Catch up, Virgin River narrows

I've been out of touch for a few months, with a new job and shabby internet connection, but never fear, I'm back to catch up on my latest trips, starting with the most epic fail of my kayaking career so far, the Virgin River Narrows, BUM BUM BUM BUUUUUMMMMM....

A big strainer...

So on a phone call with my little brother back in April I received an exciting bit of news, we were going to be paddling the Virgin River Narrows, a section of river that spends much of its time in a nasty shriveled dried up state. However, lucky (or unlucky) for me and my adventurous little brother, snow melt had cranked up the flows on this little Utah gem and we were in for the ride of our lives.

Rick getting amped for the Virgin River

The Virgin River is a stretch of whitewater in Zion National Park in Utah, about 950 miles away from my former home of Superior Montana. It winds for 17 miles through an inescapable canyon with some great whitewater and stunning scenery. It is literally the most amazing place I have ever been in a kayak.

But in order to make it through 17 miles of whitewater in a single day, one has to do a lot of planning, and get up really early in the morning. Our crew of three took off at around 8 a.m., early for my beer drinking tastes, but not nearly early enough for the Virgin. With the drastic changes in river levels that come with desert temperatures, we missed the morning high water and spent the first half of the day dragging our boats through barely enough water to float.

Rick, hoping for the Deep Creek Confluence

The Virgin River meets up with Deep Creek seven miles into the trip, changing the class II -IV creeky section into a big water romp through a steep walled in canyon. After our epic struggle through the low water hell that was the first seven miles of the canyon we finally arrived at the confluence of the Virgin River and Deep Creek. It was 6 p.m. and we still had 10 miles to go. We all chowed down a few cliff bars and started booking it down some class III big water rapids

Adding a little flow to the Virgin River before reaching the confluence

At one point in the river, we stumbled across a river wide log just underneath the water, despite screams and signals from Rick and I, our third boater did not see the log and didn't boof over it. He was sucked underneath it and swam. Luckily for him he was able to slip underneath the log and swim to shore. Unluckily for him his boat was long gone before any of us could do anything about it. Our poor pal was forced to spend the next two nights stranded in the gorge because without a kayak, there is no way out.

The canyon walls look like this, it's amazing, but committed...

Leaving someone stranded in the Virgin River Narrows was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do on a kayaking trip, but Rick and I decided that best thing to do at this point would be to push to get out of the canyon as quick as we could so we could do something about getting our stranded pal out asap.

Rich seal launches off a rock on our only portage of the mission

Unfortunately for our plans to make it out of the gorge that evening we ran into another crew of boaters in duckies stranded at a campsite without a paddle for one of their boats. We stopped to help them get two of their boaters across the river along with their ducky and by the time the rescue was complete we had to spend the night in the gorge with the ducky crew. The next day we paddled out with the duckyers. They snapped a few pictures of the gorge for us while we booked it out and notified the park service so they could send in a team to extract our stranded paddler...

The one 15 footer in the gorge. Easily portageable. I ran it. It hurt. More water would have been nice...

Rick warms up by the fire, it was a cold brutal night

The Virgin River killed my jefe grande, sad story...

Prospect Creek and an out of town booty beer!

Saturday afternoon we loaded up a truck with creek boats and took off for Thompson Falls and Prospect Creek.

Patrick, Darren and I took the two hour drive from Missoula to Thompson Falls to check out this not-so-often run gem of a creek without a whole lot of information. All we knew was that it had a pretty fun class IV upper gorge, beautiful blue water and quite possibly a whole lot of wood.


We put in and paddled a couple of fun class III rapids when we came to the hardest part of the gorge, a stacked set of powerful looking class IV rapids stacked right on top of each other. No one had the cahones to fire it up so we opted for a quarter mile portage around the meat of the first gorge, vowing to come back and get a piece of the more difficult rapids on another day. After our portage we paddled several fun class III and IV rapids, making our way finally down to the final gorge. The final gorge consisted of a fun little rapid with some tight moves and high walls followed by the last rapid of the stretch that emptied into the Clark Fork River.

Patrick fires up the first drop on the final gorge.

The final rapid on the last gorge had a great seem where the water meets up and plunges towards the final hydraulic. Hitting it just right sends you deep, deep, deep into the bottom of the river for a super fun ride.

Darren melts into the final hole

Once in the final hole you can get some pretty crazy enders after spending a little time in the depths of Prospect creek.

I get some stern squirtage in the final rapid of Prospect Creek.

Patrick with some more of the same

Last weekend we had a little visit from a good friend Shevy Schmuas. Schmaus has been living in Seattle for a while and dropped back into town for a couple beers and some time with her family. She took a trip down to Brennan's Wave Saturday afternoon and after a bummer of a paddle drop she took a swim in the Clark Fork River. She paid the price like a champ however and took a booty beer out of my booty no less!

Like a champion

Brennan's Wave and Strongwater opening!

Kayaking season is upon us...



The good old Clark Fork water levels have been on the rise and with Lochsa season bearing down on me I've put in my two weeks notice at work so I can kayak my brains out for a few weeks before I start my new job taking photos for ROW on the mighty Lochsa...

As if all of this wasn't enough to get your juices flowing, local playboating rockstars KB and Luke just opened up their new paddleshop - Strongwater. They're stocking all kinds of Jackson kayaks (That dynamic duo demo is calling my name already) and other cool kayaking stuff. They started everything off with a keg of beer and a party Saturday afternoon. Combine that with a little afternoon session on Brennan's Wave and you've got one helluva Saturday.

Darren Rabosky kicked the day off with a couple spins on the surfer's left wave. With the water levels coming up the left wave has gotten better than it was this winter, but the real action has been on the middle hole.


The middle wave gave up some big loops, and sorts of other little trickies for the paddlers out there tough enough to throw them down.



Patrick Hooper has been working hard on his loops for the past week, and they're starting to look straight up effortless.


The rest of us had to work a bit harder for our loops. While there is plenty of power in the middle hole, it isn't super steep, so timing is essential and finding that sweet spot is a must to make big tricks happen.


Darren and I spent a pretty frustrating afternoon trying to finish out our loops. Which was made all the more frustrating because we had to watch Patrick do this.


Anyone who's in Missoula or passing through Missoula should also stop by and check out Strongwater, killer owners and I'm sure it's gonna be one helluva shop. Check them out on Facebook right here.

What the *$&%)%(* is a booty beer?

What is a booty beer? You have no idea? Well my friend, you are in for a treat.

A booty beer is,

Utterly disgusting. Completely cathartic. Truly revolting. Soothingly spiritual.

It is simultaneously one of the best and worst experiences of my life.

Anyone who has spent enough time with a whitewater kayaker, rafter, river boarder or enthusiast of any discipline knows both the horrors and the joys of the booty beer. A booty beer combines the punitive spirit of Catholic nuns with the joys of alcohol and the horrors of toe fungus.

As the tradition goes, any rafter or kayaker that finds themselves unintentionally out of their craft and "into the drink"during a river trip has to pay for it in booty beer. An alcoholic beverage, preferably warm and flat, is poured into the poor paddler's "booty." If the paddler is "bootyless" they may have to imbibe from someone else's booty. Either way, as penance for their daring trip into the frothy waters of whatever river they've dumped themselves into, the boater must down the fungus-laden drink as quickly as possible.

Ever since my very first booty beer (I can't remember when this took place and I'm not sure if that has something to do with the amount of beer I consumed after the booty beer to get the taste out of my mouth or some sub-conscious memory blocking mechanism) I have had a bizarre fascination with the ritual. It has the same feel as a fraternity initiation, minus the, "Thank you sir! May I have another?" But if you look closer at what is going on, I think you'll find something much more valuable.

In the name of science, we're going to take a careful look at exactly what goes into a booty beer and why it is such a strangely important part of a sport that, unlike maybe NASCAR or rugby, does not cater exclusively to drinkers.

In this case I'm going to embarrass Alley, mainly because she now lives in another country and can't hurt me for doing this. Also because during her epic swim on the Lochsa River in Idaho, her shoulder was dislocated. After swimming herself to shore, Alley forced her own shoulder back into socket and said, "Dammit, there goes my paddling season." Alley is the essence of a boater and she took her booty beer like a champion.

It started with (lucky Alley) a lovely selection from Missoula's own Bayern Brewery.


With a little hlep from kayaking buddy Patrick, the beer hit the booty.


And then Alley took care of business...


To the lay person this is either lunacy, a severe violation of health code or, in the words of many a drunk college student, FREAKING HARDCORE!

Some paddlers treat this act as pure obligation. To not drink a booty beer after a swim is heresy. Others dismiss the act as a superstitious idiocy. Either way, it's always been a huge part of boating for me.

Maybe it's because every time you swim someone has to hit you with a rope, chase down a piece of your gear or tow you to shore. The act of watching you choke down some foot-soaked booze is a little bit of vengeance and payback for the lunacy that comes in the wake of an epic swim.

Paying back your paddling buddies for their efforts with a disgusting act of loyalty is bonding, powerful and fun. But the most important question is likely, why the hell would I name a blog after the act of chugging fungal booze, and what am I going to talk about in this ridiculously titled blog?

To answer simply? Everything.

The booty beer is everything that keeps people kayaking, living and taking risks. It makes light of a dangerous situation and it is the consequence for inevitably biting off more than you can chew. Many boaters have told me that, "We're all in between swims." But I'd like to think that we're all in between booty beers. It's what reminds us why we really take risks. The people that catch us when we fall. We owe it to them to not only push ourselves but to take appropriate risks.

So this blog is going to be dedicated to both my fool hardy outdoor adventures, as well as the reason they happen. It's one thing to push yourself, but it's an entirely different thing to know why.

The booty beer reminds us...