Mediocre Kayaking

Out of absolute desperation and the need to get on some water a group of us headed down from Seattle to run the EF Lewis April 1, 2006. The EF Lewis is located in southern Washington near the town Battleground. The group included myself(Matt Thomas), Erik Schertzl, Ryan Terry, and Brian Maier. None of us had been boating in a couple of months due to the great ski season so this run seemed a like a good fit. We were there for two reasons 1) to dust off the cob webs and 2) to get footage of some carnage that was bound to happen.

Brian checking out the boats

Photo by Matt Thomas

Sunset Falls kicks off the run and is a waterfall that gets run more than any other except for maybe Husum Falls on the White Salmon River.

Brian digging the new boat

Photo by Matt Thomas

RT getting back into the groove

Photo by Matt Thomas

The run is mostly Class IV and has another fun waterfall towards the end called Horseshoe Falls. You can also hike up Copper Creek and run the final 5 on that run, which we did. Just a word of caution be wery wery quiet when you're hiking up Copper Creek. The local property owners don't really like kayakers so just be quiet and respectful.

Once we got to Horseshoe Falls we decided to have a little fun. Schertzl and I both tried to do 360's coming down the falls with varying degrees of success.

Ricky going for the rock spin (1)

Photo by Matt Thomas

Ricky rock spin (2)

Photo by Matt Thomas

Ricky rock spin (3)

Photo by Matt Thomas

Unfortunately I wasn't able to get the final picture of Ricky landing stern first, but he turned it into a back stab type thing and paddled away nice and smooth.

So for the Carnage that day: I ended up having the worst line ever over Sunset Falls, somebody else swam on the final drop on Copper Creek, and Schertzl dented his boat somewhere above Horseshoe Falls. Most of it was captured on video so be looking for a video soon to come.