West Cherry Paradise!

The even better stuff is finally coming in! After one and a half months of chasing water the cream of the crop are dropping in. After spending four days in Roseville partying, swimming, hot-tubbing, we made our way away from one paradise to another! West Cherry Creek! Everybody talks highly about this run and they have good reason to. For three hours of walking along a pretty cruisy track and down a bitch of a hill into one of the most amazing places that I have ever been. The scenery is amazing with veiws from the very gutter of the valleys up the bare granite walls.

Getting there wasn't the easiest though, it definitely took its toll on the car. Waiting at the take out for a few mates that we wern't sure were going to turn up we saw another mate so we followed them up to the put in. Only catch was that we were in the caravan and they were in a BIG Tundra hauling ass! With Berno behind the wheel of Mum we to were hauling ass up a crappy gravel/ sealed-in-patches road just to try and keep up (doing a mighty job may I add). About a mile from the road end we felt the old girl bottom out but for once it wasn't the suspention... We kept hauling ass all the way to the road end and met the others stoaked to have kept up when dun dun dunnn some one notices oil running from the bottom of the car. That hit we took... was the sump and split that sucker! With the excitement of what was in store for the next few days we put Mum's problems into the back of our minds and hit the river!

For this one I'll let the photos speak for themselves. Unfortunately the trusty battery ran out on the first drop of day two which is not ideal. But here's what we got!

At the top of the walk over looking the river

Joshy on one of the tight little gorges

Berno sliding away

Butters chillin

Joshy lining it up between the goal posts on the double drop

Berno about to fly off the ramp

Me on the last rapid of the day.

Butters and Berno 1-2ing it!

Day two was sweet with some big slides, drops, and the confluence with Upper Cherry containing some big ass water to help us fly down the slides, off drops and scare the pants off ourselves!

Now its just the waiting game for Upper Cherry before everyone starts to leave next week otherwise we will be looking into round two on West Cherry because it was that good!!

Fantasy Falls

Fantasy Falls is on the Mokalume River and runs through the Mokalume Wilderness Area down to Salt Springs reservoir. We started out with a solid crew of 7 and after the first day the team had nearly halved with only 4 remaining after 3 decided the going was too tough and hiked out.

With no one on the team who had been in before we were in for a real adventure! Turns out that this was a bit of a test piece for the crew, getting us ready for other high Sierra runs. Not wanting to waste time and trying to keep moving we didn't get many photos. Amoungst the the mank and portarging of the first two days there were plenty of treats, copious amounts of the most amazing scenery, and story's that we'd heard of the last day being off the hook. This is what kept us going. The storys were true and the last days was stunning! Packed with miles of read and run, rapids to scare the pants off ya, and a few big drops to huck!

The last gorge before camp on day one

Camp at the end of day one

Josh dropping off of the Mushroom

Joshy in the midst of the infamous Fantasy Falls

Me on the second drop of Fantasy

Butters and I carrying on down the miles of read and run

Me on just another one of the many rapids with big holes waiting at the bottom

Berno entering 'the thing'

Butters doing the best with one of Josh's 'sweet' lines

The kind Morman folk who saved us braking ourselves on the paddle accross the lake into the wind at the end of the trip.. life savers! No sea kayaking for us on this one..

Over all the trip was fantastic. The good memories far out weigh the ball busting portages, we were a little gutted that we didn't see any bears although Josh did have a very close encounter with a rattle snake! With some sore bodies, its time for a rest day before sussing some flows for the Cherry's.

Bald Rock Canyon

After much recommendation we made it down to the Middle Fork of the Feather for a fun two day run. We made our way down a derelict road to camp out at the put in. That night we were worried about bears but much to our delight they were frightened away by the most impressive thunderstorm that I have ever been right underneath. It did mean that motivation was at an all time low because in California it's not supposed to rain during summer so all of our gear was a tad wet. We didn't let this put us off however, so we packed our bats and we started to make our way down this very scenic and fun run.

Soph, Rob, & I at the bottom of a massive smooth granite cliff

Soph lining up

Me keeping it moving through

The portage around Atom Bomb Falls

Me on Curtain Falls

Soph lining up Curtain Falls

Joshy doing his best to go deep

Our beautiful campsite on top of a nice rocky ledge

South Silver

Three days of goodness! The crew is finally feeling the pinch in our wallets so we decided to go and camp for a few days to stop us from buying that good old fast food. Best idea ever! We had been waiting for South Silver to come in for a while and when it did it was all on. After getting lost in the van on crazy logging/ 4WD tracks we found the put in and set up camp. Luxurious as always with the car seats pulled out to lounge around in and copious amounts of firewood every where you look!

Then the next morning it was time for some fun. We had heard that there was a lot of rapids so we had expected the run to take at least an hour, but once we were on it only took us 15 min to get to one of the most impressive fun fast rapids that we have come across so far.

In the days to follow we got the right idea and just lapped up the sections getting some sick photos and making some interesting lines. And just for Butters there was some party boating and racing was on!

Here is the pick of over 1200 photos that were taken over the 3 days. Enjoy!

Race time with Berno out front and Me and Joshey fighting it out at the back

Berno on rapid #2

Butters and myself doubling up on the tea cups

Josh and Bern doubling up

Freewheel central

Josh on Sky Scraper

Me dropping into Sky Scraper

Getting some sweet air on Off ramp

The team at the bottom of Plastic Surgery

Super Dinkey

Butters blending with Dinkey

Well while the others are off doing the waterfall section on Dinkey Creek Butters and I weren't feeling "it", so we went off and had a play on the Infinislide. Infinislide is this really fun continuous section of slides that finishes off in a sweet 15 foot boof. Here are some photos of our adventures.

One for mum, Butters walking in

Me having some fun super sliding

Yea! The back-boof

Butters on the last drop

Me finishing off a good afternoon on the playground

Metlako Falls

Right now we are sitting in a little mexican cafe in Hood River after just running the biggest drop any of us had ever seen and now run. We came to Hood River and didn't even know that Metlako was in town, heard it was running, then ran it. Yea boi! Cheers to Ali's girlfriend Allie for standing on the dodgy ledge to get these photos of us running the goods!

The team of 4 Kiwis and 1 Brit at the top
Josh with the first run



A sequence of my run

Butters droppin it like its super hot!

Berno's time to shine
Ali's run

With such a perfect drop at such a good flow it would have been rude to pass up the opportunity. We only had one swim with Josh getting ripped from his boat, my paddle getting ripped from my hands and nailing a cheeky little hand roll. So we had great results with no broken or lost gear. Stoaked that everyone fired it up so that we can all celebrate tonight for memorial weekend, Hood River style!

Washington

Woop woop! Little white goodness right there...

There was not a lot running in California this week with everything running either too high or too low. So we made the 13 hour drive up to Hood River and across the Columbia River to the Little White Salmon. Turns out we caught it at a really good flow and that it really does take a while to piece it together for the first time. The run started out quite bouldery with plenty of wood to keep you on your toes before the character changes and you in a primo bedrock gorge. There were plenty of really nice clean drops with a gradient that never stops dropping!

Hayden Bateman

Josh Clarke on Wishbone

Berno on Spirit Falls

Me paddling my ass off to get out of the cave behind Spirit Falls.

Just off line and I got swallowed at the bottom and spat out again in the cave... not so good times.

Me on another one of the many drops

For our first day in Hood River this was a sweet run to introduce us to the area. It offered some similar characteristics to what we have in NZ with the bouldery start, and it had something totally new with the big waterfalls!