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Linked is a video montage and photo compilation from the trip to the NW Gina and I went on recently.
The kayaking is from a wave/hole known as schoolhouse on the Klamath – a beautiful river in northern California with loads of class III+. Schoolhouse was aggressive yet forgiving which made it a great learning zone once you were comfortable on it. I managed to get my first loop! Gina even got in the playboat for the first time in a while and gave it a shot. Gina and Dave, the river ranger, showed me down a few of their favorite Klamath sections before she and I drove up to Bend, OR. There we paddled a rapid on the Deschutes called Big Eddy, which was a pretty cool parkside run in the woods just outside of town. We parked there and foot shuttled ourselves for a few runs.
From Bend we decided to check out the scene in Hood River, where we were directed to the White Salmon. At first, we were recommended the lower, but when we ran it we were a bit disappointed with class II+ whitewater with nice scenery. We heard that the middle section was even more scenic and just a step up in difficulty. The White Salmon river locals were nice enough to shuttle us for another lap down both sections. It was hard to leave the Colombia River Gorge, especially at sunset, but we headed to Seattle to visit some of Gina’s family.
Seattle is a great city to walk around, but try to avoid driving in rush hour traffic there. A couple hour drive awayDungeness Bay wildlife refuge near Olympic National park was a great place to spend an evening.
From Seattle, we went to Boise, ID to check out their play wave. There were no other kayakers on the wave, instead it was a total surfer scene. The wave was manipulated every day to better suit kayakers or surfers, and we came on the wrong day. A local told us about the Payette river and we opted to make the 45 minute drive for a better day. When we got to the payette, we pulled over at the first river access we saw where we met Danielle, who was happy to have us tag along her class IV run of the south fork to the main Payette with Andrea. Danielle pointed us to the Dirty Shame bar and cafe where we had dinner and got directions to the quiet secret hot springs where we would camp for the night. The next morning, Andrea found us back at Dirty Shame where we were having coffee and invited us on a run of the canyon section of the south fork with her husband Mark. It was a beautiful run!! The scenery was amazing and it had quality whitewater to match with one class V+ portage where we ate lunch. We took out on Andrea and Mark’s friend’s property which was a much easier hike than the public take outs.
Gina and I both felt that we had underestimated how much we would enjoy Idaho. It was a great last paddling stop on our little tour of the NW. It was a trip of many firsts for both of us in an area we plan to return to soon.
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