Ottawa Kayak School

Hey its Sean checking in. This week was awesome this morning me and Gaylan made breakfast. it was pretty good i think BLTs should be for breakfast everyday. The water levels have been messed up! its been going down but its impossible to predict. this morning it was 1.5 and by lunch it was 2.5 very strange. It skipped right over baby face (so sad.) i really want to blunt more consistently and maybe flat water loop cartwheels in a hole for sure.
tuesday we went to the movies we saw GI joe it was cool.
on thursday were going to La chine it will be awsome. my stay has been awsome
and i want to thank every person from wt and keeners for making my stay unforgetable ( im leaving next week.)
thanks for reading see you later.
sean

This is Ian reporting in for my second blog as a keener. We kicked of this week great with a full day up at McCoys doing river running a playing on the great play at this level. Yesterday corner wave was prime and all the keeners had a great time surfing it; especially because with such a small group a keeners you never have to worry about not having enough time on the wave.
The breakfasts here have been great, this morning Sean and Galen made up blt’s, needless to say they were fantastic thanks guys. With the small group a different set of keeners gets to make breakfast every day, it ends up working out really well making it so we get a great HOT breakfast almost every day.
This week water is low so we may take a trip to an other river like the Gatineau or we may even trek in down to Montreal for Lachine because it has came in the last couple days, either way it’s something I’m really looking forward to.

Regards Ian

hi my name is Peter Semehen i am 14yrs old and i started kayaking last summer and Keeners has helped me alot .every morning we assign two Keeners to make breakfast. Today we had BLT’s and they were amazing . The water levels have been changing alot so the river has been changing it is great. BYE

hey its Galen i am finishing up my first week at keeners right now. this week i learned how to do flat water helix’s and i got one loop however i am still very inconsistent on them. i dident paddle for about two weeks before i came here and i am getting the feel back and gaining a lot of river running skills. The highlight of my week was on Friday when I ran dragons toung twice and the secconet time i ran it i got worked in the pourover and in the hole at the bottem and the two back straps of my helmit got ripped off. it was awsum!

This week I freshened up on loops at Brain Dutsch and 7/8 Hole. Flatwater loops and Hole loops are going much better. Clay and Tino instructed us down the Main each day and I worked up the confidence to run the the boof and the Lorne. Wednesday and Thursday the level dropped and Corner Wave came in (right next to keener ville) and we ran some new lines down coloseum. The Meltdown line at coli is pretty in intimidating but fun. It involves at presision move over a finger like rockl narrower than a playboat. It is hard to line up for because there are few land marks above the boof and two small waves keep you from see the line until too late. Liam and I both missed our lines multiple times and fell into toast oven like slot hole and got pretty good down time. I am excited to get better at blunting on corner wave. In addition Tyler Fox substituted for tino and had alot of great things to stay about river safety, river running moves and freestyle move on flat water and in waves and holes. I am grateful that tyler came and taught today i really learned alot from him. I think the best thing about the keener program is the diversity of the paddling instruction. Specifically, the changing of instructors from week to week and the ability to learn from a different person each day.
cameron

Danny K here checking in a little late after some late night first aid delayed the everpresent weekly blog. So yesterday we finished up the course of first aid by speeding through the last chapters, going through a bunch of review, and then breezing by a quick test. Phils rodeo was pretty sick on the weekend with a bunch of crazy surfs. Congrats to Cameron on his beatdown, being in right sides for like 10 minutes definitely deserves that brand new mountain surf skirt. Since I’m writing this up on race wednesday, I might as well put in a bit about that. I ran the main today and tino pretty much tried to get us beat down in every section of the race.
First of all we had the BOATERCROSS race at big water coliseum, then we had to skirt the first wave into this sketchy eddy, do two rolls, then find a way either down the other huge hole/waves or the big boiling section right below the eddy with a ton of undercuts. Away from all that, I got through the first round, but did not make it to the finals where Liam claimed a first place.
Moving down the blog list I’d just like to say thank you to all my instructors and the other keeners for a great time. CANT FORGET PARTY SAM AND MOTHER JACKIE TOO. Ill be taking my experience to a different camp next year where hopefully I can get some kids hooked on whitewater and kayaking just like I was.
Peace…

So yes its becoming a bit sad seing as its going to be my last week at Keeners but this week has been so good, Ive paddled the main for both Monday and Teusday this week, ive spent most of my time refining skills at wikiki and the hole at the bottom of butchers night as well as tripple nipple and big kahuna! Ive found my tricks have become a whole lot bigger and a lot more consistant which is definatlty a good thing.

Rhys

Hey its Liam, yesterday was a lot of fun we split the group up one went down the middle the group I went down with went down the main. We surfed y kee kee it was one of the best days I have had on the Ottawa. I did two air scrows it was wicked also we went to blacks that was also good. Today I did the same thing also I stuck a couple loops and I stuck my first flat water loop today!

Liam Dhillon

Hey, this is Josh sighing in for what could be my last blog post. I have had an amazing time here at Keeners. I only have two days left and I will be sad to leave! I have learned so much in three weeks and met so many great people! I hope to be back next year!
We had photo and video class this weekend! Both were great but I really learned a lot in photo class! Sam is such a great teacher and I hope hope we have one more class before I leave!
I ran Dragons Tongue on Tuesday! I was supper nervous to run it because it looks really big and scary! I finally decided to go for it and I am so happy that I did! It was one of my goals for keeners and I am really happy that I achieved it!
I got a couple of loops, some spins, a blunt and an accidental back loop today! Doing a back loop is a pretty awesome sensation and I would really like to do another one!
I am really nervous for big water beat down day tomorrow! I hope it will me fun and that no one actually gets hurt!
Until next time..
Josh