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Published: March 31st 2009
Non-traditional raft riding
This practice drill was a great way to end the first weekend of training.My first weekend of guide training was on the Skagit river, nestled into the western edge of the North Cascades an hour or so north of Seattle.
As I had very nothing of import to do once my friends left Seattle, I showed up at the Blue Sky River House Bed and Breakfast around 1pm on the eve of our training. What I found was...nobody home, and nobody around. So I decided to drive further east and check out some campsites I had read about online that were free. Along the way I ended up doing a little hike to view the Gorge Dam which controls the Skagit rivers flow these days, and also got some neat views of mountains as the fogged parted ways occasionally.
When I got back to the Blue Sky River House around 5pm, I was happy to see a tent up on the far side of the field and headed over to say hello. I met my first classmates, Chad and Kyle, and a few minutes later Natasha said hello from inside the tent where she was busy making up their cots. I was definitely happy to be meeting some cool people, and got
Why?
Because...I can. to feel knowledgeable as I used one of my newly learned knots from my Swiftwater Rescue Technician class to put together two pieces of rope for them. Soon their tarp was up to deter the rain, but by this point, I was soaked through and cold, and although these three amigos seemed very cool and nice, the rain tarp was only sheltering an area big enough for two people semi-comfortably.
I knew I didn't want to be cold and wet when I fell asleep that night, and decided to head to the local library 12 miles away. Although I knew they might be closed, they had a nice covered porch with a plug for internet, and the town of Concrete had a few neat little places to eat. I ended up in a little bar and had a decent cheeseburger while I thawed and dried. I also met some interesting local characters at the bar, and definitely enjoyed hanging out there for a few hours. Soon though, I was dried out and ready to go - so I headed back in darkness to find the field full of cars and darkness. As there was no fire, and it was
Fairwell boat
A few people fell out over the weekend; I had the distinction of being the only one to jump out on purpose...which I happened to do not once but 4 times. still raining, I just hopped in back of my car and fell asleep.
In the morning, I got up pretty early with the sun, as I had gone to sleep so early the night before. As I walked around I began to meet more of my fellow trainees. All along the way I was playing the name game in my head, creating memory pegs and such for every person I met. While not perfect at first, as I tend to sometimes only remember the first letter of the name and get the next 4-8 letters off, I quickly rebounded and only made two mistakes in my learning, thus, by the end of the introductions at our first formal meeting, I felt I had all 24 trainees names down, as well as the four instructors. Although I was just getting to know everyone, the general atmosphere of friendliness was pervasive, and I already knew I liked everyone I had met and was going to have a great time in my training.
With introductions out of the way, it was time to pump up the boats, put on the neoprene, and hit the water. While most of the trainees were
Swimming the S Curves
38 Degree water is bad outfitted with wet suits from BlueSky, a few of the older trainees had invested in dry suits. I myself, had my own personal wet suit I had picked up out of the bargain bin at a dive store several years back; but I hadn't tried wearing it in over a year and a half. As I pulled it on, I certainly felt as if I had grown or it had shrunk, and boy oh boy was it tight. To operate the zipper on the front I had to requisition the aid of a nearby strong man, and with the two of us working together, we somehow managed to stretch the wet suit around my body and get the zipper up.
As we loaded the van and headed out for our first put in, I felt a battle rage under my personal flotation device with my skin, bones, and circulatory system on one side, and a constricting suit of neoprene on the other. I figured I might be asking for a BlueSky wet suit on the next day, but I had made my play for today, and it was too late to do anything about my choice for now, so
6.5mm neoprene though
Makes me into a water mammal time to just tough it out and see what would happen. As we began to unload and carry the boats down a road covered in snow two feet deep though, I felt a searing pain in my left arm which was bearing the burden most. Pump heart pump I thought, this neoprene can't oppress us. But it did. Soooo bloody tight! Sure I was warm in my core, but I had the growing suspicion my hands might soon be wilting and falling off from lack of blood flow.
The carrying of the boat was by far the most vigorous activity thus far though, and knowing the stretching power of neoprene, I decided to let my body continue to battle the neoprene. After our first example safety talk on which we were all instructed to take notes, it was time to board up and hit the water. I hadn't known what to expect with this training, but before we even hit the water, our trainer asked who wanted to be the guide...huh? What about the training part! With the bouncy sides of the raft though, and the mostly calm waters, the mentality wasn't quite sink or swim. It was more,
One thumb up
Other hand frozen shut! figure it out and look smooth, or look a little silly. And our first Trainee Guide Elana definitely did the former, making guiding look like a cakewalk. Our instructor would ask her to do a ferry angle, hit an eddy, go over there...zoom zoom with the precision of a skill neurosurgeon, Elana would gracefully place the boat wherever asked. The bar was set high, and myself and the three other members of my boat, Trevor, Joel, and Dan, all seemed a bit dazed by Elana's proficiency.
Soon though, it was time to switch, and we discovered with some relief that we didn't have to start out perfect such as Elana but everything would be alright. A few missed eddys, a few extra spins and hesitation on the commands ensued as the boys on my boat gave it a go. But while we didn't have the grace or experience of Elana, we all got it down pretty well pretty quickly, and even sitting as a paddler, you could learn a great deal about what El Capitan was doing right and wrong.
Eventually my turn came up to take over the high seat in the rear of the boat and
River Swimming Position
Using my feet as bumpers, and keeping my unprotected hands out of the ice cold water. be the rudder. As it just so happened, my turn coincided with the only class III rapid on the rivers looming presence - the S curves were coming, so it was time to figure out how to be a good guide, because I was to navigate the biggest rapids on the river shortly. In the still water, I did my own S curves, calling left backs, all forwards, and Stops - while figure out my draws and digs to rudder the boat. I also gave the boat some decent spins on my own, getting my crew quite dizzy. Overall, the boat had a solid motor and felt pretty nimble to me. Before we came upon the S curves, the river forked, and after asking whether I had to follow the boats ahead, Tom, our Instructor, told me it was dealers choice on this fork, go where I wanted to go. Time to pioneer I thought, angling the boat left, and calling, All Forward to my motor. While only a class II rapid, I got my first taste of the white water, and found the boat still responding well to my rudder techniques and surging forward when needed. I was feeling
Time to hit the oars
Jumped aboard this boat for a nice workout and lesson on oar guiding ready to hit these S curves.
Off in the distance, the horizon of the river soon dropped, signaling the beginning of the rapids ahead. As we approached, I positioned the boat for a solid straight line down a clear channel with a huge wave train, and away we went! Up and down, SPLASH ! Huge great waves took us up and down. As we hit the first corner I was told to eddy up and dashed over behind a bolder into the still water. Woohoo. That was fun, and decently easy too I thought. The next leg of the rapids was the most perilous according to Tom, and contained the Skagit river's only really decent flip hazard - a hole called the Skagitator. A hole on the river occurs where there is a large rock with water pouring over it and around it, creating a significant drop from above into a current where water is rushing in to fill the void, which can easily trap a boat and flip one if you hit the hole sideways.
As we got going underway though, the thought of that drop entered my mind - certainly it could be a hazard hit
sideways - but if we were lined up straight, and paddling fast....it could be a fun little jump and wave right? I asked Tom. Sure he said, just make sure you are lined up really well. Acting as the guide, I consulted my crew and asked if they were up for it - to which I received wary eyes of general consent. Tom pointed the hole out to me ahead, and I lined up and waited. As we approached I demanded, All Foward, and we were soon diving through the Skagitator, and with our forward momentum, splashing right by. HOOOAH! The rapid wasn't over yet though, and we splashed our way down with the occasional big wave splitting our lips into an "OH OH OH S*@)" face followed by a big grin.
As the rapid ended it was time to yield my Captain's seat to Joel to take us through the last bit to the early take out where we were to have lunch. Soon we were on shore and had the boats on the trailer - however, today's lunch was to be to go, as we all hopped back into the two vans and chowed down while we
drove back to the put in for a second round of rapids.
I don't recall too many details of the second round, but I do know that when we got up to the jumping rock I had been holding out on my bladder for quite some time, so the thought of getting in the water was already decently appealing to me. Throw in the opportunity to jump off a rock, and I weighed it as worthwhile. However, as you'll notice after watching the video of me jumping in, I quickly swim towards the rafts - and quickly got out, leaving the bladder a secondary objective left unfinished. This in part, along with the enchanting green emerald clear water, led me to my second foray into the water shortly thereafter in some flat water. Without much warning, I just decided it was time for a dip,and took the plunge. As my boat came after me I swam away trying to catch another boat. However, while my wetsuit is thick enough to keep my core well insulated, my hands were slicing through 38 degree ice water when I tried to swim freestyle, making the swim quite cold on my hands, and
causing me to give up my swimming for the day.
That Saturday night we had a great fire, and I was given plenty of free liquid bread (aka beer), a hearty helping of beef stew complete with carrots and potatoes, and even got my fruits covered with a free hard cider. The fire was hot, and the sky was surprisingly clear for the west side of the Cascades, allowing us to see more and more stars as the night progressed. By 3am, the joy of the fire and good company no longer outweighed my sleepiness, and I retreated to bed for 5 hours or so before rising at 8:30 the next day to get ready to hit the river again.
Happily, I got into my wet suit this second day with ease, as my body had won the battle the day before and the suit had stretched a decent amount, although the zipper was still a two man endeavor. As it turned out, on Sunday we would only end up doing one run in order to get people off the river and home earlier on Sunday night. However, this one run would be an eventful run for me.
Flipping move #1
Getting on the upturned raft is the first step The first eventful bit was learning to adjust to our new instructor. Every run we kept the same crew but swapped for a different instructor in our boat, as every instructor has their own style and knowledge to bring to the table. Both our instructors the first day had been very loose regarding control of the raft. However, as I sat down to take the first shift as guide, I quickly realized our new instructor had a different set of risk parameters she found acceptable. This became abundantly clear as I charged for an eddy early on that she asked me to hit, calling All forward to my crew, and then, for the first time, heard a rookie command overridden by the instructor, Michelle, who shouted, nope ALL BACK. Although the rest of my boat stated they agreed I probably had the eddy in the bag and our first two instructors would have let me go for it, it was definitely a good learning experience to have exposure to a guide that had a lower tolerance for risk and see how she handled the boat situations differently.
As we were only doing one run that day, we took
Flipping move #2
Tom pushed me away from shore as I had drifted into it, then I gave the boat a good yank and... a more leisurely pace and stopped at a nice beach for our lunch. After our lunch, we took a nature walk and our instructor who was a local taught us about the tree of life, the western red cedar, which provided canoes, clothing, firewood, lodging, blankets, and cable tv for indians in the past. Ok, you got me, the cable tv is a blatant lie, but the rest is true.
Anyway, as we were boarding the boat again, a boat mate asked me what craziness I would be up to today, swimming the s-curves he asked jokingly...I considered it. I had guided them the first day, and then been a paddling peon the first day as well. Why not try something new I figured. So, with a bit of consideration, I responded - yep, sounds good, I'll do that. This decision was, of course, considered generally crazy by my classmates for two reasons. One, the water is 38 degrees, and two, the s-curves were the most intense rapid thus far. However, in my mind, it was pretty rational because, my wetsuit was two to four times thicker than most of theirs, and the rapid looked like alot of fun
Presto...boat flipped
Now to get back in it to swim with its huge waves. However, I didn't want to be the bad boy in town, so I told my instructor my wishes to ride the rapids on my own. She had a boat go down to the first eddy after the major part of the rapids, then let me go for it, following behind me. I went for it, as seen in the video, enjoying myself quite a bit and using my SRT learned skills to breathe in the troughs of the waves - then, when the timing was right at the end of the first section of the rapid, I flipped over and swam hard on a ferry angle headed for the eddy myself. I would have made it there too, but as two throw bags landed in my face, I took the easy way and grabbed the line in proper position and waited to be towed in.
After catching my breath for a few moments, I was ready to jump back in and finish the rapid. This time, I wasn't too interested in going over the hole known as the skagitator, and was quite happy to skirt it to the left. There was a huge
Flipping move #3
Getting back in z boat rock and the current made a sharp turn there, but as a piece of debris floating along in the current, the current took me along on its sharp turn rather than smashing me into the rocks, making for a very fun little trip indeed where I really got to feel the currents power to turn and push in different directions. As I approached the end of the rapid, I got scooped up by another boat and Kira, the instructor who took these pictures and videos - handed me a fleece to put my icicle hands in. Cheers to her for that!
After all this swimming I wanted to get back into action soon though, so as the sweep boat piloted by a second year guide on oars went by, I asked if I could hop in and take a turn on the oars. He was happy to allow me to do so, and I spent the next two hours messing around with the oar boat as we moved down to our takeout. I really valued this experience quite a bit as I will be guiding using oars up in Alaska so the ability to get my double oar handling
Flipping move #3 part deux
Twas hard to kick because it was shallow and I didn't want to cheat by pushing off the bottom so I couldn't get a downward angle with my kick skills down is a great boon to me.
In any case, as we arrived back at the put in, we got the opportunity to do some flip practice. I went first and knocked it out - Kira took some pictures of this as you can see - then five or seven or so of the other guides gave it a go. After this was complete, we all went and huddled around a new fire which had been built, and then headed to our various places for the week. My place of course, was to wonder until I found my new home in Leavenworth.
As for guide training weekend number two - it has been great so far - but it's not quite over for me yet! Although most of the trainees went home on Sunday night - I was lucky enough to get to go down the Wenatchee, our new river this weekend, a third time today (monday) and will also be going down it again tomorrow. Out here, the sun always seems to be shining, and I love these opportunities to enjoy some floats down the wenatchee and get extra stick time on the river.
Ooh,
Cha Ching - Boat righted
But luckily as a guy I've got upper body strength and yanked myself in also, kinda proud of this and very happy about it - tonight, in three hours of door to door cold calling for College Pro Painting I generated 13 leads...at $10 bucks a pop tax free, very lucrative bit of work, hopefully I can repeat the feat tomorrow after rafting. Given my very decent income tonight, I treated myself to two Wendy's value meal sandwiches, the chicken sandwich and the jr. bacon cheeseburger. Mmm Mmm mmm. Still had a single packet of ramen when I got home though, just love my noodles too much.
And now I'm getting quite sleepy, so I'm going to stop writing and get to bed and get ready for another great day on the river.
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