World Kayak Event Coverage

Day minus one in Reno… well, Nevada… cause today was not tooo much about Reno. It seems the town of Reno is ready for James. Got here at, like, 1:30 am EST… after an epic day of travel, too much rain in Chicago made the metal birds go boing. Luckily Bruce (said with a nice smile) hooked me up on an even better itinerary, on that got me into Reno a bit later, but one that didn’t involve flying all the way to the west coast, down the coast, then up again to Reno … 6 hours in a plane VS 12 hours! Yay Bruce! Bruce gave me his number though… sorry Bruce, we did have quality time together, but my lovely wife and kids wouldn’t approve It was over between us the moment I walked through the security check.

WK partner in crime, Colin picked me up and was ready to inform me of my intinerary, Day minus one… Thursday, we’re goin’ paddling! Thursday am we woke up to Nevada landscape of rolling sand and rock hills, low bushes, the threat of mountain lion and coyote and a good many wild mustangs grazing at Colin’s new flat outside of the sity… a windy road up to somewhere… awesome, I’m in another place… its been a while since my last paddling trip. After a tete-a-tete with the WK gang, Colin, KB (WK Montana Ambassador) and KB’s good buddy Luke and I headed for the Middle Fork of the American just across the border in California… Chamberland Falls section. The last time I paddled a creek was… well… never. The closest I’ve been to a creek was doing the Azul in Patagonia… and the Magpie… neither of which I did any of the real moves.. Words like “boof” and the quick lines are not really part of my vocab on the Ottawa, but my life long focus on simple river running (mostly in protest of the lines on the Ottawa to play). In a nutshell, I was a bit sketched but Colin was all over my confidence and ensured me that there will be no big scary challenges for me on this run… cool.

Colin and gang were pumped, I was pumped and off we went. First moves showed up pretty much immediately, starting with slicing down a 5 foot drop by a ledge hole. I was in my first creek boat (Hero) and immediately found its stability an ability to meet the lines head on, I’m happy to say we all did awesome, making that and all other lines really clean. The day was highlited by a ton of boof rocks, great classic creek moves S-turning our way through some really fun whitewater. The only sticky spot of the day found the four of us bumpin’ around in a whirlpool eddy that Colin sat in as safety… er… we weren’t supposed to be in that eddy. We all stuck our lines great, but with the 4 of us in a small sketchy spot, things got fun. Thanks to my inability to control the craft, I ‘aided’ KG into the hole… he had fun there for sure taking a classic Californian beating. I’ll let him finish the story for ya’all… me, I got out the easy way… got up on a rock and climbed out;-)

The one great thing about Colin is his ability to guage what ails a paddler and help them deal with it. In my case it was the whole ‘new river’ thing, first paddle of the year, first creek, first creek boat… but he knew I could do every run, it was all head. He didn’t go into too much detail, if at all, about consequence. His brief line descriptions were… matter of fact, clear and with no “and oh… if you miss this line, your in a hole.” We all just listened, understood and did. KB and Luke were old pros on a creek and styled everything. Both spent most of our 3 hours with giant smiles as the skipped off anything that would give them air. ¾ of the way down, with a huge amount of confidence, I too started the rock thing… my first boof off a rock was a doooozy, landed to WOOO HOOOs from all the gang and a smile from ear to ear. I don’t know if any of you really watch a group of creekers on the easy sections of these rivers, its pure comedy to me watching us nutjobs wonkin’ into anything that sticks up a bit out of the water. Yeah! I cruised my first rocks! At the end of the day I did flip a few times, mostly due to weirdness in a boat with out a full planning hull, but all was good and after those first rolls, my season begins!

As with most classic rivers, the end had a fun grand finale involved a nifty couple of S-turns to an 8 foot boof over a nifty hole. The choice was either river left through the wave train or the boof. When Colin looked at me and asked his ‘what line are you running James’ I think I surprised all, including myself, with ‘I run the boof’. With Colin on the rocks with a camera, the three of us ran one after another, all three sticking the move… the photos capture it all… huge smiles … and better yet, an ol’ school ender hole right next to us. We didn’t last long there, but trying to get an ender after all these years was fun for me… save the paddle in the nose thing = ouch.

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Day 1 is tomorrow, gotta get rested up for a day on hard rocks with a camera and computer. Colin, thanks for the run! You are definitely the man… sorry Bruce!