Idaho: Home of the Best Hole in America

Stories

By

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February 1, 2014

Photo: Mike Leeds — Idaho: Home of the Best Hole in America

“It’s the sickest play hole probably ever built,” says Junior World Champion freestyle kayaker, Jason Craig. “At least, that I’ve paddled in—and I’ve paddled in a lot.”

He compares the top feature at Kelly’s Whitewater Park to the Ottawa River’s world-class waves, but at Kelly’s, there’s never a line in the eddy.

It’s a ghost town a lot of the time says Craig, who spent a month at the Cascade, Idaho, park last summer—an eerie emptiness that you’d expect to see bustling with big-name boaters and beginners alike, based on the quality of whitewater.

There are four main waves at Kelly’s and the biggest is Craig’s secret training ground, a hole he says is the best in the country for boosting freestyle scores. The bank is landscaped with boulders that form amphitheater-style seating for more than 3,000 spectators near this feature alone, benches that are packed on event weekends when people flood to Kelly’s to join or watch high-level competition.

BRINGING IN BUSINESS FOR CASCADE

Since it opened in 2010, the park has hosted two National Kayak Championships and the 2013 Payette River Games, which drew 14,000 people, including a long list of world- class kayakers, to the park for a weekend of SUP and kayak competition.

The 2014 Payette River Games are from June 20 to 22 and have a prize purse of over $100,000, with $10,000 top prizes in both men’s and women’s categories—the biggest money weekend in whitewater history.

The events are booming business for Cascade, a single-store town that only 1,000 people call home.

Mark Pickard is the man responsible for plopping this world-class whitewater on the map in the middle of Idaho. A retired Wall Street hedge-fund founder, Pickard and his wife Kristina poured funds into the park as an act of philanthropy— a memorial to Kristina’s late sister, Kelly, and an economic jolt for Cascade, a town the New York-Miami Beach couple had fallen in love with.

“We’re not paddlers,” says Pickard, who transplants to the area for a few months each year. But a whitewater park was a long- time dream of the community so Pickard worked with a team of engineers to blast through its planning and construction in a matter of months, turning a donated abandoned sawmill site into what he hopes will become a national tourist attraction.

MORE THAN JUST WHITEWATER

Everything at Kelly’s is completely free, and Pickard didn’t stop with whitewater. Beach volleyball courts, an outdoor concert area, horseshoe and bocce ball pits and an extravagant visitor’s center are all part of the plan to bring more people to the not-for-profit park, on more than just competition weekends.

Between events, the site is scattered with small groups of local kids attending Kelly’s Academy—a program where fifth- to twelfth-grade students from the area get free lessons from world champs like Craig, who agrees that it’s just a matter of time before the park catches on as a whitewater hotspot.

“It feels like paradise. Every level of paddler would love that whitewater park,” he says, adding that it’s only a short drive from Kelly’s to the legendary 15 miles of Class V on the North Fork of the Payette River.

It’s “an incredible place to be a kayaker,” he says.

This article first appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Rapid Magazine. For more great content, subscribe to Rapid’s print and digital editions here

Betcha Didn’t Know About…Bears

Stories

By

Kaydi Pyette

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February 1, 2014

Photo: Courtesy Casey Anderson/caseyanderson.tv — Betcha Didn't Know About...Bears

Bear Brutus is just part of the family for naturalist Casey Anderson. His 800-pound ursine pal attended Anderson’s wedding as his best bear. He’s even sat down with the family for dinner.

Bears can run at speeds up to 35 miles per hour. The average human sprinter clocks in at 12 to 15 miles per hour. Don’t even try it.

Spokesbear for U.S. Forest Service, the original Smokey Bear was an American black bear cub rescued from a 1950 wildfire. After being nursed back to health, he lived at Washington’s National Zoo for 26 years, receiving up to 13,000 fan letters per week.

Though attacks are a common wilderness fear, bears have been responsible for only two to three deaths per year in North America since 1990. By comparison, dogs kill an average of 15 people and lightning kills 80 people each year.

For his show, Man vs. Wild, Bear Grylls has consumed frozen yak eyeballs, camel intestine juice, raw goat testicles, a live snake, giant maggots and live insects. The goat testicles were the worst, he reported—he bearly made it though.

It was Theodore Roosevelt refusing to shoot a tied-up bear on a hunting trip that gave the toy teddy bear its start. Roosevelt’s refusal made the papers, painting the soon-to-be-president as a compassionate man. It boosted his popularity and toy manufacturers jumped on the opportunity, creating the immediately successful “Teddy’s bear.”

This article first appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Canoeroots Magazine.

Basecamp: The Forgotten Phase

Stories

By

Scott MacGregor

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February 1, 2014

Photo: Ontario Tourism — Basecamp: The Forgotten Phase

The nacho chips and salsa were just placed on the kitchen table and already conversation was shifting from how nasty the ski conditions were today to my idea of a family rafting trip down the Coulonge River next summer.

By the time the pizza was coming out of the oven, the mothers were planning the menu. The other dads and I were Googling river levels to see which rapids we could run and which we may need to portage. Sitting at the cooks’ end of the kitchen table, one dad, hearing talk about boxed wine and lawn chairs, suggested we best keep the portaging to a minimum and run everything we can. That was our plan.

If we’d invited Professor Ed Krumpe from the Conservation Social Science Department at the University of Idaho to join us for dinner, he’d say we were deep into phase one of the five phases of a satisfying recreation and tourism experience.

Anticipation and planning is the pouring over guidebooks, route and food planning, campsite booking, travel plans and gear preparation phase. It’s an important step because it creates buy-in and commitment. Done well it sets expectations for the whole group. Done poorly—well, you probably know the answer—the experience would more than likely end in disaster.

The dads were looking for a big water run. The mothers had more of a low-water float trip in mind. The dads were thinking of starting way up north in the spring and stretching the trip over 10 days. The mothers were thinking three nights in August without bugs. Eventually we’d settle on a trip that offered just enough adventure and margaritas on the sand bars.

These important details are best worked out before the travel phase, before the participation phase and before the travel home phase, so the final recollection phase is a pleasant one.

A truly satisfying experience, according to Krumpe, is one where expectations are met or exceeded. How the story will be told après ski in years to come has everything to do with anticipation, planning and setting these expectations before the trip. Our memories are burned into our subconscious and affect the planning or likelihood of follow-up trips.

But we know that family trips never, ever go exactly as planned, especially ones in the backcountry, which is why I believe there is an even more important phase of the outdoor recreational experience. The imperfect recall phase falls somewhere between Krumpe’s travel home phase and recollection phase. You may know this phase better as selective memory.

When planning goes all wrong—shuttles are late, rafts flip, fish hooks enter fingers, tequila runs short and bugs live too late in the season—imperfect recall is our natural ability as parents to remember the good times and block out or make light of the bad. Imperfect recall is really what affects the likelihood of a follow-up trip.

Rounding up our ski jackets and our kids, we’ve already forgotten how cold, windy and icy it was on the hill today. Going out the door, we make plans to meet again early next Saturday morning at the lodge. —Scott MacGregor

This article was originally published in the 2014 Spring issue of Canoeroots

This article originally appeared in Spring 2014 issue of Canoeroots Magazine. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions here, or download the Paddling Magazine app and browse the digital archives here.

Skills: Night Photography

By

Mike Monaghan

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February 1, 2014

Photo: Mike Monaghan — Skills: Night Photography

Of all the great canoe tripping memories I’ve had over the years, some of the best evoke the magic of the night sky and the warmth and comfort of the evening fire. Capturing the spirit of a wilderness trip through the lens can be a challenge at the best of times, but photographing low-light and nighttime scenes demands some expertise and a lot of patience.

Beyond the essential equipment for effective low-light photography, which includes a digital SLR camera, tripod and fast aperture lens (less than f2.8 is ideal), there are some basic concepts to remember when out on your next trip.

The first is that the longer your exposure, which is also known as your shutter speed, the brighter your photo will be because more light is let in.

While you can photograph a campfire after dark, some of the most effective campfire shots are taken during twilight, when landscape detail or silhouettes put the campfire in context. Also, the darker it gets, the smaller your fire needs to be if you hope to balance it with the ambient light. A glowing bed of coals and a few flickering twigs will appear as a crackling campfire after a 10- or 20-second exposure.

On clear, moonless nights, capturing the stars can make for great images. To include foreground elements you’ll first have to expose for the sky, being sure to keep your exposure to 30 seconds or less to avoid blurring the stars due to the Earth’s rotation. Foreground lighting can take the form of a headlamp, off-camera flash or simply the glow from a nearby campfire.

A bright, moonlit night is a great time to make unique images. Moonlight provides backlighting to clouds, shimmers off water and provides an all-round spooky array of shapes and silhouettes. Including the moon as part of a longer exposure will result in a soft, circular glow.

If you’re lucky enough to experience the northern lights, photographing the display makes for an exciting and memorable tripping experience. If the aurora display has definition, keep your shutter speed to 15 seconds or less to avoid washing out the bands of light. Don’t forget to include some foreground to help with framing the image.

View seasoned wilderness traveler and photographer Mike Monaghan’s work at mikemonaghan.ca.

This article first appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Canoeroots Magazine.

Why I’m No Longer Opposed To Blowup Boats

By

Larry Rice

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February 1, 2014

The first time I took on Oregon’s wild and scenic Rogue River, I was in a solo hardshell open canoe, as were my boating buds. Self-supported, with camping gear and food for our three-day trip, we used every trick in the book to avoid capsizing as we negotiated 35 miles of remote, challenging whitewater. We weren’t always successful, but we did fine-tune our skills chasing down runaway boats. Tackling rapids can test even the most experienced wilderness tripper.

Ten years later, I returned to the same section of the Rogue with the same crew. Only this time, there were no swims and we were even able to run one difficult rapid that we portaged before. What gives?

We were all paddling inflatable canoes. Self-bailing, and with more stability than their hardshell counterparts, our burly, blowup boats bounced through the frothing rapids of the Rogue, emerging triumphantly into the emerald pools below every time.

I wasn’t always a cheerleader for inflatables. When I was first invited to use one—on a weeklong, self-supported, 100-mile whitewater trip, no less—I was suspicious of their durability, usability and lack of sex appeal. Would it be sluggish on the flat stretches between rapids? Would it hold up to the beatings a hardshell can take on a wild river? Would my buddies think I was a wimp for choosing an inflatable over my trusty Bell Nexus tripper? Could I really trust my life in the wilderness to some kid’s ducky?

How an open boat and open mind can change a stubborn man. That 100-mile trip made me a true believer. My fully loaded, 14-foot inflatable felt and responded like a hardshell canoe. And because of its stability and self-bailing attributes, I was able to run boat-swamping rapids with aplomb while my hardshell brethren scrambled to make it through the gauntlets unscathed.

The inflatable canoe has evolved into a technological marvel over the past 15 years. Built of rugged materials and designed by paddlers for paddlers, these are serious boats for serious boaters. The fun factor definitely diminishes when paddling an inflatable on flatwater rivers and lakes, but speed isn’t everything when river tripping, which is the inflatable canoe’s true domain.

[ Also read: The Best Inflatable Recreational Kayaks ]

I’ve grown to rely upon these versatile craft. Their large cargo capacity is perfect for multi-day river safaris and I’ve taken them across the continent, everywhere from Texas’ Lower Canyons to the Nahanni in the Northwest Territories. My friends used to laugh at me, but I’ve since made converts out of them, too.

More than anything, my inflatables have proven their worth on remote and exotic rivers—the steamy jungle of Nicaragua, mountains of Bolivia and in the wild steppes of Mongolia. You try getting a hardshell there by mule, backpack or public bus. These rivers are only an option if your boat packs smaller than a golf bag.

Whether it’s short sojourns near home or hardcore getaways, don’t be surprised if, after putting it to the test, you, too, advocate for these practical and efficient blowup boats.

Larry Rice resides in Buena Vista, Colorado. Among his fleet of canoes are four inflatables, from 10 to 16 feet in length, stored neatly in bags under the pool table in his basement.

You Are Here: The Art & Science Of Mapmaking

By

David Johnston

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January 31, 2014

Maps and charts are magical pieces of paper. Layered with a wealth of information, they can tell us everything from what kind of scenery to expect to where to camp and when to paddle. They can be a source of inspiration, or show you the way home when you are lost. Maps are truly the backbone of any trip, but rarely do we give much thought to how they were created, or by whom.

You are here: The art & science of mapmaking

Maps have been around since at least 2,400 B.C., when they were used in Mesopotamia to show property boundaries for taxation purposes. These maps were largely inaccurate, however, as their creators struggled to draw a bird’s-eye view without leaving the ground.

It wasn’t until 1539 when Dutch mathematician Reiner Gemma Frisius developed a surveying method of dividing an area into triangles—triangulation, as it’s known as today—that cartographers could begin to map large areas with much greater accuracy. It was another Dutchman who first employed concentric lines, or contours, to show areas of equal water depth in 1727. Still, topographic maps using contour lines to represent land elevation didn’t catch on for another 150 years.

In North America, most early maps were developed by laborious land surveys. Teams of geologists and surveyors scrambled over the land, documenting, measuring and sketching. It was excruciatingly time consuming, often taking many years just to collect the initial information.

In the 1930s, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) started using aerial photography, which significantly increased the accuracy and reduced the development time for new maps. For the first time, cartographers could truly get a birds-eye view of the landscape they were trying to draw.

Modern advances in mapping

Today, the first step in topographic mapmaking is still the collection of aerial photographs by either airplane or low-orbit satellites. The process requires meticulous planning. To get a stereoscopic or 3D image of land elevation, the land is photographed from two different, overlapping angles. The images are then scanned into a computer to extract the topography and convert it into contour lines. The development process for nautical charts is quite similar, but rather than using aerial photography, the sea floor is mapped by ships equipped with specially designed SONAR.

[ Browse the widest selection of boats and gear in the Paddling Buyer’s Guide ]

Field survey staff check accuracy by measuring the exact location of various control points in the area of the new map. There are over 69,000 topographic maps covering North America that must be accurate to within 40 feet. With over 1,000 charts covering over four million square miles, the Marine Chart Division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration maintains accuracy to within 33 feet.

person holds up a Garmin handheld GPS at a mountainous kayak location

The Rise, Fall And Rise Of Handheld GPS

“Technology has helped speed up the development process of new maps,” says Jean Pinard, a Geomatics Technician at Natural Resources Canada, “but it is still a very time- and labor-intensive process and it’s not uncommon for it to take up to five years to go from initial research to final product.”

It used to be, the more popular the map, the more frequently it was updated and reprinted. As recently as five years ago, paddlers planning a remote trip in some far-flung northern wilds had to content themselves with maps that were last updated in the 1950s. Now, however, all Natural Resources Canada and USGS maps are kept as up-to-date as possible by using a print-on-demand service, enabling quick adjustments and annual updates without waiting for existing print stock to sell out. And of course, there are always the navigation apps if you can’t stand paper.

David Johnston is the founder of www.PaddlingHQ.com. He dreams in rasters and vectors.

Cover of the Summer/Fall 2013 issue of Adventure Kayak Magazine This article was first published in the Summer/Fall 2013 issue of Adventure Kayak Magazine. Subscribe to Paddling Magazine’s print and digital editions, or browse the archives.

“I am told there are people who do not care for maps, and I find it hard to believe.” —Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island | Feature photo: Fredrik Marmsater

Train for the Ocean in Freshwater

Skills

By

Ryan Rushton

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January 30, 2014

ea91bb19891b6c623322a2cb25533741_XL — Photo: Virginia Marshall

How can Great Lakes paddlers and ocean paddlers in areas like southern California, the Gulf of Mexico and many areas in the southeastern U.S. learn to handle dynamic ocean conditions? Whether you want to prepare yourself for British Columbia’s Skookumchuck tidal rapid or notorious races such as Wales’ Penhryn Mawr, or earn top certifications with any of the major paddlesports bodies, paddling high-volume, class II to III rivers in your sea kayak can improve your skills between trips to challenging tidal environments.

How do river currents compare to the races, rips and overfalls of the ocean?

Whitewater currents are created by gradient, the loss of elevation along the river. The steeper the gradient, the more powerful and technical the whitewater. Ocean currents are created by the tide. The larger the tidal range, the faster, more powerful and technical the currents and features.

Beyond causality, there are differences in the currents themselves. Tidal currents constantly change as the current goes from slack to max and back to slack again (and then turns and goes the opposite direction as ebb changes to flood). Whitewater currents stay relatively constant with the only change due to rising or falling water levels. Many tidal features are significantly affected or amplified by wind and ocean swell, whereas these environmental factors do not really affect whitewater.

Though these are significant differences, there are many similarities when paddling sea kayaks in these seemingly polar environments. Eddylines, standing waves and pourovers are found in both tidal and gradient-inspired currents. How you manage boat speed and position, angle of approach and edging are basically the same. Eddy turns, peel-outs, attainments and ferry glides remain the most common maneuvers. The ability to surf a standing wave on a whitewater river transfers directly to surfing a standing wave at an overfall. Ditto coping with whirlpools.

When selecting a river for practice, look for a high-volume flow, wide deep channels with swift current, numerous eddies and standing waves, and a safe wash-out zone. Avoid technical rivers with obstructions, strainers and tight turns where there is a risk of pinning or entrapment.

Remember the acronym SPANGLES to focus on the main factors for successful maneuvers: Speed, Position, ANGLe, Edge, Stroke.

Begin by practicing eddy turns and peel-outs into current. Exit the eddy near the top— a clean eddyline and perpendicular approach will result in the current pivoting you quickly downstream; you’ll want to approach with more speed if the eddyline is turbulent. Edge down into the turn and use a static low brace for support during the transition.

Next, try ferrying—crossing the main current—and attaining—paddling upstream using eddies to ascend a rapid. Cross the eddyline with speed and a parallel approach so the opposing current is less likely to spin your boat. Edge away from the oncoming current and fine-tune your angle until the kayak glides effortlessly.

With coaching and practice, river features can prepare you to paddle anywhere the ocean beckons.

Ryan Rushton is the founder of Geneva Kayak Center in Illinois. He is an ACA Advanced Instructor Trainer, Swiftwater Rescue Instructor and BCU 5 Star Sea Leader.

This article originally appeared in Adventure Kayak, Fall 2012. Download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it here.

Skill: Build a Debris Hut

Skills

By

Vince Paquot

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January 30, 2014

Photo: Flickr user JustTooLazy — Debris Hut in Forest.

Squirrels are kings of survival in the forest. Have you ever wondered where squirrels sleep?  Next time you’re in the forest, look high up in the trees and see if you can spot a ball of dry leaves and twigs nestled in the branches. This is a squirrel’s nest—an insulated home that uses leaves to keep the temperature inside comfortable, just like a debris hut. You too can be a king of forest survival with this fun-to-build shelter that serves as both a tent and a sleeping bag. Each hut is unique and perfectly sized for the person building it.

Materials

One long, sturdy stick roughly twice your height
Rope—about one metre
Lots of smaller sticks—half to one metre long
Lots and lots of debris—leaves, grass, cattails,  hay and/or straw

 Instructions  

1. Find a flat spot next to a sturdy tree. Tie one end of your long stick to the tree at waist height and rest the other end on the ground so it makes a ridgepole above the flat area.  

2. Lie underneath the pole with your head at the trunk and use some sticks to mark out your body’s outline on the ground.

3. Lean all of the smaller sticks that you found against your ridgepole with the base of each stick just outside your outline. Place enough sticks to cover your debris hut on both sides and around your feet like a tent. Leave an opening on one side of the tree trunk big enough to crawl through—this will be your door.

4. Cover your new home with all the leaves and debris you can find. A 30-centimetre-thick layer of debris will keep out the rain; an arm’s length will provide insulation for survival through a cold night.

5. Block the door with your back pack or anything else you can find—this will seal in the warmth.

This article first appeared in the 2009 Late Summer issue of Canoeroots and Family Camping magazine. Read the issue in our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read it online here.

This photo is by Flickr user JustTooLazy and licensed through the Creative Commons.

Humpback Whale Collision

Videos

By

Paddling Magazine Staff

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January 28, 2014

Berthold Hinrichs

Berthold Hinrichs was paddling near Senja island in northern Norway this January when humpback whales began surfacing right beside his kayak. “That day there were about 30 humpbacks and 50 orcas in the bay,” says Hinrichs, who had his camera recording when a humpback surfaced at his side. “It did not capsize me, but [splashed] my camera and me,” he says. Hinrichs was busy drying his camera when “it happend again and then I was on the back of the humpback. I got a lot of water in my kayak, which froze to ice so I had to return to the harbour Hamn i Senja.”

Hinrich’s short film of the close encounter has been viewed worldwide, demonstrating our endless fascination for these friendly creatures of the deep. You can also view a magical 19-minute video from his trip paddling with whales at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxsArgxPcqc

Sweet Water

Gear

By

Kaydi Pyette

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January 27, 2014

Don’t be put off by its name; the Katadyn Hiker Pro is as appropriate for backcountry paddlers as it is for those pounding out miles on the trail. The Hiker Pro is a pump water filter that is compact, light and reliable…

This Field Test gear review originally appeared in the November 2013 edition of Paddling Magazine. Download our free iPad/iPhone/iPod Touch App or Android App or read every issue of this new monthly magazine here.