This long weekend I only got out paddling on Sunday. However, it was good to take the free time to get my place more organized, and get things finally out of boxes. The Sunday paddle on the Cowichan was good, surprisingly, the water level was higher than the previous weekend.

I paddled the Super Ego again, and having done more outfitting work in it, I was more comfortable in it. I had to practice a number of rolls in the Super, as I figured out how it rolls differently from the Jive. The Jive has all the volume in the front, so a C to C roll (or any roll for that matter) works great. The Super Ego, having a wide base, no secondary stability, large volume in the center, and a very slicy front end is extremely difficult to roll with a C to C roll.

The solution was to switch from my favored C to C style roll, and finish with a sweep roll, and lean far back on the rear deck. While this places my shoulders in a weaker position for the finish, it is better in my opinion, to be able to breathe. I have to go far back on the deck because of the volume distribution in the Super Ego, and with an extreme lean backwards I am able to bring the Super Ego around in a roll with ease.

Still, I did forget to do this while playing around at one point, and had trouble when I tried to come up with a C to C out of instinct after a forward flip. I had to forcibly remember to sweep my paddle and lean back to get the boat upright on my second attempt. The upshot to all this is that I am less afraid of flipping in the Super Ego now. Given that I have swam out of the Super Ego about 5 times since I have owned it, and the last time I swam out of the Jive I was hand paddling on the Clearwater when I went into a whirlpool, I have much more confidence in the Jive. With the ability to bring the Super upright, I can play more aggressively in holes and waves, which is exactly what I did on Sunday. I dropped the Super into Bert’s hole without any reservation. Whereas, previously, I was only comfortable taking the Jive in that. Sadly, I got shot out violently, as it is not nearly as retentive as I would have expected it to be.

The wave below the Final Drop was quite good, although being at a higher level the Jive would have been more appropriate due to hull speed. Still, I was able to get some good surfing off of it. I realized I was tired when I blew of the wave and flipped. The need to roll clued me into being done on that wave for the day.

I am really looking forward to the Puntledge River Festival coming this weekend. The last time down the ‘Punt’ I felt uneasy as I did not know the river, and was not in my Jive. This time I will bring both boats. The Jive for running the upper Puntledge, or perhaps the Browns if the level is there, and the Super Ego for playing in the waves and holes once I have done an exploratory run in the Jive.

On another note, it looks like I should be able to have my truck on the road fairly soon, so I will have to get the Tercel all fixed up and ready to sell. It will be nice to have a vehicle again that I can sleep in on kayak trips, and of course, carry a whole host of boats with. Granted, it is not nearly as good on gas as the Tercel, but give that I don’t need to drive to work - or even for shopping now - I can get the 4Runner back on the road. It probably won’t be licensed in time for the Puntledge, but should be road worthy by the next weekend.

In other news, the Gold River is getting to good levels, and I really hope to head out there. I have a feeling that I will be making a stop at Home Depot to pick up all the materials to build a collapsable bed for the back of my 4Runner to make it even more comfortable to sleep in. Nothing like a 4X4 camper.

I got back on the Cowichan today, it was a much smaller group of us. Jessica, Matt, Rob and myself. I brought my Super Ego out after working on the outfitting the night before. Instead of going all crazy with the contact cement (which I was considering!) I made a bunch of layers for my seat so that I could sit higher in the Super, and take out layers as required.

I fit better in the Super Ego than in the Jive, but due to the different design, I feel far less secure in the Super Ego. I did a few bow stalls in the current, and that meant that I had to roll of course. I tweaked my right arm rolling up. I always seem to do that in the Super. I need to work my back deck roll, and other rolls in the Super as it is so different to roll from the Jive.

The Cow had dropped again, but was still fairly similar to yesterday, and it was a good day out. I helped spot Jessica with her roll a few times, and really like the drypants for standing in the river to help with a rolling session. Nobody swam this day out, and everyone was on target.

Running final drop was a bit spooky as I was not in the Jive, so I was not nearly as lazy as before, and I went over with a good amount of speed. I leaned a bit too far back - as I am always concerned about the bow diving in the Super. I got squirted again, just like when I went over in the Jive. But, I did not have to roll.

The wave below Final Drop was great, and Matt had the best surfs of the day as he brought out his Fore-Play, and being in a long boat, he had the easiest time of getting into the sweet spot. I had a few good surfs in the Super, and while it was hard to work up and into the wave, once on it, the super surfed well. It kept trying to ride high on the wave, and I could feel the hull getting very loose and bouncy. It kept trying to flat spin of its own accord. I worked to keep it from doing that, while I like flat spinning, I knew there was a good chance of a window shade, or just general dunking if I tried to flat spin. I need more rolling sessions in the Super Ego to really get dialed in.

It was a good day, and I will be heading to the gym to do more training for next weekend and the Puntledge Festival coming up soon. After that, I will probably have to head off to the Wenatchee and Clearwater to get my whitewater fix in, so it will probably be back to Mountain Biking for the rest of the summer, or just lots of sea-kayak touring, and flatwater K-1 Paddling.

Driving to the put in:

I just got back from Paddling the Cowichan River. It was a good day. There were a ton of paddlers I have not met before out on the river, and most of them were brand new! There were also a bunch of Beavers, Cubs and Scouts holding some sort of ceremony at the put in, I have been so far out of Scouts all these years, I could not tell what it was.
Paddlers at the Put in:

The weather was great, which probably explains the high turnout. On the river were, Larry, Ian, Jessica, Matt and Myself. The Cowichan has dropped since last week, but it is higher than it was mid week. S-Bend was fairly tame, as were most things before it. In fact, before S-Bend it was mostly a float. I helped Jessica with her roll, she has it, but she still thinks a bit too much. Otherwise, she is progressing from being a beginner paddler to an intermediate paddler extremely fast. She has a Jive like me, and it will suit her well.
Jessica running past Bert's Hole:

Bert’s hole was good, but a bit flushy, hard to stay in, and I went back up for another run. Below it I managed to get a Pirouette, but that took a great deal of work. Down double whammy I took a bad line, with Jessica close behind - and she took the better route on hard river left, while I went over to center throught the chop and the sideways hole. Oops. Still, no flipping.

Down at Final Drop, I was so lazy I just floated to the edge, with zero forward momentum. I really should have been paddling somewhat… I went nose down and deep, and then the spoon on the back of my jive caught the pour over, and brought the deck up fast. So, I was squirting my boat… while under water. All that went through my mind was: “Oh, damn, I am going to have to roll now.”
Running Final Drop:

However, as the boat surfaced, I was able to level the Jive, and come up without a roll. Funny really, as I was totally immersed when I went into the foam. I am pleased that I did not have to roll!
Hamming for camera on wave:

Further down, the unamed wave below Final Drop was in good shape. Not as good as last weekend, but nothing to scoff at! I surfed and surfed like crazy on it. Ian had good surfing on it too. The longer boats did very well on it. Gerald had a great drop-in surf too, but then he got out and took photos that I hope to upload soon. I lent my boat to Matt as his short boat had trouble getting past the eddy fence into the wave. He ripped it up in the Jive. Switching back to his Bliss-Stick, he got in the wave and had a wicked ride. Afterwards, we hit up the pub for beer and food. Don and Rose stopped by to say Hi as well. It was a good time all around.
Hands free surfing:

I was watching other people in the little boats, thinking about my Super-Ego, and how I am happy to paddle the Jive. However, I am making some changes to my Super-Ego now so that the seat is much higher. I opted for paddling the Jive because I am just so confident paddling it. But the Super-Ego has always been very hard for me to roll. Watching Ken Whitings Video he notes that raising your seat can make the boat easier to roll, but not so high you are rolling all the time! After looking a newer Drago Rossi, I noticed that the seat in it was considerably higher than the one I have in the Super-Ego. Therefore, I have bought a foam sleeping Pad from MEC, an I am currently cutting it into bits for lifting my seat. Looks like there is a group of us hitting the Cow tomorrow, so I hope to try it out!
Left Rudder:

The pictures arrived via email, and as you can see, Gerald did a fantastic job of taking pictures! I owe him a few beers!
Hip steering to the right to carve:

I have had a busy past week.

On Saturday I headed out to paddle the Nanaimo River again. On the river were Tim and his daughter Cara (or Kara?), Larry, and Jessica and myself. The level was good, but much lower than before. The level was dropping off fast. I had a good time, and did not have to roll once. In fact, in my last 5 runs out, I have not flipped once at all! (That includes Sunday).

Jessica did great for a relative new paddler, even after following me down a bad line at the A-Frame drop. I chose what was a good line at high level, not knowing that there was a massive pillow and rock in the center of the river. I boofed it, and the rock below, but turned back to wave her off, but she boofed it as well. Pretty good for someone who is just getting her roll dialed in on the river! Cara was paddling amazingly well - especially given her age. She gets to go to Montreal soon for Kayak Slalom racing. pretty impressive.

I was set to head out to Vancouver on Sunday morning, but my paddle on Saturday was so good, I elected to head to the Cowichan as well! On the river were a whole bunch of people. I did not get to know all their names. There was Gerald who took a picture of me just coming out of final drop. I look a bit weird in it as I am just recovering from a face full of water. There was also Jessica, Cara, Tim, and about 10 or so other people. I am meeting more and more paddlers, and this is just awesome. I hope to get involved in a subset of the VI club for the Victoria area so I always have people to paddle with.

The Cowichan had dropped considerably, and there were not many features around on it. Not for me in the jive anyways. Or i thought so. As we got lower down the river, I found a few fast surfing waves that I had to work to ride. Most everyone else was in the new smaller boats. Tim was in a kevlar C-1 Cara in Kevlar kayak, and Jessica and myself in Jives. So we had the biggest boats on the river.

After I ran last drop (as seen in the photo) I continued on down to try the wave below final drop. It was unbelievable. It was just a phenomenal wave. And because it was running so fast, and I had the Jive as opposed to the Super Ego, I could surf up a storm on it. It was a great ride. But then a guy swam, and I had to break off to go rescue him. Unfortunately I did not have my river booties (I thought I had lost them, but I had just left them in my car) and I had a long walk back to the take out after the rescue with no footwear. No big deal, except the rocks on the Cow are very sharp. Fortunately, the guy I helped rescue (I also helped him swim by encouraging him to try the wave - my bad!) came back down and carried my kayak back for me, because the walk back was taking me a long time.

My left leg goes numb often in my Jive because I am too tall for it. It was numb for a long time on Saturday, on Sunday I think I pulled my calf muscle while paddling, but because my leg was numb I could not tell I had cramped it up. I found that out starting Sunday night…

After heading back home, cleaning up my gear, I shot off to the ferry to get over to Vancouver (where I am as I write this) for my VMWare ESX/VI3 course. I have been so terribly busy out here. My brain hurts from VMWare information and the labs. I have had lots of requests to visit friends, but I sadly don’t have the time to see them all. I did get to visit Christine, but then I had to drop off her computer system! The VMWare course is great, I should be able to take the exam in Victoria soon. But I will have a good amount of study before the test to become VCP certified.

Other than that, because I finally have my first real cash flow card, and because I feel I have worked so hard, and made so many sacrifices, I dropped $1650 at Ikea today. You know you are an adult when you are exited about buying furniture at Ikea… What ever happened to wanting toys? At least I did it smartly, I got it all on credit for no interest, and I am taking the money I would have used to buy the stuff outright and putting it in a GIC so I earn interest, and pay off the card before the end date.

I hope there is more water to paddle this weekend… The island is drying up fast. Still, I can head out to Wenatchee and Clearwater to get my Whitewater fix on long weekends! Provided that I can walk normally once my calf heals up…