The Development of the Liquidlogic Stinger

It started nearly 6 years ago.  Hard to believe.  I had both a lot less and a lot more hair.  I had fewer wrinkles and we had less technology going into the design of our boats.  The Remix 100 was the original name of the Stinger.  The name came from the 100+ gallons of volume and the common dam release of water on the Green which is 100% of 1 unit.  Woody liked to call the 100% release a "hungee", and so the first proto of what would become the Stinger was called the Hungee.

The original design was a complete side project.  I hammered away on the computer for a few days at home, printed out cross sections and applied them to foam to be cut and glued together to make the model.  It was a mix of modern and a little old school know how that I learned from Alan Stancel (designer of the Dancer) to get this boat together in a hurry for the upcoming Green Race in the fall of 2007.

We were still in our small shop just on the outskirts of Hendersonville, N.C. and only 6.582 minutes from the Put-In of the Green River.  In the design department it was just Allen and I hammering away on models.  In these photos you can see the entire shop.  When we would get busy there wasn't any room to move around.

Once I printed out the cross sections I then cut them all out and glued the entire thing together on a spine to hold it all straight and level.  Then its just a matter of cutting, grinding, and shaping down to the cross sections and you have a boat... sort of.  There are a few more steps in between but you get the idea.

This very first prototype of what would become the Stinger was 11'9" it had a fairly traditional long boat hull design with a little more bow rocker and a little bit of flatness under the seat.  After working our asses off to get this one ready we hammered out some prototypes just in time for the Lord of the Fork race on the Russell Fork river in Kentucky.  In fact I loaded the van and met Toby McDermott and John Grace late in the evening with, hot out of the oven protos, so they could drive through the night and race the next morning.  Toby won the race and we were pretty excited about that.

Van load.

Notice the frost on the boats.  Its race seaon!

The day after that I got a few folks together and paddled the Green for the first time in the Hungee.  The first float is always nerve racking but it came out great.  It was very predictable, stable, and far faster than anything we were paddling at the time.  The competition at the time was the Tornado, the first proto of the Green Boat, and a proto boat from Waves Sport called the Momentum.  We seemed to be in the realm with those guys but after that very first day I knew that there was more that could be done.  My actual thought was "this is too easy to paddle, surely we can go faster and hang it out on the edge more".

The next year i decided to really push it and see what would happen.  I added 8" in length, only on the stern of the boat.  Anything that I would have added to the bow wouldn't have been in the water so its affect on speed would have been minimal but that 8" in essence represents a boat 16" longer.  So in a way the Stinger has a water line of 13' 1" boat but by keeping the bow shorter my theory was that it would be easier to move around rocks and potentially help with resurfacing, and keep me from pitoning off Sunshine.

Once again paddling away from the beach that first time was a little nerve racking.  I just wasn't sure that a boat that asymmetric was going to turn quickly enough.  Some of the team paddlers thought I might be a little crazy.  The amazing part about that design change was the speed.  Adding that extra length made it into a rocket.  My favorite feeling was the first time skipping through the pools at the bottom of the slides in the race course.  The extra speed carried momentum easily.

In 2008 Adriene tied for her first win of the Green Race.  Obviously there were great paddlers paddling the boats but they were all moving up the ladder in placements of the race so it felt like the boat changes were making a difference.  To fund the first Stingers we sold some of our prototypes to the public and they were obviously a big hit.  We couldn't make enough of them and people lined up on a waiting list to buy the boats used by racers.  That first Stinger was fast but it was also a bear to control so over the next year I skeemed on what sort of changes I wanted to make.  The main thing I wanted to focus on was maintaining the speed but if I could also make it easier to paddle that would be awesome.  I made subtle tweaks to the hull making it slightly flatter and rolling the bow edges under the boat so that they wouldn't hit quite as hard.

In 2009 we had 4 boats out of the top 6 in mens.  Adriene won again with a record time breaking run and breaking the 5 minute barrier.  Keith Sprinkle took the hands paddles class.

In 2010 5 of the top 6 were in Stingers and Mike Dawson and Isaac were at the top.  Tad Dennis won the C-1 and Keith Sprinkle won hand paddle.

Each year I would do small changes.  After 2010 we did a small deck volume increase and flattened the hull a little more.

2011 Isaac won the race and Eric Deguil pulled into 3rd and Adriene won again.

2012  was a crazy year because of the high water.  The gage was reading 12 inches plus and that proved to be fast and wild.  Mike Dawson crushed the course record.  Isaac came in third and Eric finished up the top 5.  John Grace was 6th with his fastest time ever.  Adriene won and Jordan took C-1.  Just before this years race I did some more small changes to the design adding more flat hull and more deck volume to the ends of the boat for surfacing.  All the team folks agreed they didn't want me to change it any more.  With that in mind we sent the model off to the mold maker to finally make a production mold that racers across the country had been asking us to do for 6 years.  Automatic for the People!

Now everybody gets to go fast and do big enders!

Here is a few Stinger Videos.  https://vimeo.com/album/2510310



Later
Shane

Eternity Hole with Proto #4 of the LL Composite Playboat

Yonton trickin' it up.

Its been a bit since I put my butt in a playboat sunny skies and upper 50s temps had Yonton Mehler and I jumping into a car with Kerry Porche headed for Eternity hole on the Tuckasegee River.  Yonton started jumping back in a playboat a couple months ago and is starting to show signs of his skills that took him to the World Championships.  I however am way off the back end.  It was definitely a case of the old dog trying to learn new tricks.  Fortunately I don't think anyone was taking pictures while I was paddling but I did get a few of Yonton looking good in Big Orange!  The session was enough to get me stoked to get back in the shaping room with the playboat model.  A little more time and I may be able to hit that Phonix Monkey.  Proto #5 in time for team trials maybe!
Shane

Open Call for Art Proposals

Open Call for Art Proposals

As part of making Legacy Paddlesports the sweetest place to work on the planet, we plan to enrich our offices and factory inside and out with Art that evokes our love of  Water, Rivers, Kayaking and of course, Liquidlogic Kayaks and Native Watercraft. We want to surround ourselves with the work of others who draw on the paddling environment as a key source of inspiration.  We hope to create a workspace that will keep us fired up to imagine, design, and build the world’s greatest boats.  Hence: this Art Proposal.

We have built some fun and playful offices; our staff has optimized every part of our production floor, but our walls, though colorful, are bare.  Our front garden and grounds around the factory have begun to grow many natural wonders, but we still crave something distinctive. Like: your work.

We aspire to build the world’s premiere collection of paddling-based artwork and we want to offer you the opportunity to be a part of it. To start our collection, we hope to commission up to 20 separate pieces of art.

Our Committee will consider works:

• in any medium
• in any style
• with content connected directly to paddling or evocative of its elements
• in any scale.... do note that we have a large space and will certainly welcome large scale proposals

Complete applications must include the following information:

• Contact Information

• Work Samples in the form of jpgs, url, snail mail, or bring it here to the factory.
• JPGs representing an existing work or works that you would like us to consider
• Resume or Bio

Deadline for Submissions: May 1st.
Final Projects Deadline: July 15th;

Artists will be compensated with one Native Watercraft or Liquidlogic Kayak (not including the Pedal Drive boats).  The Legacy Paddlesports Gallery Committee may consider other compensation at their discretion.

Contact:
Shane Benedict, Curator, Legacy Paddlesports Gallery of Fine Arts
shane@legacypaddlesports.com
℅ Legacy Paddlesports
210 Old Airport Rd.
Fletcher N.C. 28732

Section 00, 0, and 1 of the Chattooga in a day, along with other ramblings

I think Adriene is excited about the day.

Adriene said she wanted to paddle all the Upper Chattooga.  Who was I to argue?

For more than forty years it's been illegal to paddle the upper reaches of the Chattooga river (huge thanks AW!), and besides me, no one else in the group had ever paddled the upper sections before so it seemed like it would be irresponsible of me not to go along.  Especially given the perfect levels (about 700 cfs at Burrel's Ford).  As I was chatting with Adriene on the phone it became clear that she didn't really understand that paddling all 15 miles of the newly opened sections of river was going to be a challenge, not because of the hard rapids, but because of the miles, the portages, the hikes, and the rapids.  After I said, "ok its going to be a long day."  She said, "and if we get done quickly we can go do Overflow.  Oh and we want to get an early start so we can get back and cook a nice curry dinner!"

At that point I decided I better brush up on my memories of the run and trails along the river, just in case.  There are some good maps on the American Whitewater page that I started pouring over.

I packed extra water, Snickers bars, fleece, a headlamp, and a little vitamin i.  I knew we would be ok because there is trail along 80% of the run so we could get out no matter how badly we got delayed, but, still... I have done this trip twice before and each time we got off the river in the dark and now that it's legal having to hike in two miles and out nearly a mile to actually be legal makes it that much harder.  So I had a feeling we weren't going to be running Overflow or making a nice Curry for dinner.

Yes we went too far.  AW says if you see the handrail you've gone too far.  :) oops

It was a deceptively cold day.  It was KAVU as hell out there but when we stepped out of the car at the put-in there was ice all over the parking area and it was 28 degrees.  Fortunately we were going to be hiking for a bit to get warm.  The two mile hike in along the Chattooga River Trail is fairly easy but it is uphill the first half and then along the ridge and down to the river the second half.  We had a touch of confusion about exactly where to put-in and we didn't want to ruffle any private land owner feathers so we went a little further down than we had to.  I later read the American Whitewater page for the upper section a little more closely and its pretty clear.  I should have studied harder.  I guess I could say that about college too, but I was too busy sneaking off to go paddling rather than getting to class all the time.

First Falls, a nice little starter slide

The first time I did this section, let's just say it was a little while ago, our group rolled up to the Burrel's Ford take-out of section 0 in Beaz's land yacht of a car, loaded down with gear for 5, there sitting in the parking lot was a ranger.  He looked a little bored but perked up when he saw us drive in.  He knew exactly why we were there and I actually knew the guy because at the time I was guiding on the Chattooga a bunch and saw him at the river often.  

The conversation went like this: 

"What are you guys up to?" 

"Ummm going kayaking?"

"You know this section is illegal don't you?" 

"Ummm yes.  What happens if we get caught running it?" 

"Its a $500 fine."

"$500 dollars per person or could we pay it all together?" I was trying to decide if that would be worth the risk.  

The ranger smiled and said, "$500 a person",  and turned away to talk with some other folks.  We schemed in the car about what we were gonna do.  

The ranger walked back over to us and said with a very deliberate tone.  "If. I. catch. you. I am gonna fine you $500 dollars.  You guys have a good day", and he walked away.  

"THANKS", I said, trying to keep my excitement somewhat controlled.  He had given us the green light without having to say it.

Log Jam Portage

Slide in amongst the Log Jam

The Upper sections of the Chattooga have a bit of an ominous feel when you first get out there.  When we used to run them in the past it was unsettling because you were sneaking around and where we put in you paddled in on a tiny river/ creek, ducking through the rhodos all the way to the lip of the rapids.  From the new put-in, the first thing you run into is a huge log jam that you have to portage over, down, and through to a seal launch amongst the logs and rocks.  These sections just aren't  "normal" in the southeast.   We are used to our river runs being accesible, well manicured, even the portages on most of our runs are fairly easy but here on the upper you start with a fairly long hike into the Nantahala National Forest, portage through a log jam, the rapids have wood in them that is illegal to remove, and you know at any one time you might have to hike several miles to get to a road or phone.  It gives it the feel of a remote run anywhere in the world not the well lapped routes of the Southeast.

No Kayaks is a stupid name.  Can't we come up with something else?  How about Exit from Log Jam?

Dropping into the Alleyway.

After you get through the initial worries of the hiking and portaging the log jam and immediately get into a couple of cool drops you settle down a little.  The river is spectacularly beautiful.  It is classic southeast creeking.  If you are from the south you know it well: thick rhodo along the river, moss-covered boulders, and sweet, tight, whitewater.  But all the time, in the back of your mind, you feel just a little uneasy.  Logs, a few sieves, and the remoteness keep you on your toes.  Though the rapids aren't difficult, some of the consequences are, and the potential for a long walk out in the dark and cold of winter remind you to keep moving downstream.

The Waterfall in the Alleyway

When I was a kid I went to a camp in Highlands N.C. at the very top of the Chattooga watershed.  My brother and I worked for a decade there, at The Mountain.  We hiked along most of the upper reaches of the river along the upper Chattooga, Overflow, Holcombe, Big Creek and many others.  We paddled our first rapids on the West Fork and Section 2 and though I only lived at the river for a few years as a raft guide I still call this place home.  I love the fact that the first times I paddled most any of the upper Chattooga drainages I didn't realize that I was floating through places that during the hot summer months as a kid, I swam under those waterfalls, and through the potholes.  Now when I return to the Chattooga I get to touch Ellicott's rock,  jump off of Singley's, and slide down Big Bend falls in a different way.  It's good to be home again.

My brother at the put-in for section 2 of the Chattoga (1980), just a couple miles from our take-out the other day.

Oh damn, I got distracted from the story of the river the other day.  Sections 00, 0, and 1 of the Chattooga are very cool.  The character is similar to the sister tributary, Overflow, but the rapids are much more spread out.  There are long stretches of mellow water with easy rapids.  Along those mellow parts stretch miles and miles of trail and lots of folks camping and fishing along the river.  We had only positive interactions with anglers.  I have to admit I was prepared for the worst with all the verbal sparring in the different forums over the re-introduction of paddlers to the upper reaches of the river.  The day was long but we made it to the take-out just as the dark was getting thick enough that I needed to pull out my headlamp for the last couple hundred yards.  The trail put the finishing touches on our energy reserves and a happy exhausted crew posed for the obligatory team paddling photo which by chance was taken by one of the very folks that made this run possible the equally tired and happy Don Kinzer, thank you.

If you head over to do the Upper Chattooga:

1.  The AW page has good instructions on how to get to the Put-In and Take-Outs of all the sections. Read them more carefully than I did.

2.  The trails are not totally obvious, read the hiking directions on the AW pages.

3.  Pay attention to Don't Go Left.  You can go left but its stupid and a little sketchy.  Going right looks horrible with the wood that is there right now but it is fine; go straight over the hump on the right side.  You will probably spot the rapid if you look for a fairly innocuous drop maybe a half mile down from the Log Jam with fairly large wood coming in from the right that looks like it will make the right side scary to run.

4.  Trails run along most of the river.  Study them and you'll find your evac plans aren't too bad.

5.  If you aren't comfortable running on beta from others scouting don't try to do the whole thing.  

6.  Section 1 is really nice, mostly scenic but there are some good rapids and there is wood involved.  The last "Rock Gorge" is a really sweet section of whitewater.

7.  The easiest hike out trail is a couple hundred yards down from Lick Log Creek.  You can hike directly from the confluence of Lick Log Creek with the river but it's more difficult.
8.  On January 19th it got too dark to paddle without a headlamp at 6:19 pm.

Corey on the right side of Bull Pen Bridge rapid.

Yonton dropping into Super Corkscrew on Section 0

Snowy in Rock in the hole in the wall.

Adriene heading into one of the final drop, Harvey Wallbanger

6 hrs, 15 miles of paddling, 3 miles of hiking, an awesome day.

Here is a link to the rest of the photos from the day.  Click Here

Make sure to get out and do this somewhat unknown classic.
Shane

10 things you should know about Overflow

The last 6 months have been crazy.  Liquidlogic and our brotha brand Native Watercraft have moved our entire manufacturing facility and offices from Greensboro to Fletcher NC, near the Green River.  Its kind of like moving from one house to another except the moving truck is a tractor trailer and instead of one truck it took us 50 tractor trailer loads to get everything in the building.  I have had the pleasure of designing new offices, helping design the manufacturing floor plan, helping train new staff, integrating new manufacturing plans, and I am definitely getting pretty good on a fork lift.  All that has been on top of the normal stuff so to say the least its been a fun busy time. A different sort of Class 5 which has made it difficult for me to take off and run much other than our home run the Green.

However... the other day it rained cats and dogs.  It rained enough that I knew things would be super high in the morning but that they might start dropping in during the afternoon.  I had convinced myself I would be fine just going to work and not worrying about it but as the day wore on my leg started that twitch thing.  The boatingbeta flows page was on constant refresh and Overflow was looking like it would drop in perfectly, if I left right then.  Fortunately Yonton was ready and on call for a paddling adventure.  We loaded up my van with boats, gear, and the motorcycle for the shuttle and we were off.

10 things to know about Overflow

1.  The shuttle road is longer and a little rougher than you think.
2.  The mud on the put in trail is slicker than snot.
3.  The right eddie in Hemlock is a bitch to get out of while you wrestle rhodos.
4.  There is a new tree after 7 Car Pile Up. Watch the video.
5.  The left hump boof at Round About is awesome.
6.  Gravity is much harder at lower water.  Fortunately we had a sweet level of 1.3579341
7.  If you haven't been on Overflow there is an initiation.  If you have its your job to initiate.
8.  The Twilight mini gorge is one of the coolest sections of whitewater you'll ever run.
9.  The Great Marginal Monster is an awesome iconic rapid.  Go left on the drop below it.
10. The motorcycle shuttle is awesome!

It was a perfect fall evening, enjoy the video.

Sometimes you forget how good a river is...Overflow from Shaneslogic on Vimeo.

Shane

Stomper testing on the Green with Brown Claw

Brown Claw wants a Cracker

 Last season seemed to be the, thankfully, climax of the brown claw epidemic.  However I didn't enter my video into the Brown Claw archives so here it is.  You will see your basic Claw, The Spinning Claw, Under Over Claw, Double Claws of Fury, The Clap On Claw, The Clap on WTF, The Double Shocker Claw, The Claw of Terror, The Claw Your Way out of a Hole, The Preemptive Claw, The Claw Your Friend, and the Claw Your Way Up Out of the Water.

They Wander Downstream...I Claw My Way

Enjoy and May The Claw Be With You.
Shane

Testing the Stomper with Woody and others on the Green at 9"

Dropping into the Green with Woody

Another classic day of footage that I recovered from the depths of the Stomper prototype testing archive.  It was a day much like we have had lately.  Water and air temps were just starting to get downright comfy last year as the final touches were being put on the Stomper.  All the crew was out on a perfect weekend.  It just doesn't get much better than that.  Oh and add on top of that I got to roll down the river with my paddling and business partner Woody Callaway.  He is living my goal in paddling to just keep rolling out smooth lines for a really long time.

In any case the Stomper proved fun for all... and it rolls well!

Cheers
Shane

The Green River at 16"

Its not that different just a little more padding

Well now that I found this little nest of forgotten footage I might as well keep going.  Adriene and I got out on the river last winter at 16".  I was testing out one of the early protos of the Stomper 80.  It was a fun day just the two of us out there.  We didn't see a soul.

To me the river is actually easier and more fun at this level, except Gorilla of course.  The whole thing is just softer.  The boney rocks and slides that beat you up daily at normal flows are well padded and the extra juice makes it more splashy and bouncy.  Yes there are a few holes that become a bit more disconcerting but over all it makes the river easier.  The best examples of that are Go Left, Zwicks, and Sunshine.  At Go Left you can start to run down the entire left side of the whole rapid which makes it a direct line rather than having to paddle out on the dome and turn hard to run the slots at the bottom of the rapid.  In this video I run the sneak and Adriene comes down the Left Left line.  Just watch the log its pretty exposed at 16 and gets better as you go up.  At Zwicks you can run right of the top hole which takes this one from being one of the tougher rapids to being one of the easier.  You can't help but run out over the shallow slide.   At Sunshine as the levels get over 16 inches you can just run straight off the middle and pretty much clear the center rock.  Adriene ran straight and I ran the right line.  I should have run the straight line because I did flip over.   Gorilla is a beast and it gets really beastly as the water goes up.  We walked it.

Going Direct at Go Left

The down side to the river being this high or higher is that when things do go wrong they go wrong really quickly and in a much worse way.  Its going to be a long time before you can pull your boat out of the river if you swim and it may be a rapid or two before you can swim yourself to shore if you aren't aggressively swimming.  So if you are thinking about running this river at higher flows make sure you know the lines well and know you can deal with the issues that can arise.  If you have that covered this can be some of the best runs on the river you will ever have.

Oh and don't forget about Hammer Factor.  When the water levels rise the bad ass paddlers that are on this river at hi flows aren't worried about Go Left or Sunshine.  They are pinching a loaf about Hammer Factor.  Its big, nasty, and it gives grown boys and girls nightmares.

The Pit in Hammer Factor

Here is the video from the day.

Adventures from found footage: Testing the Stomper on Yellow Creek

I was sifting through my hard drive and stumbled across a few extra morsels of Stomper prototype goodness.  These tidbits came from a day when we were doing the classic chase the rain around looking at rivers that were too high or in the case of the Santeetlah the gate was locked and we couldn't get near the put in or take out so we had to opt for something that none of us had done and as always happens on these types of days we had 45 minutes of daylight.  Yellow Creek flows into the Cheoah River.  Its the last river on the American Whitewater database of rivers for North Carolina.  However we had no idea what we were getting into. We didn't know what the level should be but it looked paddleable.   We had no idea how long it would take but we did know that it was short and worst case we would be able to walk out in the dark if all hell broke loose.   As it turned out it was a fun short run that takes about 45 minutes.  The top 2/3rds is easy peasy, fun and cheesy.  The part from the falls down to the Cheoah River is pretty juicy with a nasty sieve and some fun read and run.  The Stomper rocked it in this tight and technical environment.  Mefford, Adriene, Snowy, and I had a great time.  Enjoy the flick. Fast and furious helmet cam love.

Cheers
Shane

12 Days in the Grand Canyon: Every day something different

Everyday something different.

Day 1.  Day one was a big one for me because I just don't get to go on trips where everyone is paddling one of our boats let alone everyone was paddling the same boat.  It was also a really cool experience to see how well the Remix XP performed for everyone and how perfect it is for this type of trip through rapids and long stretches of flat water.  Pushing off from shore and feeling the stability that the boat had with 100+ pounds of gear loaded into it felt great.  Yes it was another proud designer moment.

Day 2.  One of the incredible things from day 2 was the appearance of the Redwall Limestone and this wall.  You can see how small the kayakers are next to it.  It was distinctly layered with dark and light colored sediment layers.  The perspective as a paddler going through the Canyon is really wild  because the walls that surround you seem so big and dominating of the landscape but from the canyon rim looking down and in, the river gorge is just a small part of the Grand Canyon as a whole.

Day 3.  The hike up Little Nankoweep Canyon and up onto the first bluff above the river was really cool.  I am not sure how much altitude we gained but I would guess around 1000 feet and we might have walked 2 miles each way.  The tricky parts were 3 slightly sketchy climb spots on the way up and down.  Nothing terrifying but it certainly made you concentrate.  This hike is just up stream of the classic Grainery hike at Nankoweep Canyon.  We had this incredible view down river and we stood on this rock directly over our boats parked far down below.

Day 4.   Oh boy this was a big one.  We camped at a place called Basalt on day 4 because Mike had a hike that he had never done and really wanted to see.  Mike has somewhere in the neighborhood of 70 trips through the canyon so this is actually an unusual thing to find.  I joined in on the experience even though the report was that there would be sketchy climbing.  I got to the first "crux" of the climb and pulled rocks off the wall that I was trying to use to climb and lets just say that rattled me.  A couple rocks rolled down from the folks up above us and I opted out with signal.  But a big group pushed on to the top of the ridge.  I waited at the bottom of that first crux listening as they worked their way up the wash, avalanche looking area.  They managed to climb all the way up but I heard several cries of "ROCK!" and I could hear rocks careening down the gully.  One of them even got down near me even though I couldn't see them any more.  I saw that they had reached the top so I started walking back to camp but I could still hear them as they started the descent.  Then came a really loud yell!  "ROCK"! and "COVER UP!".  I heard a few echoes of the call by people further down the climb and then it was quiet for a minute and there were some nervous laughs.  I was glad to hear those laughs.  I couldn't handle it any more I went down to camp but for the next 20 minutes I glanced nervously up at the path leading into camp hoping to see them but at the same time hoping to not see someone come running into camp.  It all came out ok and the group had stories to tell all evening and into the next several days about the "Mike Hike".

Day 5.   One of my favorite things about day 5 was this camp.  Its called False Trinity.  It was small and close in but there were good places for everyone to set up their tents and room for all of us to have a nice kitchen space.  We watched the nearly full moon come up along with Orion.  We had a great night chatting about the Mordor middle earth like canyon of the inner gorge.

Day 6.  It was the rapids of day 6 that I really enjoyed.  Granite, Hermit, Crystal, and the Gems were super fun and we covered 16 miles like it was nothing.  Hermit was in fine form.  As I slid down the green tongue into Hermit I could see down the row of waves and down in the middle was a huge wave that was breaking heavily.  It made me think a little about dodging the heart of the waves but then I remembered I was in a 200lb kayak.  It would take a giant hole to stop me.  With that reassurance in mind I floated through the towering peaks laughing all the way.  The big wave broke over me.  I didn't even slow down.

Day 7.  We covered 24 miles and got to camp a little tired.  We were all struggling to stay up and it really helps to stay up at least until 8 or 9 pm or you wake up way before sunlight with nothing much to do.  So I came up with something to do.  We had a fun evening playing with our headlamps and long exposure photos for a an hour in the moonlight over the canyon.

Day 8.  The highlight of this day was doing an up and over hike from Tapeats Creek to Deer Creek, which was only possible because a few of our team hauled our boats a couple miles downstream for us.  This hike takes you up to Thunder River which is a creek tumbling out of the side of a massive ridge fed by an underground aquifer.   We climbed up past Thunder river and across Surprise Valley to Deer Creek which is one of the more famous side canyon hikes.  There were spectacular wide long vistas and an intimate carved micro canyon which falls over a 100 foot waterfall into the Colorado river below.

Day 9.  Day nine had a complete up and down feeling to it.  We stopped off for a classic hike at Matkatamiba.  The hike was super stylie climbing through the smoothly carved hall way that the creek had formed and it was warm up on the rocks when the sun hit us at the top of the gorge, but when we returned to our boats we realized that we were one boat short.  "Boat missing!"  A big group took off immediately to try to catch up with the kayak that must have slipped into the river on a surge or rise in the water level.   The rest of the group held back to keep track of the boatless paddler.  It took us over 2 miles but we caught up with the boat.  All the gear staid in the cockpit and only a few things got wet that shouldn't have.  John rode on the back of Woody's boat until they caught up with us.  That was a hilarious sight.  Woody told me that while John was perched on the back of his boat he had said,  "the next 60 miles is going to suck if we don't find my boat", and Woody's reply while trying to keep the his boat above water was, "you're telling me!" 

Then late in the day we caught up with another trip that had a unique set up.  They had a cataraft with two kegs strapped on the front and with true river man class they invited us in to fill our water bottles with a fine local brew from Flagstaff.  Thats a nice way to cap off a slightly stressful afternoon.

Day 10.  Lava day.  It fills paddlers minds from the moment they get on the river sometimes.  When it gets quiet people start talking about what they think the water level will be at Lava or how it went for them last time they were at Lava.  Its the perfect whitewater climax to this trip with only a couple days left.  We spent the morning running good smooth lines with only one swim and a flip or two out of 16 boats.  We had big smiles through 20 more miles of the the lower canyons that day.

Day 11.  Miles and miles.  These last few days we covered about 25 miles a day.  My arms were tired but it was a good tired.  The shadows continued to morph and change on the canyon walls.  The moon followed Orion over the horizon.  The end of the trip felt close.  I tried to keep myself focused on the present but little bits of home started to seep into my thoughts.  The lower canyons are beautiful.

Day 12.  We had just a short paddle to the take out so it was more of a silly float.  I think we all felt pretty happy with ourselves accomplishing a great trip, with a great crew.  Paddling fairly remotely for that long, with a lot of people, in the winter, is a fairly serious endeavor.  It came off perfectly.  Its not very often that you travel with 15 other people with, no drama, no real problems, and lots of memories from a trip of a lifetime.

Cheers

Shane