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Creekin Cali |
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1 May 1998 |
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Been a while but I've been doing some pretty cool stuff, mainly paddling. Since Las Vegas we’ve been to Kernville for a kayaking festival, sort of like the Buller fest but not quite as sociable. Met up with Shawn there and finally got in my kayak and took it for a couple of warm-up runs down some relatively easy water on the Kern river. The weather is great here, all sunshine which melts all the snow which feeds all the rivers which means the water is bloody cold. Did my first real creek run on Brush creek, which has an huge gradient down a granite gorge. All runnable but the unrelenting steep gradient had the sphincter twitching a little at first. Once used to running continuous 15 to 20 foot blind drops and never failing to land safely, the river became like the wildest Disneyland ride you could imagine, we couldn't stop grinning. Next day Shawn and I ran Dry Meadow Creek, a classic creek run that is a series of 3 to 6 meter, teacup style, waterfalls. Running the drops was not that difficult but the head game was intense. I was completely unable to spit, my saliva glands had gone into reverse and once again my sphincter was developing a nervous pucker. The seventh waterfall, not far from the bottom of the 6th waterfall, is a 50 ft drop onto rocks and made the adrenalin pump that little bit faster.
To make us all the more aware of the consequences, Bruce Barnes (one of NZ's top paddlers) had made the mistake of miscounting the number of drops just the day before we were there and was extremely lucky to get away with only bilateral compound fractures of his arms and not quite fatal internal injuries then 4 days in hospital before he was able to be flown home. I think most people would have ended up looking more like toothpaste!
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In Sequoia National Park we put in to the Kaweah with a bunch of Poms on tour, not really knowing what to expect. This was by far the most intense river I've ever run. Nearly every rapid had to be scouted and a few portaged. It took us 5 hours to run 2.5 miles, lucky it was a sunny day and hanging out an the hot rocks wasn't all that bad a way to pass time while everyone took their turn at scouting. We decided to bail when the river disappeared into a gorge, which only left us about half a mile short of the take-out. |
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Had a look at a big tree (sequoia), the largest living thing on the planet and then went to Yosemite Nat Park to be impressed by very large shear granite walls, all my photos were of the waterfalls cascading down them! |
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Next adventure was an easy run down the lower Merced. We had met up with Jo and Steffi again and spent a couple of relaxing days camping and paddling with them. |
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We are now in Caloma, near Sacremento and have run the south fork of the American river which had lots of awesome big and very fast surf waves. Not really sure where to from here, hoping to meet up with KC in the next few days. Bye everyone Dave
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The river started with some pretty intense warm-up rapids, the first one I messed up and took a couple of chunks of flesh out of my thumb which didn’t help anxiety levels much. By the second half of the run I'd built up confidence again which was sort of a good thing cause that’s when the fun started. The rapids were continuous and steep with a lot of big boulders creating sieves, undercuts and just generally being in the way, making this no place to stuff up. I portaged the worst stuff, full of sumps, sieves, trees etc and survived the rest OK. Since then I’ve meet up with a kiwi couple (Matt and Lou) and I'm now travelling with them for a bit. Shawn has bailed back to Canada and Taki has shot up to Idaho to paddle some big stuff up there. |
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I’ve also bumped into a kiwi dude called Ray Button, an old timer outdoor sort of legend, have done a bit of paddling with him as well. Nigel from OPC has just turned up and will probably be joining up for some paddling when he gets a wagon. The paddling has been kept to a more moderate level of late and we’ve done a few classic runs with great scenery and fun rapids. |
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Bye for now Love and Custard, Dave
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Custard Adventures
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I've been doing lots of cool sightseeing, biking and paddling in fantastic places. The other day we drove through Death Valley at twilight with the cruise control on and we sat out the windows with the warm desert air (and the odd bug) in our faces. We drove till 4am and went to sleep on the side of a desert track with the first light of dawn chasing the stars away. Four hours later I offered some watermelon to an old dude who was out for his morning ride through the Utah desert. He took us to a place known to the locals as "the cracks", where extensive fractured limestone has eroded into chasms that only a few locals know are there, and maybe a few old time rustlers who would heard cattle down them and slaughter them for a "freestyle BBQ" as George put it. The bones are still there. |
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We went to 2 national parks, Zion, where we camped in the wilderness, and Bryce Canyon, which was absolutely spectacular. I blew lots of film on cool looking rocks called monoliths that will probably all look the same when I get them developed but looked amazingly different every time I walked 10 paces. |
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That night Junior coughed over an 11,000 ft pass to Frisco, Colorado (we figured he didn't like the thin air which messed with his fuel mixture). Kayaking and biking at about 10,000 ft is beautiful in terms of scenery but kind of tough on the body. |
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This three month adventure is coming to an end and once again I am feeling the intense sadness, happiness and apprehension that comes with leaving behind good times, people and places and facing a big unknown, another adventure for which no parameters have been set, no known places and lots of strange faces. |
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Before I started driving across deserts I was spending lots of time in my boat, I love my boat. I've paddled it to places that most people have and will never see, on water that used to be snow that hung on the branches of trees. Then when it melted it flowed and carried me, through beautiful and sometimes bizarre places, past outlandish geology, and past plants that are poisonous if you touch them. And other plants with names like Indian Rhubarb and Indian Paintbrush and fields of wild flowers that make a place seem magical and trees that grow straight off the top of big boulders, they just wrap there roots around them and through cracks in them. |
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My favourite run is one called clear creek near a place called 'Happy Camp' in Northern California. I paddled with a guy called Scott who rescued a drowning snake and I took lots of photos, especially of rapids that made me nervous. When I finished paddling on this creek I wrote in my diary "...right here, right now, beside this river just feels blissful, tranquil, contemplative and complete. This is why I am travelling. Right now nothing else exists outside these feelings, I hardly even notice the traffic on the road right behind me" This river is one of the most beautiful places I've ever been and the rapids are white-water entertainment at its best, scary enough to pump a few good shots of adrenaline through the system without sending the sphincter out of control.... "
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Northern California in a beautiful place, the bush is thick and fresh, the wild life is happy and the relatively few locals are friendly. Some of the wild life is pretty wild too, lots of things with big claws and sharp teeth like bears and mountain lions. I’ve seen skunks and squirrels and eagles and crows and blue jays and wolves and raccoons and chipmunks and deer and snakes and other stuff that I cant even remember right now. |
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I did an overnight trip on Mill creek where the water has cut bizarre and unnatural looking chasms and canyons through very young looking volcanic conglomerates and other stuff. A 60 ft wide river will suddenly narrow and funnel through 6 ft wide chasms that are 100 or more yards long with no eddies and ridiculous undercuts. No significant rapids but these bits were the scariest class 2 water I’ve ever paddled. |
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I've been invited to parties and shown great hospitality, in some places I'm starting to feel like a local. After all that paddling I went to Yosemite National Park. I hiked up a trail to Yosemite point and for some of it I ran up it, thinking of Paul who had done that the last time we were here when I went paddling. Eight hundred and fifty vertical metres later the cloud set in and all I could see of my friends who were doing a most legend rock climb up a thing called "lost arrow spire" was a few people outlined with a white cloudy background. Had it not been cloudy I probably could have written a few more paragraphs on just how cool this was, even just to watch. The next day I did some rock climbing myself and the day after that I walked (with sore legs) 13km along and 1500 m up till I got to the top of a really really big lump of granite called 'Half Dome', because it is shaped like half a dome! I don't recommend doing this wearing bike shoes with cleats on. I got the obligatory naked photos and one with me standing right on the vertical edge wearing a pair of winged 60's style sun glasses made from purple velvet (we found them yesterday). It was kind of tricky with about 20 other tourists about but I actually started a trend 'cause this other guy did it as well (after asking me if this was a shot for a Fosters beer commercial! ...thinking I was an Aussie, like most Americans) |
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On the hike down we saw lots of waterfalls which I wont even try to describe because I just don't know enough adjectives but one of them especially was one of those magical places that will always stay vivid in my memory. Looking up at tonnes of water falling towards me in an enormous curtain, being soaked by spray and rainbows it was easy to forget about 24 km worth of sore feet and legs, sucking up the freshness and the energy of the place and feeling very alive. |
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I've done lots of other cool stuff and been to lots of other cool places but this is long enough so send me a few of your adventures (thanks heaps to those of you who are) and I'll keep the Custard coming. Bye Dave |
