! We thought I lost the other one but it had actually stayed in the boat the whole time!!! Yippie! Overall though, the Lower Gauley was an awesome experience and I can’t wait to run it again!!! There was harder lines that I would never have imagined running on my own! (I did get a boof at one point during the day!!!)
Upper Pidgeon – I ran this one without the Z’s! it was semi-planned but mostly not! The morning of this day I spent trying to find rafting company’s that would let me run with them as I was on my own for this experience! I finally found one and they actually arranged that I could run with some well-known locals/raft guides from another company just down the road. So I geared up and met them at the take out! This was my first time ever running a river with someone in there own personal raft!!! He did it by himself too! Was really cool to watch!!! The Upper was an easier run, lots of class 2-3 and a couple of class 4’s that weren’t very hard at all! Every line was done successfully and planned! And I even got to play at a feature! Towards the end of the day we noticed that the water was rapidly decreasing so we booked it to the take out! Overall I met some new, exciting people and enjoyed a nice river!!! I stayed a bit after to chat with my new friends, and then loaded up my car once more to head to North Carolina!!!
Poison Ivy! – is not fun and makes paddling uncomfortable…I had this for my entire trip…bleh!!!
US Whitewater Park – North Caroline was awesome!! I ended up staying at a hotel that was 40minutes past where I wanted to be, so back tracked to the whitewater park! There was also an event on that day for slalom paddlers so I was asked not to run the harder section =( the other section was fun though and I think I ran it all well over 10 times!!! Definitely got some playboating in there as well!!! After the day was all done, it was time to head home!!!
CUKC Whitewater Weekend – my trip ended on the Ottawa! I joined CUKC for their whitewater weekend! I chose to not run the Middle that day with the majority of the group and rather vested in my time playing on Babyface and Pushbutton!!! After the day was done! I started my trek back home so I could work the following day!
This trip was definitely the highlight of my year!!! The paddling, the adventure, and the friends were all awesome!!! And even the driving wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be!!!
Till the next Hullabaloo!!!
Cheryl
If you would like to read a detailed description of what we did and places we saw, you can read Emily’s post on this blog or go to Zachary\’s kayak life
As for me, I will list the highlights of our trip. They are not in any order of importance or chronological.
There was a lot of driving and I was mostly in the passenger seat so looking at the scenery was a big part of my trip. The drive to Gauley fest was very nice. I also brought walkie talkies because for part of the trip, we had 2 cars, so we had a lot of random comments that made me smile.
Seeing a goat on the side of the highway.
Making it back to Gauley fest after driving the boys to the put in. The road there with our Golf and the trailer attached was lets just say interesting! We realized the next day that the muffler was kind of hanging. Robert fixed it before we hit the road again. I think it is still held on with a wire
A few town’s names made me smile: Yazoo, Kalamazoo, Mattoon, PawPaw, Effingham, Dix (it was a small town and being a half french family, we wondered if there were towns named neuf, huit, sept, etc….)
Crazy squirrels. Here at home, most squirrel you see on the road when faced with an incoming car run towards the side, not always in time and not always the closest side but they try to get out of the way. In West Virginia, we saw them run in random directions on the road, sometime going off and then back on the road as if going in zigzag would prevent them from getting hit.
One afternoon, coming back to our campsite on Summersville lake, we found a pile of wood for our campfire left there by some fellow campers that left that day. Thanks!
Finding Emily in one piece in the eddy after she swam, I actually did not see her swim so I wasn’t at all worried, I thought she was just waiting for us with her dad in the eddy until I got closer and saw that she did not have a boat 
Then, finding her boat and learning later that a group of paddlers had found her paddle and left it on shore with a marker on the side of the road(a red cup) so we could find it easily. Thanks!!
Cooking on a campfire.
Finding my tent dry. We came back from laundry and lunch out on a very rainy day and found Zachary’s tent floating, Cheryl’s was leaking but ours was ok We tried to move Zachary’s tent but it was our old one(we bought it in 1991) and it ripped. We salvaged all his stuff and sleeping bag before it got all wet and he slept in the car that night. We have room in our tent but the car looked more appealing I guess!
Finding out on the highway in Dallas that the car’s problem was very easy to fix by Robert and that we had everything we needed to fix it on the side of the road!!
Going to the biggest state fair with the family and watching the kids go on all the rides. I was also very happy to make it to the fair in one piece, we were following our cousin in downtown traffic! Very stressful for the passenger!
Spending time with the whole family in Texas.
Getting a tour of the Jackson factory. Thanks Eric!
Visiting the Winter Quarters State Historic Site in Newellton Louisiana.
Stopping at the New River Gorge.
Climbing on the Dune on the shore of lake Michigan. Even if it was raining.
Walking around in Hot Spring Arkansas. Then finishing diner just before the thunderstorm hit.
Watching the cousins get in a kayak and Zane roll with Robert while collecting rocks with Zecke and bringing him back to the house with pockets full of them.
Hiking down to Pillow rock. Then hiking back up and telling Emily every few minutes that we were almost there!
Being told to smell a bug ( I told Cheryl that one kind of bug stings but she heard stinks so she told me to smell it to see if it was that bug)
Paddling the Olympic park on the Ocoee.
Except for Gauley fest, we had facilities in every campsite we stayed at.
Paddling the Ocoee and the Hiwassee with everyone.
Catching a Jackson hat and sponge.
Looking for bugs with the kids ( scorpions, stick bugs, big spiders)
Finding the keys. ( We have one big set of all the keys we need for the car, trailer, locks and 2 cargo boxes, we cannot loose them)
There are a lot of highlights! It was nice to spend time together as a family, paddle, visit some interesting places and visit relatives. We had a good time and now have a few more places we’d like to go back to!! That’s for the next vacation
Sylvie
The rest of Gauley fest was ok other than the parties at night which were great! Saturday me and mum went biking and after we just sat around waiting for Zach, Cheryl and daddy to get back from kayaking. I read and mom slept, finally they came back. Sunday we packed and MORE DRIVING, this time it was not very long, just down the road actually. We put up our tents, talked, I tried my new boat for the first time ate around a fire and went to bed. The next day the boys paddled the upper Gauley with World Class Academy. That day there was a boat race, Cheryl, mom and i went to watch it at pillow rock, (bad idea!) to go down you have to go down a hill that is practically vertical! Plus it was raining! Good thing is it was the right way, because we were not the only people there. Back at the camp site, we went biking. We went far enough that when we got back we were very wet and a bit muddy, so we took a shower. after the boys came back we ate supper and went to bed.
Emily