Goodbye

So, for the time being, I am going to temporarily retire this blog. Maybe a better word is its going to go into hibernation. Ive started contibuting to the FLOW blog on a pretty regular basis and uploading and formatting the pictures and text between the two blogs is a huge pain in the ass. So ive chosen to keep posting on the FLOW blog as its more of a team effort with lots of people writing for it and gets a lot more traffic.  You can see those posts here : http://fortheloveofwater.wordpress.com/
Peace, ill be back sooner or later
- Clay

Getting back at it after surgery

Its been about 6 weeks since I had my knee surgery and i'm finally able to go kayaking again. I'm pretty fortunate to be back in the boat so soon, I was thinking it would have been a lot longer before I was able to.  

I was real impatient sitting around watching kayaking videos all day from the couch, and it didn't help that I had a brand new 2010 Burn sitting in my basement right next to me.

Finally I got out to the ocoee and put some scratches on this thing. It felt great to get out, I felt real good but slightly out of paddling shape. 

Me in hell hole 1st day back

I aslo have made a few trips to section 4 lately including one self support overnighter, where we camped at camp creek. (which happens to be the same spot where the rape scene in deliverance was filmed)  The Burn handled real well loaded down, it did not trip up or anything, and still boofed well too. And I am probably at the very top of the weight range with all that gear. 

I made a trip to the upper ocoee one weekend as well and got to show my dad down that section for the first time. Heres a few photos from alien boof: 

I really wish this shot wasnt missed but you get the picture

Made it out for the cheoah release last weekend but didnt get any pics unfortunately. Oh well, it was fun as always.

So overall, I have really liked the Burn so far.  I never really paddled the old one except for once so I cant compare for you, and I havent gotten to paddle anything steep yet so I am hesitant to do a full review.  Hopefully ill be going to the green again soon.  But one thing I have grown to like  is the edges, the boat ferries really well and snaps into eddies great. The elevator move at broken nose on the ocoee was compeltly effortless in this boat!  Its easy to boof on the ones I have gotten so far, but again I need to get on something steep. It hold a line well too, paddling the pushier (for the SE) water of section 4 and the cheoah was not a problem at all, it was easy to drive where I wanted to go.   Well thats all for now, A chattooga trip for tomorrow is in the works, so maybe ill take some pictures.

- Clay

Video on kayaksession TV!

Spring Southeast Video on Kayaksession TV

My video edit of our spring season here in the southeast reached the international scene and got on kayaksession tv! Check it out

Helmet Art

I got bored not being able to do anything while recovering from knee surgery so I painted an old helmet. Check it out.

http://fortheloveofwater.wordpress.com/

I also took the time to finally try to fix all the crack in my old Jefe. I think there are 16? I forget.

I finally went kayaking a few times, check back in soon for an update on that!

- Clay

Spring Season 2010 my edit

Spring Season 2010 from Clay Lucas on Vimeo.

enjoy, and let me know what you think!

Eternity Hole Video

Eternity Hole from Colin Hunt on Vimeo.

Check it out! Going big in the Molans!

Week of boating out of GA again

After two last low water runs on the Watauga for a few months, I packed up all my things and headed home to Georgia.  It was a real good year of school, paddling, mountain biking, skiing, and good times. I kept a little log of paddling days for the year, its pretty accurate for the most part. Here are some quick stats:

1st semester: 35 days on the water, 15 new runs

2nd semester: 42 days on the water, 6 new runs

I logged 31 runs on then Watauga as well!

Not too bad, I think.  

When I got home, I had about a week of free time until my knee surgery, so I resolved to go kayaking as much as possible until then. I started off with a trip to run the Chattooga with Greg Garrard and Sam Causey, two real good friends that I hadn't got boat with in a long time, so it was good to be back boating with them like I did all through high school.  When we all first paddled with each other, we thought the Ocoee was badass, and the Chattooga was the absolute shit.   We planned to meet Katie Worley and Zach Dean to run shuttle with, but they werent off work until 5 so we decided to head over to the upper Tallulah for soma laps while we waited.

To be continued...since my photos are not uploading for some reason

High Water Raven Fork Trip Report

It all started on tuesday night at 2 in the morning with Marks facebook status updating to "really wants to run ravens tomorrow."  The river was primed already with rain forcasted for the morning, so I gave him a call and we made plans to leave Boone after my 10 o'clock class.

We kept speculating levels on the way down, the rain was off an on so we really had no idea what it would be like. We both agreed about 12 inches on the stick would be our max for this day, if it was higher we would try for west prong or big creek.

Meeting Paul, Jay, and Justin Kleburg at the gauge, it read about 11 so we decided to put on. Paul was nervous about the level so he opted to go get drunk with Emmanuel while we paddled.   It was Kleburgs first time on Raven Fork.

We hiked in in the rain, catching glimpes of the river through the trees we could tell it was high. At Anaconda, I knew it was way higher than 11 inches. We all fired it up and had good lines but I subbed out for a long time in the first and second drops.  We all portaged headless, as the hole was disgusting looking.

Everyone had good lines everywhere down to Mike Tysons. Mikes was probably the fastest I have ever been in my kayak and was completely mind blowing.  Caveman was sweet as well, water was going all the way off the end of the slab rock!

It was a great day out there. We met up with Joe Barkley and Dustin at Manny's, it turns out Dustin swam and lost some gear at headless. Joe estimated the level to have spiked into the high teens, and he would know. They were only shortly behind us. After chilling with Emmanuel for an hour or so and listening to some hilarious stories, we headed out and checked the bridge gauge on the way back and it was at 17 inches.

I wouldnt have thought about hiking up at this level if I knew thats what it was, but honestly after paddling it, I would go back at that level.  It is definitely a step up from the normal Raven Fork run, mostly because of holes and some more push.  But it was not un-managable, and was still drop pool. the rapids only got better and more fun, which is hard to believe because its so awesome already.  It was a great level and a sweet day out in the Cherokee reservation and I cant wait to go back.

Sorry I have no picturess, I wish my camera was not broken so badly, especially for this day!

-Clay

End of Spring

Its been a while since I last did an update, due to the end of the school year, finals, and moving back home to Georgia for the summer.  I had no time to do any updates, but I did get to go do some good boating a few times in there.

I'll start with Paddlefest, which took place in and around duck pond, on ASU campus. This was the first time I have been able to go, and it was a fun event with relay races, a throwbag competition, rolling competiton, and other events, most of which my good buddy Ty and I took 1st place in. Chan came up in the van with some new Pyranha Burns and Molans  for demo on the pond. There is only so much you can do to test out a boat in a tiny pond but the Molan was fun to throw around in the flatwater for sure. Everyone else had fun paddling and showing some people who had never been in boats before the basics. 

    Throwbag competition

Me and Ty throwing down in the new Molans in front of the fountain

I'd also like to shout out to Outdoor Programs who supplied loads of raffle prizes for the event, almost everyone went home with something!

After a fun night chilling with everyone in town for the festival, Me Chan and Mac headed down to eternity hole, where we met up with Paul Jay and Colin for a surf session and to test out the new Molan for real.  I gotta say I liked it, it was definetly a very fast boat and also popped really high.  I have never been much of a playboater at all, but I finally got my loop dialed in this session, it was awesome.

   Mac going real big in the small.

                                          Me throwing one in the medium

Cool photo of paul looping, check out that spray

Colin blasting

After a night in Cullowhee, we all headed to the Green for Jerry's baddle. Jay was the only one of us to race, I wished I had thought about it and done it cause its a super cool event.  The race was also Jay's first time running the monkey, he had an iteresting line for sure but it all worked out. He has since run it clean!

You can see me cheering him on real loudly on the bank

Jay, by the way you scared the shit out of your dad. 

Colin was going back to Boone, se me and Mac caught up with Will Selle for some overflow laps on sunday, rounding out the weekend. Overflow was juicy when we got there around 2ft, but dropped to around 1.4 by the end of our second lap. It was a super nice day, overflow is a great creek. That concludes the weekend!  Next up, Raven Fork at 17 inches trip report and more!

Mo' Raven Fork! Plus some sweet pictures and a ballin' contemplation video!

Mi camera es still broken...so no original pictures from me again. But fortunately Colin has got some sweet still frames from his camera so I have something to work with!

Colin has been putting together all of the footage we have taken in the last few months, and here is the result: Includes Raven Fork, Watauga, Tallulah, Green, Chattooga, Wilsons, Laurel Slides, Cheoah, Elk, and probably some more cause this video is stacked.



Southeast Kayaking from Colin Hunt on Vimeo.



Sweet video Ballin'!!

Like I said in the last post, we headed down to Cullowhee and got on the Raven Fork again on friday afternoon.  It was timed perfectly, me, Colin, and Mac were all out of class by 11 and left Boone by 12. By the time we met up with Paul, Jay, and Jake, set shuttle, and hiked in it was about 5 o'clock.  Jake and Paul had never been down before, so it was a little bit stressful trying to show them the lines while trying to keep moving and be out before dark. Plus there were 6 of us, so the eddies were crowded as well.  Everything went great though, good lines everywhere. And I remembered my elbow pads! yay. I looked at Big Boy for a long time but had to walk away...this time.  Jake and Mac fired it up with great lines though!

Getting to Caveman was a relief, we all walked back up for more goodness. At Mangler, it officially got dark and we blue-angled through the rest of the "boogie" to Emmanuel's.

Going from sitting in English class in Boone that morning to running the Raven Fork made for one great day!

Here are a few surprisingly good quality still frames from Colin's camera:

"Think Werner would sponsor me if we take a picture with all of their paddles?"

Hiking into the beautiful, lush Ravens Fork

Mortal Combat

Mac Mcgee is a big boy

Me in the ring with Mike Tyson

Paul airing out Caveman!

Jay - caveman is a lot harder at low water!

Jay boofing with Mac on cave saftey

Colin avoiding the cave, nice line!

Me in caveman at low light, it got dark shortly after.

Thanks Jake Ament and Colin Hunt for the photos!

Saturday we woke up early and went to the Cheoah.  It was a juicy 1500cfs and it made for a really fun day, we did one  forest service bridge down lap, then a full lap, and then 3 more fs bridge down laps.  It was great, but left us feeling extremely tired and beatdown after the Raven Fork the day before especially. 

Sunday we tried to go to Eternity hole for some playboating but were skunked! Apparently its the first time it hasn't been running since about december. Not feeling like trying to boat anything that would require more effort than park and play we headed back to Boone to work on building a playhole of our own...but that has to remain a secret for now :) Nah not really, its on the Watauga and doesn't look like anything right now but hopefully we can get some good work done on it when the water drops out. 

Paul looping at eternity a different time

Speaking of getting skunked on playboating, it happened again yesterday when Colin and I tried to go to the Nolichucky. We were turned back by forest fires of all things! They were dunking the buckets from the helicopters in the pool at the put-in and wouldn't let anyone put on. Crazy. 

Thats all for now, oh yeah when we got skunked we hiked a creek instead and found a West Prong-took-meth style creek very close to Boone. Can't wait for rain :)

PEACE!

-Clay

Watauga Race, Chattooga, Tallulah, Green and More

So the past few weeks have been eventful, but unfortunately I have no pictures of anything due to my camera dying on me.  Hopefully I will be getting a new one soon but in the meantime here is a little update on whats been going on.

The Watauga Race was great this year with juicy water levels, a great turnout of over 40 racers, and perfect weather.  Hopefully this can become an annual event!  I took 20th overall, but 2nd in short boat. I was pretty happy with my finish, but next year I am going to try to get my hands on a longboat for sure, I just could not keep up with the greenboats in the flat sections.
Here is a nice write up with photos and a video from the race:
http://riverkeeper.appvoices.org/2010/03/

This weekend was a really good one for boating, it almost felt like summer! Going with no drytop for the first time in 6 months felt awesome, along with swimming in the river.  We started the weekend off with a run down Tallulah on saturday with Colin, Mac and my brother. Here is a nice video Colin put together, showcasing the major rapids in the gorge:


Tallulah Gorge with most of the rapids from Colin Hunt on Vimeo.



On monday, I got to paddle with my dad on section 4 of the Chattooga, along with Colin, and two guys we met at the put in, Craig and Fast Fred.  We had a great time on another beautiful day. Two swims in the 5 falls and a beatdown in socemdog made things a little interesting!

Tuesday we headed to the Green, where I got to show my brother down the narrows for his first time! It was a nice 10" and a great first time level. He did great until a skirt implosion at hammer factor, and yes it counts as a swim!  We took some video on Colin's camera that should be up before too much longer.

Back in Boone, Matt, Ty, Jesse and I went to the Watauga for a nice low water run, the first in almost a month.  The level was around 160 cfs, plenty for a fun run.  It channelizes really well and some fun boofs and different moves open up. Not a bad playboat level either, the Watauga is full of good splats and rockspins. Stateline was good to go as well, its just a lot more of a fine line.

The rain is falling, tomorrow we are headed to Cullowhee in hopes of creeking in the smokies, then Tallulah again the rest of the weekend, see you out there!
-Clay

Twisting Falls - Elk

Yesterday, 3/24 I got the opportunity to go run the Twisting Falls section of the Elk river. I was supposed to go run Linville but not having a car got in the way again, so I got on board with Frank and Edgar for my 2nd ever Elk run.

We decided we didn't want to drive the 45 minute one way shuttle, so we opted to try out the hike in option, where the shuttle is more like 4 miles, with a "15 minute hike" to the river. After making our way up the road we found the trail and started hiking.  The trail disappeared into the woods after about 100 yards, and we ended up following game trails and hiking through rhododendron and following a creek until we met the Elk. I was relieved when I heard Edgar whoop when he saw the Elk, I was starting to have Steeles Creek flashbacks.

Frank hiking beside a cool boulder

With the hike in option, you only miss two rapids and it is a lot less time consuming than driving the long shuttle and paddling all the flatwater. But personally, I would rather do that then the hike, unless the trail was improved a lot. We may have just missed the easy way at some point though. 

The level was medium-low, but still good, the Watauga was at about 600 cfs this day. Shortly after putting on, we met up with Andre, Pete and Josh and paddled with them. After making it through all the big, shallow, fast slides the Elk has to offer, we made it to the Twisting Falls Portage.  Now I am not usually very scared of heights, but this portage is not fun at all. Especially because i was worrying about my knee the whole time.  

Passing the boats along the narrow ledge

The consequences. I am against the wall.

Twisting Falls

After gingerly making our way around and down twisting falls, and a sweet boof over a big hole, we arrived at the goods. The 15 footer had a very juicy hole at this level, while a few chose to run it, with one beat down, most of us seal launched from the ledge next to it, of equal height. Then came the prize, Compression Falls. The height is debated, my guess is around 30 feet of vert with another 10 foot high roll in for a total close to 40ft. 

Andre went first, and broke his paddle on the landing, even though he ran it perfectly clean. 

Rolling off

I was next, and had a pretty good line I think, but I was a little more vert than I hoped to be. I tucked up tight and landed fine though. I think I was about completely vertical, but the curtain on compression is a little off vert, so you want to have a little bit of angle. Unhappy with my line, I hiked back up for a second shot at it while Josh, Frank, and Pete fired off with good lines. 

My first line

I knew what to do on my second attempt, I just needed to tuck up later, not as soon as I spotted my landing. I did and it worked out perfectly. 

My second lap, about to tuck it up

After my good line on Compression I was much happier, as the last 2 I did I went vert too much. Compression is really the only "must plug" waterfall I have run so far, there just are not that many around the southeast, or Colorado really. I am more interested to find more around here though, I know there are some, they are just not very plentiful.

Waterfalls are a lot trickier than they appear, timing your tuck as to not go over the handlebars or break your paddle is tough. Edgar has run the Elk around 10 times, he said every time he has been someone has gotten hurt or broken something, this time was no exception. Compression does have a big hit at the bottom, it don't tickle. But, I am pretty stoked on waterfalls now, and looking forward to doing more bigger ones.

Boogie on the paddle out, with compression in the background

It has been a solid week so far, with me and Colin paddling some Red Roof and Laurel Creek slides on tuesday, Elk wednesday, Watauga today at a juicy level, and the rest of the week looking like Watauga race training and then the race on saturday, and clean up on sunday.  Another great week of boating in the high country, an awesome place to be in the spring time!

Video coming soon!

Week of Watauga

With the warmer weather and good water, I have been really stoked on kayaking lately. I am usually pretty excited about boating, but this past week its all I have been thinking about. I managed to get on various sections of the Watauga 6 days in a row this week, with today ending the streak unfortunately. I did the Red Roof one day, just the Gorge 3 days, the upper Watauga and the Gorge one day, and a Gorge and Wilson Creek double one day. I got to paddle with a big variety of people, and saw a lot of other friends out on the river too. 

The first day the level was around 400 with Beech and Laurel putting in a lot more for a level of about 550 or so in the gorge. Throughout the week I rode the bubble all the way down to about 200 on the gauge. Every level of the week provided something a little different, and I couldn't begin to pick a favorite level. They are all pretty equally fun. 

Since I ran the Watauga so much this week  I finally took a few pictures from out there, I dont know why I havent before.

Mac on one of Watauga's many good boofs

New team hydro crew member Matt West on the same boof

Frank freewheeling

Mac freewheeling with a very painful look on his face

Matt with a freewheel

Me in a boogie rapid (photo Andria)

Another great Boof/Freewheel Spot (photo Leland)

Here is a sequence shot of me running stateline: 

(photo Matt)

Maybe it was just how many times I ran it this week, or all the Canadians and New Englanders that had traveled down, but I have just started to realize what a classic, awesome, underrated river the Watauga is.      

It has super high quality class IV rapids the entire 5 miles down, with 2 really fun class V's. It has more fun boofs than any other river I have ever been on, there must be about 50. There are all sorts of alternative lines, slot moves, ferries, runnable sieves, and other cool moves in lots of the rapids. I discover new stuff every time I go out there. Its a beautiful canyon with lots of wildlife, I have seen a bear down by the river before. I feel really lucky to have this river so close that I can run it 6 times in a week and have even more fun every time I do it. 

Frank throwing a ninja-death-boof-stroke-paddle-tuck on the last rapid