Canyon Creek, WA

December 15, 2007

Last weekend was fantabulous. I drove up to Portland to #1: drop off Kim and Todd at the airport and #2: Paddle ma little bum off. We drove up Friday afternoon and had some of the best thai food around. If you are ever in Portland, make sure you stop at Sweet Basil in the Hollywood district....friggin amazing. Oh and fyi, their food is HOT. :D Anyways, we had a relaxing Friday night and then I woke up EARLY Saturday morning to drop Kimmers and T Odd off.

We checked the river levels that morning because after doing many many rain dances, we were hoping for higher levels...we were disappointed. No rain Friday night and it was partly SUNNY that morning! Not cool. We had a few options and we decided on meeting a crew at Canyon Creek. One thing must be understood- when you paddle with Dave, you end up with a BIG crew of people. I don't understand the phenomenon that is Moldy but it's awesome. So...Moldy and I drove up and met two guys at the take out. We were then expecting four more to show up. By the time we got on the water and were half way down the run, this had grown to around 15 people....

Canyon Creek is a class 4/5 run. I would call it a class four at the flow we hit it at....350 cfs.
It has very few boulder gardens but it full of ledge drops and sticky holes. All good stuff :)

(Above) Photo by: Dave Gridley
Paddler: Christina Russell

(Above) Photo by: Dave Gridley

(Above) Photo by: Dave Gridley

(Above) Photo by: Dave Gridley AKA "Moldy"
Paddler: Christina Russell on Thrasher

The run starts off with a few mellow drops: "Swizzle Sticks", "Terminator", "Prelude" and "Thrasher". About a mile and a half downstream is a 17 footer called "Big Kahuna". It's a pretty clean drop but...just fyi....it's not necessarily the best to boof....a wee bit painful.

ha ha me
(Above) Photo by: Dave Gridley

Big Kahuna is where you end up with bumper boats (Atleast we did) . Moldy and I hopped out first to get a look and then fired it up :)

Checkin out Big Kahuna
(Above) Photo by: Dave Gridley

The photographer himself, Dave Gridley
(Above) Photo by: Christina Russell

Paddler: Christina Russell on Big Kahuna

(Above) Photo by: Dave Gridley

The final drops: Champaigne and The Hammering Spot

(Above) Photo by Dave Gridley

Ah yes...
After the run you have about a two mile paddle....wait it might be 1.5 miles but it felt long lol. :P We were pretty hungry and Moldy had some Gu gel with him...."What's the flavor?" ...."Oh, Banana Blitz". Hmmmmm....this sounded sketchy but I was pretty low on food so I took a swig of the stuff....
It was quite possibly the nastiest food I have EVER put in my mouth. It tasted like burnt bananas. Maybe it was old? We will never know.

It was a near perfect trip (minus the Gu gel) and hopefully I will get on the run at a high flow with Moldy! WOO HOOO!

Winter boating is here!
-Christina