Friday:
I stopped by Matt Troutman’s place in the Burg on Friday afternoon and asked him if he thought anyone would be paddling at Bussy. His answer was yep and the next thing that came out of his mouth was “By Mom” and all his gear was on the top of my car.
We headed over to the river and paddled across to the island. I spent the next couple of hours taking pictures of him, Sam Ewing, Dave Crerar, Stephen Wright, Megan Harpham, Rafas Mexican Buddies, and Jen the photo girl from WT. I still can’t figure out why people want to paddle that thing and get bounced around like a cork but they all had smiles on their faces so I guess it was worth it to them. It was also pretty funny to watch the rafts get totally folded in half.
Soon it was time to leave as we knew the Keeners would be over shortly and the lineup for the tow rope would be huge. We headed back across to the lunch spot and that is when I said hi to Nick, Joel, Rafa, and the keeners.
We ran into Harold Cox and Lisa in the parking lot. He is the manager for the Canadian Freestyle team. I was totally surprised to see him as he had one hell of a drive coming all the way from New Brunswick. After that we headed back to Matt’s place for dinner. I spent about an hour offloading my Bussy pictures and gave Matt his.
I headed over to WT to check in for what I figured would be an entertaining weekend to say the least as I knew there would be at least 30 people for sure. We had a brief meeting with Ryan as to what the schedule would be for Saturday / Sunday before departing ways to setup tents and have a few drinks before crashing for the night.
Saturday:
After breakfast we had another meeting. The group is now at 40 plus 15 of the Canadian Team. Imagine 53 kayakers, 1 C1, and me the token open boater. This was going to be a pretty cool run down the river.
Everyone started loading up their gear onto the huge kayak trailer. Billy was pretty adamant that my boat was not going on that trailer as it was for kayaks. It was the standard Billy / Colin love / hate / poke fun at relationship at its best. Billy won and my boat ended up being shuttled on Harolds truck even though there was room.
We finally made it to the WT putin where it was soon a sea of plastic boats. The weather was starting to crap out on us which would be lousy for pictures but at least we were paddling so no one really cared. I spent some time floating around taking pictures why things were being organized. Soon everyone was broken off into smaller groups and then there was me “open boater party of 1” who floated from group to group.
Nick Troutman came over and decided to grab the front end of my boat and started to do front loops over my boat. It was pretty cool to see. I was hoping to take some pictures but I had the camera put away just incase I ended up going over. Billy decided to come up and start flossing his teeth with my painter line on the front of my boat.
It was great to see the high end paddlers like Billy, Carly, and Nick take the people with less paddling experience down the river.
After a quick warm up we headed over to McKoys. The level was about 14.5 and is the highest I have ever paddled it. We were all going to run the Middle Channel. A lot of people decided to scout this one including me. On my way back up I started to get those butterfly feelings in my stomach and almost heaved. I was pretty nervous to say the least. I started my run down and headed towards Phils. I know there were quite a few of the CDB crew on the sidelines watch my run and I styled it no problem at all. Guillaume said I had a really great line and good boat control as I went through it. I was just happy I didn’t swim. We all walked back up for a group photo before heading down river.
Soon we were coming up to Iron Ring. Pat Camblin ran it in his creeker as some of the gang watched. There was no way I was running that and headed over to scout Little Trickle for a bit as I had never run it before. I asked Guillaume if he thought there was enough water there for me to run it and we agreed there was. I hopped into my boat and started heading down and that is when Katie asked me if I was actually going to run it as I was shaking my head yes. She seemed a bit surprised when I talked to her later that I actually ran it in my boat and I ran it clean with a great line. I took on a bit of water but that was expected and I only had to do a strong low brace at the bottom before making the 90 on the turn before doing the next small drop. I was very happy to say the least!
I tried to catch Angels Kiss on the fly but that ended up in a swim. I tried to surf it a few more times and that also ended up in swims and that is when I decided to get out and take some more pictures before heading down river for a late lunch and some surfing at the bottom channel beside the lunch spot.
Next up was Upper No Name which had a surf spot at the top that I did not bother to try followed by a big wave train. Soon we were at my arch nemesis on the river known as Lower No Name. I hate this rapid as I normally end up getting trashed followed by a long swim. Last season I was 19 for 23 making it thru Phils Hole and probably 12 for 15 swimming Lower No Name. I did not bother getting out to scout it as it would just probably end up freaking me out. I just headed down river for my run. I got to the first wave and went holy crap as about six feet of my boat was probably in the air when I looked forward and seen that another two big waves were still to come. To my surprise I styled it with ease and I was happy that I did not swim. I headed over to shore and started walking up to Big Smoothie to take pictures. Carly Harris was apparently in the eddy when I made my run and she said I did great and had good boat control and this made me happy.
I spent some time of people surfing on Big Smoothie. It was a huge fast wave. There was no way I was getting on that. After that we headed off to the takeout.
I noticed at the takeout that Josh was trying to sneak up on Pikey to make him swim out of his boat. I tried to swim out to him but he started to paddle away. That is when I asked someone for their kayak and paddle and headed out to get him but with using a skirt. I finally caught up to him and grabbed him by his PFD. After a few rolling sessions with me using him as a brace to get back up we came to a dead heat as I could not figure out how to undo his outfitting and he was very tight in his boat. We finally agreed to let go of each other but no I had another problem to contend with as I was about 80 feet from shore and had a boat literally full of water and was paddling it. Soon I was upside down and I wondered if I could actually roll it back up. It took a few times but to mine and the crowds amazement I was back up. I think everyone was pretty surprised that A. I was in a kayak and B. I managed to roll it up full of water. I finally made it back to shore.
Soon it was time to pack up and load the trailers. To Billy’s dismay I finally got my boat on the kayak trailer but it had to be the other one!
Saturday night was sure to be interesting as it was an 80’s night theme party. Not that I had an outfit or anything. The pre-party drinking started in the parking lot. We were waiting for Pat and Steph to crab their car as we were going to drive over and see what Bussy was doing. I spent some time taking pics of Carine and Paul walking on the fence posts. Josh managed to jump over the garbage can which was pretty cool to see.
Pat and Steph were taking for ever and that is when we walked back to where there car was. They found out they could not start their car. It turned out the security system had cut off the ignition system. We spent some time trying various combinations of stuff when I had a brilliant idea and Pat and I went and searched on the internet. Of course during this time the drinking continued. I asked Carine if she want a drink and tried my Nalgene Cooler and showed her where the bar was. We had a couple of options to try and headed back. I disconnected the battery and cleaned off the terminals and waited for twenty minutes but that did not seem to help. We looked for the infamous valet button under the dash but could not find it (Steph found it a couple days later when they had problems at Champlain Bridge).
After a no go we headed back to the main building for some snacks, pool, and partying. Yeah we were kind of lame not being in the 80’s theme but I went over a few times to see how it was going. It was pretty frickin crazy in there for sure. I think I finally went to bed around midnight. I think the party ended sometime round 2:30ish as that is when people were starting to head back to our campground. It was pretty funny when I heard “There are people camping over here in tents … why would people actually want to do that”. City folk you gotta love them.
Sunday:
I woke up with a killer headache thanks to Carine. It turned out the Nalgene Coolers that went down so smooth were pretty strong. I realized that after most of the 40 ouncer was gone and she was the one who took over the bar duties. I am pretty sure there were quite a few paddlers in our group feeling worse than me.
It was pretty much a repeat of Saturday with a few exceptions.
I almost caught Angels Kiss on the fly and managed to get somewhat of a few surfs on it.
I got a couple of half ass surfs at Butterfly as well. I managed to get wedged under a raft when I was trying to go up the line to surf left side and that is when a guide your own raft decided to peel out on top of me.
At the lunch spot Brendan asked if he could try my boat out as he had never been in a canoe before. I said sure and that is when I hopped into a kayak. We both headed down the river to the surf waves. He did great and I got trashed at the last wave and could not roll back up.
On the flat water paddle back to the takeout it was pick on the open boater by the juniors. They saw me paddling my boat standing up and tried to catch up to me to make me swim. I got back down on my knees and strapped into my boat pretty tight. The game was one. Josh and Matt tried to tip my boat every which way to make me swim but no go. I finally popped Matt skirt and that I when Josh decided to try and make him swim. Soon Matt was in behind me in my boat and was going from side to side trying to tip it. He then decided to stand up and try it again and that is when it was all over and I was in the water.
It was an excellent two days of paddling on the river with old friends and new ones. I had a blast and definitely picked up some great tips.
In case your wondering at the end of the day Pat and Steph car decided to start.
Oh I forgot to mention that there were a group of girls that only had about 4 or 5 hours ever in a kayak and they managed to run the river with the help of all the great instructors we had.
The pics can be found here except for the people I don't know they are yet http://www.flickr.com/photos/cmnypny/sets/72157605946832515/
Until next time be safe out there.
