Off to the Yampa River

[kerry]

We leave on Friday for a 5 day trip on the Yampa River thru Dinosaur National Monument. It's the last free flowing tributary of the Colorado River and it's been a high water year. It's very hard to get permits in the lottery system but a friend of mine picked up a late season permit. I was going to canoe it with my daughter but since she dislocated her thumb this week, that plan got the kybosh so I picked up a 16' Avon Pro raft to row. It's been 24 years since I last paddled it and I'm really looking forward to one of the best river trips in the USA. Here's a link to a raft run of Warm Springs Rapid this spring at high flow. River is a lot lower now (3500cfs compared to about 15,000cfs). This raft was doomed from the start as he was on the wrong line entering the top of the rapid and made no attempt to move further right.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQNnFYJJffM

I'm taking along a copy of Ed Abbey's biography which I just picked up. Nothing like a little eco-anarchism in the canyons. Made my daughter read the Monkey Wrench Gang for the trip.

[POS]

My family has a place in Steamboat on the Yampa - river'd it a few times.

[kerry]

Originally Posted by POS

My family has a place in Steamboat on the Yampa - river'd it a few times.

They've got a nice whitewater slalom course right in town now.

[kerry]

A not very good picture of me rowing Warm Springs Rapid, one of the 10 big drops in the US.

[kerry]

Tiger Wall

[Hatterasguy]

Very cool, I want to get out west.

[Mistress]

Originally Posted by kerry

Tiger Wall

Kerry, beautiful photograph, makes you appreciate just how small we are...

[Chad300tdt]

Originally Posted by kerry

A not very good picture of me rowing Warm Springs Rapid, one of the 10 big drops in the US.

You look like you could hold your own in an @ss-whoop festival.

Excellent pics sir.

[Matt SD300]

Cool pics dude!....Be safe and have a good time!!......

[kerry]

Originally Posted by Chad300tdt

You look like you could hold your own in an @ss-whoop festival.

Actually, I was about to get my own ass whooped in there. There's a big hole on the left hand side so you need to stay right. In order to do that, the stern of the boat needs to be facing right, and as you can see in the photograph, it's facing left! That's why my right oar is cocked backwards, I'm desperately waiting for space to drop it in and do a reverse sweep to spin the boat around. I'd just come thru a narrow slot upstream and I hit something which spun the boat around stern left. I don't know if it was just poor judgment on my part, being too far right (other boats had run the slot clean) or whether the fact that I was rowing the biggest boat just meant there wasn't enough room to get thru the slot without hitting something. In any event, I was able to drop the oar just after the picture was taken and spin the boat around in time to make the pull to the right.

[link]

Looks like an awesome and very challenging trip! Have you ever published photos?

[kerry]

Here's a link to the 1985 archive of American Whitewater. I published an article there on a late fall trip on the Green River thru Lodore Canyon in canoes. It's called Canoes, Canyons and Dinosaurs. I can't remember if any of the photos are mine. I doubt it.

http://www.americanwhitewater.org/content/Journal_index_issue_2_year_1985_

An interesting piece of trivia associated with that article is that after it was published, I received a letter from Henry Wallace, son of Henry Wallace, who was Roosevelt's vice president. He used to paddle with a friend of mine, Dave Cialone, pictured in the article and had lost touch with him. He wrote me inquiring as to Dave's whereabouts.

[el presidente]

Nice!

[Chad300tdt]

Originally Posted by kerry

Here's a link to the 1985 archive of American Whitewater. I published an article there on a late fall trip on the Green River thru Lodore Canyon in canoes. It's called Canoes, Canyons and Dinosaurs. I can't remember if any of the photos are mine. I doubt it.

http://www.americanwhitewater.org/content/Journal_index_issue_2_year_1985_

An interesting piece of trivia associated with that article is that after it was published, I received a letter from Henry Wallace, son of Henry Wallace, who was Roosevelt's vice president. He used to paddle with a friend of mine, Dave Cialone, pictured in the article and had lost touch with him. He wrote me inquiring as to Dave's whereabouts.

Cool story and pics. I guess you guys were pretty happy to have made it to the end as evidenced by the "one deranged soul that did a naked dance around his boat".

Which one is you here? ... and how did you get into this sport in the first place?

[kerry]

I'm in the stern, my wife is in the bow.

It all began with a 3 week wilderness canoe trip in Algonquin Park, Ontario in 1977.