West

The West River in southern Vermont near Stratton Mountain, runs every September during a reservoir drawdown. There is a class III section followed by a short class II section. With no formal class II trip, I arranged to meet some of the class III trip boaters at the end of the class III section and continue down. An open boating couple, the Hayeses, did this too and we carpooled.

Because we were meeting the class III group midway through their run, we did not have to arrive at the put in until noon, meaning I could get up at a reasonably late hour, which was nice. The drive was almost entirely backroads and very nice.

We arrived at the put-in/takeout and tried to find someone to shuttle us down to the class II takeout to no avail because everyone there was proceeding back up to the start of the class III section to either run it again or get their other cars. This development meant that we'd be hitching back to the parking area, easy enough to do with the horde of boaters at the West today.

The group from the class III section was about 20 minutes late and we got going pretty quick after they got there. The river was noticeably high, washing up onto grass on the sides and brown in color (but not in a polluted way). When I pealed out, I noticed it was quite pushy and that if I hesitated for a split second in deciding whether or not to ferry over to an eddy or wave, it was already too late. The first quarter mile or so was pretty much continuous rapids, solid class II, regular waves all the way across the river. Pretty quickly, I managed to hit a pourover; my boat lodged on the rock just beneath the surface and I got spun off of it at an awkward angle, flipping. I ended up swimming, but not for very long as I quickly got into one of the few eddies on the shore. (Stopping in an eddy on this run sometimes meant paddling over to a place on the side with a slower current and grabbing as big a handful of grass as possible). I got back in the boat and promptly hit another pourover, but this time I rolled. It was nice to just continue on down after rolling instead of flipping right back over as in The Gap.

After some more heavy water, we came to the biggest rapid on this section, Ducky Dump. We pulled out on river left just before this II+ rapid and scouted. There are some huge waves, and three large holes, two on river left and one on river right. There is a very easy sneak route hugging the left shore, which is how I went down the first time. After debating for a few minutes, I decided to hike back up and run it down the center, between the holes, over the big waves. Despite a near collision with an open boat, I made it unscathed. Going over the big waves was fun, as was seeing the big holes go by very quickly. There was one kayaker attempting to play in the river left holes; he rolled several times. We then paddled a short distance to the take out and we were done. The run was very quick, less than 2 hours, but it was fun to go in the slightly bigger water and get a roll kept me up for the rest of the trip instead of 3 seconds.

Deerfield, part 4 (The Gap!)

I felt back in command on Fife Brook once again today. The level was much lower than the previous trip with beautiful sunny weather. I had one really good surf at the first wave below Hangover Helper, which I saved at the end with a hard right-hand brace. This wave was noticeably smaller than two weeks ago. I had no flips until the tricky spot below the island, where I went over where the currents come back together. I was not shaken by this happening and I had already decided to run the Gap.

When we got to the take out just above the Gap, it was determined by the group that only I and one other would be running it. The other person was an older guy whose young son was with us today and whose name I forget. I told him it would be my first time running it and would be following him. Meanwhile, he helped his son to put away his gear and bring it up to the road. So I sat in my boat on the shore for what seemed like ten minutes but was probably only three, my state of calm slowly eroding. Finally he came back down and I took a deep breath and sighed and we peeled out.

In the lead-in waves, he took an interesting route around a big one. Trying to follow his line exactly, I did the same; it was a semi-circle about halfway up the wave, left to right. As soon as I got on to the downstream side of the wave, I flipped over. I set up quickly and rolled--my first combat roll at a very opportune time. I was stil moving towards river right and ended up hitting a rock above the Gap. For some reason, I tried to brace instead of grabbing the rock and I went back over. I was upright for about 3 seconds, long enough to hear someone say "Great roll." I decided not to try another roll here, following advice I had heard at the beginner's class which was just to stay in the boat if you flipped in The Gap and wet exit at the bottom. After looking at many pictures, I realized I was much farther from the heart of The Gap than I thought I was, giving me time to try some more rolls.

All and all, it was a good trip and I was very pleased to get my first combat roll, however brief the benefits.