Manville Dam - July 11, 2017

Finally made it to a Tuesday night paddle club trip - Manville Dam.  Paddled tandem with Danny in his Explorer.  Good time.

Pawcatuck - Shannock to Richmond - July 8, 2017

Running Lower Skannock Falls

I was thinking about going up the NH for a low water run on the Winni, but the threat of thunderstorms killed those plans.  Instead, I stayed local and paddled the Pawcatuck from Shannock to Richmond with RICKA.  The sun was out and the river was at a nice level – 2.5’,130 cfs on the Wood River gage.

Since I had the float bags in the boat from the trip to the Deerfield, I decided to run the the Lower Shannock Falls.  It’s an easy line that goes from left to right and then back to left.  I took in a little water in the drops at the end.  After a little bit of surfing below the falls we headed down.

Above the Richmond Dam

This is a short but pretty section of river – about 3.5 miles.  The Carolina Raceway provides a little excitement, and the Carolina Canoe Campsite is a great place to stop for lunch.  Before long we were down at the Richmond Dam.

I’ve run the Richmond Dam several times in the past, so rather than looking myself I asked Chuck if it was runnable. He said it was, so I did.  The drop was a little bigger than I expected, but I ran it fine, and followed up with a little surfing. 

Surfing at the Richmond Dam

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Chuck’s Pictures on Facebook

Chuck’s Video on Facebook

Wood River Junction gage

Lower Deerfield - July 3, 2017

Over the years, I’ve done a lot of trips on the Lower Deerfield. I can remember my first RICKA trip there with Jim Cole, Alan August and Henry Dziadosz, which was probably back in 2006. 

A few shots from 2006

It’s the perfect trip for an easy summer afternoon – the water moves enough to keep it interesting, but not enough that you need to work too hard. I had a good time there yesterday with Adam, Sandi and Brian. We put in at the Zoar Gap Picnic Area and paddled down to Charlemont Academy.  The river was running at about 1000 cfs, which kept things moving.  Nice day.

It doesn't get much better than this!

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Deerfield Gage
River Description form American Whitewater

Second swim of 2017 - Tville - June 29, 2017

It's hard to believe that it's the end of June, and I can still get my whitewater boat out on a natural flow river. Tville on the Farmington River in CT continues to run, and shows no sign of dropping. I got out again last night with the CT/AMC, and had my second swim of the year. My ride in the playhole only lasted a couple of seconds, but this time there is a picture of me upright.

The calm before the swim...

The paddle on the upstream side probably contributed to my speedy demise, but a least I was facing the camera for the shot.

The river was 1.6 feet, 550 cfs.  Tom wrote on Pnet...

Anyone can bob a hole embedded in a cork,
but when the tale wags twain gunwhale that wallows wide as pork,
that into stall that sooee's call you herd with the short stick,
Wellll, then you've done well sink or swim in swell where the yak yawns in dizzy lick.

(Meaning a pig's pirouette in the sty is worth two yak bow stalls in the eye. Mind you, that's a pirouette not spun around an horizontal axis!)
TW

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Tville Gage
River Description from American Whitewater

Pawcatuck “Wilderness” Trip – June 24-25, 2017

Steve

Each spring, The RICKA Wilderness group does an overnight trip on the Pawcatuck River.  The idea is to give people a sense of what it takes to do more extended wilderness tripping from a canoe or kayak.  The Pawcatuck has a bunch of nice paddle-in sites, so it’s the perfect place for this type of trip. 

I didn’t have time to pack up on Friday, so I was rushing around on Saturday morning to get everything together. Usually with meals it is “everyone for themselves”, but for this trip we decided to do group meals, and I agreed to take breakfast.  The remnants of Tropical Strom Cindy would be coming through as well, so I packed tarps, clothes, and rain gear that I wouldn’t normally bring.  I had two big drybags stuffed with food and gear.

Enjoying the campfire

Just as I was about to leave the rain started, and it pored until about 11:00.  Then, just a predicted, the storm moved off and the sky cleared.  It turned out to be a beautiful day.  We met at the Richmond Landing (now called the Jay Cronin Access), ran the shuttle down to Alton, and then got on the river for an easy paddle down to the campsite. 

We camped at the bootleg site at the confluence of the Wood and the Pawcatuck.  When we arrived, the site was a mess – littered with beer cans and broken glass. The first job was to clean things up.  After that we set up the tents, took a hike down to the osprey nest (no osprey in residence) and cooked dinner.  Bill joined us around dinner time, and we settled in for a relaxing evening around the campfire. 

At the take-out at Alton Dam

Most of us were up early on Sunday, so we got the fire going, cooked breakfast, and sat around the fire before packing up to leave.  Once on the water we paddle up the Wood River to Alton.  Great trip.

The crew gets ready to leave

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First swim of 2017 – Tville - June 15, 2017

Last year, my first swim of the year was on January 1^st, and I swam again before the month was out.  This year it took a little longer, but I finally had my first swim of 2017.

With Father’s Day and rainy weather, I knew it would be tough to get out this weekend, so I decided to join the local AMC group on their Thursday night run at Tville.  Tville is a short but fun trip at this level - 1.7 feet, 600 cfs.  It has some nice surf spots above the Gorge, and a couple of pool drops in the Gorge.  The highlight of the trip for most is the playhole.

Tville from Erik Eckilson on Vimeo.

To be honest, I usually skip the playhole and focus on taking pictures.  I had tried it once before at about the same level, bounced around for a few seconds before backing out with the boat still upright, and considered myself lucky.  It didn’t look too bad on Thursday, so I decided to give it a try again.  

I ventured in and the boat immediately got swung around sideways.  I side-surfed for a couple of seconds before doing a couple of forward strokes to get myself out.  I was almost out when the boat hit the stronger downstream current that the edge of the hole, shifted upstream, and over I went. 

Over I go in the Playhole

I gave the boat a good push thinking that would get it over to the eddy, but in the strong current it continued downstream – and me with it.  I decided that I had better focus on getting myself to shore, which I did.  My boat went over the next drop before the crew as able to push it into an eddy. 

Even with the swim, it was another fun trip, and I reamain captain of the swim team for 2017! From Tom (canoeswithduckheads) on P-net:

There's a vortex in which the little yaks squirt,
and twist and flip roll play,
with bipolar tale they flail and flail,
wave-to-wave they glide away,

but for big gnu this just won't do,
whilst in their one-legged doggy paddle,
with a sideways buck they often like to chuck,
into the trough riders from the saddle.
TW

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Video from the Playhole

Tville Gage

River Description from American Whitewater 

RICKA Flatwater Training – June 11, 2017

I helped Bill and Frank with the annual RICKA flatwater training.  We had ten participants, and seven tried to do assisted rescues.  We got all seven got back n the boat – including me!

Bill and Frank demonstrating as assisted rescue

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