On Saturday, July 1, some of us ran the French Broad, section 9 (Barnard to Hot Springs). Nothing else about the trip really stands out in my mind now (it has been almost two weeks). Oh yeah..."He's got speed!"

After some storms the night before, the Mayo was up but dropping fast. When we put in on Saturday, June 24, the gauge on the North Fork was probably around 2.2 feet. We had a great time. There was lots of surfing at the ledge beside "lunch stop" (a big rock on the left of the river right before the South Fork comes in). There was also good surfing at the Boiling Hole and at the bottom of the S-turn. Also, at the Boiling Hole it appears that most of the kayakers went almost completely under the water coming through. Thanks to James C for the pictures.

On Saturday, June 3, we woke up about four in the morning to go to the Nantahala. After a five hour drive, we arrived ready to paddle. It seemed like it would be a warm day when we put on in the warm, sunny parking lot, so some of us dressed sort of light. After Paton's Run, however, we found out that the lack of sun in the gorge and cold water made everything much colder. Overall, it was a great run. We took our time and stopped several times. Everyone ran Little Wesser and the surfing was great. After running the river we ate in Dillsboro at the Dillsboro Smokehouse. On the way home there was plenty of snoring going on. We made it back to the house at one in the morning on Sunday. It had been a full day.

On Sunday, after the French Broad, some of us left to do Wilson's Creek. Only four of us actually ran it - which is good because there is no spare room on this creek. Le B, Scott T, Scott W, and myself (David M). Special thanks to Le for explaining the rapids and guiding me down. The level was low and good for my first run. It was somewhere around -6 or -8 on the gauge below the bridge (hard to tell exactly). This did, however, make the creek pretty tight and some of us were pinned against rocks at one point or another. I think the drops were awesome though - I heard the gradient was one hundred feet per mile. I had lots of fun and am ready to go back and run it again at a higher level.

Last weekend - on Saturday, May the 20th - was our big weekend. Our destination was the French Broad, section 9, and our mission was to have fun. We did have fun, but the weather didn't help much. The night before we had slept (or not slept) through thunderstorms and gully washers. When we put on the French Broad it was running 2,400 cfs. We ran section 9 - our usual run from Barnard to Hot Springs (many of our group took out before Hot Springs at Stackhouse, however). Four of us ran Frank Bell's - it ate me up good. There was plenty of carnage (due partially to our most experienced guides abandoning us for Big Laurel), but in the end I think most of us enjoyed the trip. PS - I am going to try to use more exciting titles from now on and maybe add descriptions to some of the pictures in the gallery.

I redesigned the site a little and added a search feature on the sidebar. I also switched to some software called Gallery to manage the recent trips pictures. Click the pictures in the post to see the whole album. You can browse the entire gallery by clicking the "Gallery" link in the "Meta" section on the sidebar. Let me know what you think...