18-Nov-2007
Washago Black
Water Level: 7.65 on Washago Black gauge
Most of the people were on time for meeting at the putin at 11am. I however was late as I decided to go to a last minute house party in Hamilton the night before. And yes I got picked on for being late. The air temperature was a bit cool today probably around the 0C mark.
We had a huge crowd. More people showed up than expected but hey we are all friendly paddlers and we just ended up being one happy family. Here goes it for names (sorry if I missed anyone). Janice, Blaine, Greg, Neil, Dan, Dan’s friend who was paddling my boat, Doug, Colin (different one), Louis and friend, and myself. Janice and Blaine were the kayakers in the group and everyone else where open boaters. Most of the group had never been on this particular river before.
We probably finally got started around 11:30ish. I was paddling in a different boat today. I borrowed a Esquif Nitro from my fellow paddler Geoff. It is a lot shorter and way narrower than my current boat. It was a bit tippy at the start but I soon was getting the hang of it. We started to head down river. This was the lowest I have ever paddled this river and wasn’t sure what to expect.
The first set of rapids were non-existent.The next set was ok and everyone was starting to get warmed up. We ended up staying at Baby Ender for a while as people seemed to be enjoying themselves. I ended up having my first and only swim of the day after. All I can say is the water was brrrrr.
There were a few surf spots just above the lunch rock. It was really weird to see the rock ledges above the lunch rock for the first time. The ledge after the lunch spot and before the bridge was ok. Some people decided to carry back up and run the ledge again. Dan decided to run it backwards for some reason but hey that’s Dan.
We paddled down the long flatwater stretch. Everyone played for a bit on this one wave where we ended up having swimmer number two of the day. We then headed down river since everyone was done. I ended up playing icebreaker to see if we could make it through the channel but it was too low. Greg came in to break up the ice as well. We had to make the run around the bend before getting to Bell Ringer. I opted not to run Bell Ringer as it was too low for me and I did not want to put a gouge in Geoff’s boat. Janice, Greg, Neil, Dan, Doug and Colin ran it. They all carried back up from the other side of the island and we all headed down to the Cottage Rapids.
There ended up being a sweet surf wave at Pinkies. Dan was on there forever. Neil managed to get on for the same ride. Some of the others were on for a bit but not as much as the two wave hogs did. My feet were getting a bit cold and I decided to head down to the take out. The was a bump and grind at the bottom of Cottage Rapids as we had about three boats stuck in one place at the same time.
I got to the takeout first and Janice was right behind me followed by Colin and Doug. The others were still playing on the river. I decided to borrow Neils truck in order to get the rest of the vehicles for us that were finished for the day. I was glad we did that as the others were still playing on the river when we came back.
All in all it was a nice day to be out paddling. There was way more water here than the Lower Head and I am glad we came hear instead. Thanks to Val for scoping out the river the day before and posting the recommendation.
Video Clip
