My early days on the "T"

I fired up the wayback machine this week and came up with a few reminiscences of my river guiding career.

Back in 1983, several years before there were self-bailing Avon rafts, the Tuolumne was considered one of the more difficult commercially run rivers in the West. In fact, our company’s name is taken from one of the original “Big Drops” - Clavey Falls.

Back then we ran 16’ gear boats piled high bow and stern with duffle bags loaded on plywood decks. There were no drybags. Everybody put their personal gear in nylon duffle bags and then we wrapped everything up with big blue tarps (for maximum water resistance). When you were done rigging, the pile was so high often it required the guide to turn the boat sideways or stand up on the slant board frame just to see downstream. A couple of coolers were slung in the cockpit and the center section was left open so that you could bail what water you could reach out of the bilge. We’d carabiner two 5 gallon buckets next to the seat for bailing purposes. Two buckets were required because sometimes you’d lose one in the frantic effort to lighten the boat by as many bucketfuls in as short a time as possible. Believe me, you did not want to be without a bucket!

On a typical trip, we might run one or two paddle rafts, a couple of stern loaded oar boats with passengers in the front, and a couple of the aforementioned gear boats. You had to plan your routes to avoid as much whitewater as possible, keeping as much water out of the bilge as you could. Nonetheless, quite often in the middle of a rapid you would find yourself caroming half out of control, bilge full of water and straining to see over that load.

The Forest Service on the “T” requires that a guide run the river top to bottom at least three times before taking commercial passengers. Hence, the gear boat is often run by a “training guide”. Essentially a “training guide” was somebody who was rowing a heavily-laden boat, down a river they don’t know well, and not getting paid for it. As a second-year guide in 1983, I couldn’t wait for the opportunity.

Things may have changed since then, I don’t know. But back then the more experienced guides literally threw everything and anything they didn’t want to carry on your load. Instruction for rapids included the following:

“Keep up, follow me, and don’t get stuck”.

Because you were rowing a boat by yourself, you needed to make sure you didn’t get stuck.

Early on in the trip, at a rapid called Nemesis, you have two choices:

One is to to run left at the bottom and risk getting royally stuck.

Or two, run what we used to call Airplane Turn where if you did it right you pivoted your raft down a chute, not getting stuck. If you missed a stroke, you would end up hopelessly wrapped around the entrance rock.

I remember seeing a photo on the cover of National Geographic magazine of just such a wrap on that very rock. Fortunately, I never lost an oar or missed a stroke there. Later on, after qualifying as a lead guide and after self-bailing rafts came along I decided I never had to try that move again.

The most challenging rapid on the Tuolumne, the one it is really known for, is formed just downstream of where the Clavey river comes in. The route over Clavey Falls is hard to read from the river, and so requires a look from shore. At high water it’s difficult to scout right, as that requires a hard pull across the current that’s much stronger because of the Clavey coming in at that point. So at high water, you scout left and at lower levels, scout right.

Prior to my first training trip, I had seen the river twice; once at low water, and once at high water. Naturally the level was right in middle of the two extremes for my first crack at rowing it myself. Our lead guide decided we would scout right.

In addition to his minimal approach to instruction, he felt that training guides should be able to secure their boat with no assistance. So landing upstream of Clavey Falls meant you first made sure that your stern line was unfurled and laying on top of the load. Then, after pulling as hard as you can, you jump over the load, grab the line and leap for the shore right before the raft hits. Miss your timing and the boat bounces off of shore, and you’re hanging on for dear life-with visions in your head of the fully loaded raft dragging you over the falls.

If you’ve done it right, as the boat hits shore, you wrap the rope around your waist and hunker down in a body belay. Later on, when I began training guides on the “T” their boats would come in last with assistance from the crew already on shore. Call me soft if you will, but we never had anyone dragged downstream by his or her overloaded boats anymore.

These days, my guess is that when new guides arrive at Clavey Falls, the more experienced among them show them possible routes, things to be aware of, and probably have them watch a boat or two “do it right” before shoving them off. A more callous lead guide would make a training guide go first, “so we can be behind you in case you screw up!”

Our lead guide that day is probably thought of very fondly by his mother. But I don’t personally recall any fond feelings for him as I untied my boat, pushed off by myself, and quickly clambered up and over my load. I grabbed the oars (heavy solid ash oars) and looked down at my hands - shaking. With just a few strokes to clear the shore, I felt the current pushing me towards the falls before I was ready. I was not really sure where the route was—after all, I was the lead boat on our trip now, with no one to follow.

I struggled to pivot the overloaded craft sideways so that I could see downstream. Water was sloshing about in the bilge making the boat even more unwieldy—I’d forgotten to bail it before shoving off. Here comes the falls! Time to straighten it out now and brace...(I can’t really see ahead of me as there is this huge blue tarp full of camp gear and our passenger’s worldly possessions in my way).

In an instant I am at the bottom of the falls and my boat is totally full of water. There’s no time to bail. Here comes the hole! (I’d heard that if a raft hits that hole dead center, it stops abruptly, rotates sideways and goes over in mere seconds--something I’d learn firsthand later in my career.) There’s no chance I’m going to make the pull to the green highway - a nice tongue of beautiful water marking the border of that seething beast - the route you’re supposed to take.

It doesn’t matter. My boat is so loaded with water that it’s gushing back over from the bilge into the river (a classic “Grand Canyon swamp”). All I can do is haul on the right oar with everything I’ve got and hope to straighten it out before plunging in. And within the next moment, my boat and I are both into and out of Clavey hole. Completely out of control now, I drop sideways down the next drop and shoot into an eddy. And bail. And bail and bail and bail. 5 gallons, 10 gallons, 15....

Finally my boat is empty. The other boats fly by, passengers busily bailing and hooting and hollering. A thumbs up from my lead guide, and it’s off to camp we go. He gives me that look and I can hear it in my mind: “Keep up, follow me and don’t get stuck. Oh, and while you’re at it, don’t forget to gather lots of firewood before camp, because we don’t use a stove and trainees are in charge of the cooking fire”.

Honeymoon in Cancun - Part 1

Why read about my honeymoon? Well, it sure beats watching a video of the wedding.


Among the many, many issues I spent the summer before our wedding stressing about, not least of which was where Nicole and I should take our honeymoon. The day for our nuptials was in early September so that dropped us into one of the best seasons of the year to travel; the families are back in school, the rates have dropped into low season and the weather has yet to turn - let us use the term - poopy. Where to go? Where to go? Where to go?


This past year we'd finally brought canoes back into the shop at Clavey and I was pretty geeked to put together a trip into Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. But then again, if we're driving all the way to Idaho to get on the water, we might as well take a raft and get on the Main Salmon. I'd run the Lower Main years before but had never actually gotten on the River of No Return and had kicked myself every time I got an offer to go but couldn't get away for some silly reason (read: work). Of course Nicole and I had been talking about Tuscany, and with the economic earthquake of the past year, they were practically giving away trips to Italy. But then there's Catalina. I'd spent eight years sailing the island from my days in L.A. - each trip better than the last. Or we could sail the San Juans and the Gulf Islands in Canada. Or I could drive my car off the Golden Gate Bridge and then I wouldn't have to think about it anymore.

As I was contemplating the speed it would take to break over the side of the bridge, Nicole got a call from one of her bride's matrons (I know it sounds odd, but she's married and that's just good grammar), saying she had a timeshare just south of Cancun we could use if we wanted. I put the keys to the car back on their hook and began looking up flights. To be completely frank, Cancun wasn't the sort of place I wanted to go back when I was in high school. It wasn't the sort of place I wanted to go to when I was in college. Heck, it wasn't the sort of place I even wanted to go to when I was in the navy. I'm no teetotaler and before meeting Nicole (and not one moment after) I had been a fairly strong advocate of scantily clad, inebriated college girls enjoying a ribald time in the sun. But even at that, Cancun just wasn't for me. Until now obviously.

The wedding went off without a hitch, almost as though we got married every day. Nobody stood up to declare why we shouldn't get married. Nobody gave an embarrassing drunken toast involving a previous relationship before falling backwards into the cake. Over all it was probably 92% Martha Stewart, 5% Oprah and only 3% Jerry Springer. It was an awesome wedding. And bright and early the next morning we said our goodbyes, packed our bags and flew to Cancun.

Now, it's my understanding, that there was a time when you could walk up to the service counter of any major airline, show them your wedding band, flash a huge smile, tell them you're on your way to your honeymoon and they would grab your ticket, give you a wink and tell you they just bumped you up to first class. Well, I'm here to tell you those days are OVER. The look on the woman's face behind the counter told me she was probably getting ready to end her third marriage and wasn't about to help anyone who might be starting their first. Never the less, we sneaked a bottle of Nyquil past security and had no problem sleeping away the flight with the rest of the riffraff back in coach. By the time we arrived in Cancun, we were well rested and ready for whatever it was we were about to do, of which we had no idea.



















As I was done researching post-wedding vacation spots by the time we committed to Cancun, I had no idea what to expect outside of the muy autentico dining experiences of places like Senor Frogs. I knew there was some diving. And I had a vague idea about some Mayan temples. That was about it. Luckily, we manage to stumble into a pack of feral time share sales people at the airport who were more than happy to give us all sorts of useful information. Oh and by the way, if we'd care to listen to a brief time share spiel, they would shower us with lavish gifts: Dinner, drink, spa treatments, the key to the city, their first born male child, the list goes on and on. Neither Nicole nor I had ever sat through the time share sales pitch before so we were kinda looking forward to it. This would end up being a vacation of many, many firsts.

After dropping off our bags at the resort, we found a Hertz in Playa del Carmen and traded the inconvenience of waiting for a bus in for a new Jeep (ah, the freedom of a vehicle). Now that we were truly unencumbered from immobility, we began our search for the ultimate tacos. Our Hertz guy sent us up the street to a little taqueria where the carne asada was muy el yummo. Satiated with bellies full of beef and beer, we began walking the town hoping maybe to get our gift shopping out of the way early. Just off the main calle we stumbled across a little shop packed with Talavera, the Mexican artisan pottery we had planned to look for for the kitchen. The plates and bowls were exactly what we wanted at the price we wanted, so of course we decided to shop around. Who knows how much time we wasted over the week looking at other Talavera before finally coming back to that little shop at Playa. Eventually we bought so much Talavera that the plane was actually listing to one side on the flight home.


Our second day we went shopping again, this time in Cancun. I don't remember anything specific that we bought but I can tell you, if you want to watch a Mexican vendor cry because of how he got beat up so bad on his prices that he had to sell one of his kids just to make up for the loss - then you want to go shopping with my wife. It was after the first piece of jewelry that we bought that I remembered how we met - at Clavey. I had somehow forgotten the way she had kicked me to the curb over the price of a kayak she was planning to buy. These poor guys who spent their lives haggling over prices didn't stand a chance. Whenever she would begin ask about prices, I would step outside. I couldn't bear to watch. After ten or so minutes, Nicole would step outside smiling, a new piece of silver around her neck or wrist. I would glance back into the store and catch a glimpse of the owner, his hand shaking as he tried to raise a glass of tequila to his lips, his shirtfront soaked from his own tears. After a couple tacos and couple beers we were ready to head back to the resort for the day.

I'm not one to ask for directions, even in a foreign city I've never been to. So I looked at the sun, I looked at the ocean and then I proclaimed, with confidence in my voice, "That way!" I put the key in ignition, turned the engine over and ten minutes later we were hopelessly lost in the sketchy barrios of Cancun. Eventually Nicole had had enough and insisted I pull over for directions. Forty minutes later we were back on the highway heading south.

The next morning we put the top down on the jeep and took off for Sian Ka'an, the Biosphere Reserve just south of the Mayan temples at Tulum. We paid our 25 pesos to get into the park, said goodbye to the pavement and made our way towards the estero where we would hop on a boat and head up the river to the freshwater Lagoon of Chunyaxche. Now, based on a knowledge of the Cancun area found only from the MTV Spring Break of my youth, I was surprised to find the surrounding area, which I will call the Yucatan Peninsula, stuffed full of some of the most interesting natural and historical locations I'd ever seen.


















The Lagoon of Chunyaxche (please don't ask me to pronounce it) for example is 9sq miles of fresh water in the middle of the jungle that wells up from these sink holes, called cenotes, that are all over the place. And the river to get to it from the estero? The Mayans dug it out. See how that works? Nature and history coming together to create an awesome wedding gift just for Nicole and me. At the lagoon we drove around for little while looking for manatees, but after going 95% of the way for our honeymoon, I guess nature decided to cheap out on the extras.

On the way back, we stopped in at a little Mayan ruin on the river. My guess is, it was kind of like a starter temple - two really small rooms and some bats for ambiance. Then we jumped in the river and just floated for a couple miles soaking up the warm Mayan sun. After we got good and pruney, we jumped back in the boat, Nicole yelled, "Home James!", and we were off like a shot, back to the dock at Sian Ka'an. I don't recall what time we got back to the dock but it must have been fairly early because we had full day still ahead of us. Ariel, our local Mayan guide, had suggested a couple of great spots to hit later, away from the huge tourist resorts. Based on my prior history of driving around Cancun, Nicole suggested we might hire Ariel for the rest of the day if he could escape from Sian Ka'an. They said no problem. He just had to be back at work "manana" - which of course, based on my previous experiences in Mexico, could either mean tomorrow or next year.

It ends up, this wasn't Ariel's first day as a guide in the Yucatan. When the tires of the jeep finally hit pavement, we put the hammer down, racing back towards Cancun in an effort to get the most from the day and our guide. Slowing down only for the topes (the most serious speed bumps you've ever seen), we made our way to the snorkeling mecca of Akumal. This was the first time I'd ever seen a halocline, which I thought was more likely the result of a chemical spill nearby than the introduction of saltwater to freshwater. It looked like something out of science fiction movie. There you are snorkeling around the beautiful crystal blue waters with your new bride and then, from nowhere, a clear but gelatinous looking cloud appears in the water before you. 24 hours later you've become a giant avocado and Mayan zombies take you away to make to make human guacamole for their volcano gods. Actually, we never did turn into avocados but I was a little nervous since no one really seemed capable of explaining to me what we were seeing at the time.

After drying off from the sci-fi fish farm, we jumped back in the jeep and raced back towards Tulum in search of cenotes. Our first stop was Dos Ojos, which at 38 sq miles is one of the largest underwater cave systems in the world. Unfortunately, because of some national holiday, they were closed for the day. This is how Clark Griswold must have felt when he got to Wally World (Mexican businesses shut down for more holidays than any other except the United States Postal Service). They did offer a suggestion for a cenote that probably would be open. Ariel said he knew of it but had never been there so we gave it the old college try. If you were looking for suggestions on cenotes to dive on, this probably wouldn't be my first suggestions.

And in part two of this exciting story, you'll discovery why.

Did my nickname have to be Riverboy?

My first time on the river, how it changed my life & I why I still begrudge Tom Meckfessel.

When I got out of the Navy in '92, and with no prior experience, I decided I wanted to be three things: mountaineer, big wall climber & whitewater kayaker. I didn't know any mountaineers or big wall climbers but my sister's boyfriend Tom was a river guide. Taking pity on her little brother, my sister invited me (against Tom's better judgement) on their upcoming float down the lower main Salmon. So I made my way up I-84 from the thriving metropolis of Troutdale, Oregon to the burg of Whitebird, Idaho where I met up with up with Tom, Elizabeth and their friends Danny and Viv. Addie, the best dog ever, and her deaf daughter Mae were their as well.

There were a total of three boats on the trip: an Avon Adventurer, Tom's drift boat and the state of the art kayak for the day, a Dancer XT. Unlike today's whitewater kayaks which are all flat on the bottom and excedingly stable, the kayaks of the 70s, 80s and early 90s were all designed based on the cigar, and had all the stabilty of a beach ball. When we put on the river at Hammer Creek I had never actually been in a kayak before. I did, however own a copy of William Nealy's Kayak, which I really thought would give me a solid leg up in lieu of experience. After all, I had looked over his cartoon instructions on how to roll a kayak on more than one occasion. You just stick the paddle out to the side and kind of pull back on it and then the kayak rights itself and you move on with your life. How hard could it be?

Tom has never been a big advocate of hanging around at the put-in. So rather than waste time with actual "hands on" instruction, he offered me some quality tidbits of paddle advice instead: point the kayak into waves and holes, keep the paddle in the water, and lean downstream. Between Tom Meckfessel's 30 Second Whitewater School and William Nealy's cartoon instruction book, the casual reader will no doubt be lead to believe that I instantly mastered the way of the kayak and went on to win the silver in the olympics later that summer. Based soley on the first rapid we encountered, anyone watching from the shore, would have assumed that I had been kayaking for years and that I was as well versed at playing in the water as any river otter.

That first rapid is called Rollercoaster. It's a long class II of big, fun, easy, rolling waves. Tom had given me three small tasks which he assured me would keep my head above water (As easy as explaining to one of the Matis tribespeople of the Amazon, who had never even sat in a car, the mechanics of driving said car in three simple steps: let out the clutch, give it some gas, point the wheels in the direction you want to go. Got it? Okay, welcome to Seattle. Have fun driving around the city). And just like the poor Matis indian who sideswipes a dozen cars before bring his vehicle to a gentle stop on the steps of the public library, I too was doomed to failure.

After the first couple of rollers, I turned the boat sideways to the waves, took the paddle out of the water and leaned upstream. If you're wondering what the fastest way to turn a kayak upside down is, I would highly recommend this method. It may not be the absolute fastest method but it'll guarantee results. I sat there underwater for a moment, bobbing down the river, the hand drawn instructions for rolling a boat playing through my head. I leaned forward. I pulled the paddle. And voila!, I was back on top of the water, paddling my way successfully through the remainder of the rapid.

Tom, Dan, Viv and my sister all cheered. Even the dogs looked impressed. I had never been in a kayak before in my life and within 90 seconds of getting on the water I had successfully completed my first combat roll. But, just like the perfect joke that escapes your lips accidentally that people might remember you for but never again receives a laugh no matter who you try to tell it to in the future, my history of rolling a kayak - upright at least - had come to an end. I swam 72 miles of Salmon and Snake rivers over the next five days.

Back in 1992 I was 21 years old, 50lbs lighter and had an unbelievable amount of energy. And that was good, because a person expends quite a bit of energy tipping a kayak over, trying to roll the kayak upright three or four times, wet exiting, pulling the kayak to the shore, dumping out all the water, putting the skirt back on and paddling back into the current - every 50 feet or so for 12 to 15 miles a day.

I don't remember where our first camp was - I actually don't remember where any of our camps were - but I do remember I still had some energy left over. Enough that that the rest of the group was looking for way to get rid of me so that they could have a little quiet time on the river. With the exception of my sister, no one else had any idea just how much I could talk, and the truth of the matter is, I could talk a lot. So when we got to camp that first day, and nobody could get me to shut up, Tom and Dan devised the Salmon River Challenge: a peak above all others, inaccessible to all but the most confident of the mountain goats, give me a time limit of an hour or two, and tell me they didn't think it could be done. And with that, they'd have their relaxing drinks on the river while playing cribbage and making dinner. After the sun set they would turn on their head lamps so I might have a better chance of making it back to camp (they knew my sister would make a fuss if I didn't make it back). And then I'd come limping back onto the beach. Bleeding. Bruised. Covered in poison oak. Ready for a beer.

And for all my effort, for all the swimming and the paddling and the near drowning and the forays into the wilderness while the others enjoyed their gin & tonics on the beach, for all that they gave me a nickname: Riverboy.

And for that, I will never forgive them.

How to make class V a little hairier

I had an opportunity this summer to work on the Kern – not as a guide though – but as some sort of “manager”, thus ensuring that I would never get on the water. The Kern is broken into three sections: the Lower is below Lake Isabella, the Upper is above, and the Forks is pretty much the “Upper-Upper”.

Chris and Chandra pop out of the hole in Big Bean:

For day-trippers, the Kern is perfect because there are lots of access points and different runs, with everything from flat water to class V. The Forks is the only trip with difficult access and, for rafts, requires packing in with mules about two miles. It has great whitewater, is in a wilderness area (the Golden Trout), and is often considered one of the crown jewels of wilderness class V. As an outfitter, we don’t run very many trips on the Forks – it doesn’t fit well with the L.A. crowd scene.

At the end of April we decided to run a private Forks training trip. The date was set for May 12th. The cost of getting equipment (we use Avon Expeditions and Avon Adventures for our oar boats) down to the river is expensive so I wasn’t expecting my own boat. The numbers continued to go up though and at some point we discovered that, yes, we would need another oar boat and, yes, I would be taking it.

That was great news – for me (at the time), the only thing scarier than running big water was being someone’s passenger. Then, it turned out that my girlfriend wanted to go. Then, it turned out that my mother wanted to go. So I was left wondering exactly what the hell I had gotten myself into. They would be my paddle-assist and I now realized that the only thing scarier than being someone’s passenger is rowing your mother down class V.

Seven years ago my younger brother Matt and I ditched three days of high school, caught an Amtrak train to Bakersfield and a ride to Kernville to paddle-assist on the Forks. Looking back on the two days we had spent on the water all I could remember was a mango-salsa we had made at camp (must have been good) and Carson Falls, the very last rapid on the Forks. Not helpful.

Back to the present: After a day of packing-in (our Clavey oars and personal dry bags have to be hiked in), a night of sleep on the island (where the Little Kern meets the Kern, hence the “Forks”), and a jittery breakfast we pushed off and thus began the most nervous three days of boating I’ve ever had.

Ceremonial drinking of the Little Kern water:

The Forks is something incredibly special. When you’re not focused on the whitewater (rarely) you have a chance to catch a glimpse of a very dramatic and beautiful river canyon. The whitewater is, of course, one of the main draws to this section of river but it’s not what I would call “stupid-big”. The thing that is most impressive about the whitewater is how continuous it is.

A side-hike up Peppermint Creek led to this impressive waterfall:

From a statistics book, one probably wouldn’t predict the Forks to be as great as it is. The gradient is only 65 feet per mile and the run is only 18 miles. There are lots of rivers and creeks that match up and exceed both of these numbers. This is a great thing about rivers and creeks – they aren’t machines, you can’t just look at numbers, they’re dynamic and sometimes you just have to be there to see what they’re like. We like to look at rapids and say “this one’s class III, this one over here is class IV-, and so on…” and I could do that for every rapid I’ve seen, but what I would prefer and what is more meaningful to me is to just say that it is “big” water and - when your mother is in the boat - it is “bigger” water.

Continuous whitewater on the Forks of the Kern:

I have never boated the same river twice- unless you look at it geographically or by name- and I’m certain I will never boat the Forks the same way I did back in May – with my mother and girlfriend in the front sharing and living through the same whitewater and river canyon that I was. Sharing the moment when we watched, as the number two boat, the lead boat get surfed wildly at Vortex (one of the “big ones”) and lose the two bow paddlers just above The Gauntlet (another “big one”) and me screaming at them to get down and huddle in the front rather than paddle (I was terrified of accidentally knocking one of them out of the boat and was fairly certain I could keep the boat upright).

The peak of the trip for me was reaching the lead-in to Carson Falls, pulling over, and walking down the scout trail. The drop led into a huge lateral hole, which, if you hit it correctly, you would punch. Otherwise, you would end up going into “The Thing” – a large nasty pour-over covering the right side of the river. I picked out a marker and knew we could hit it. We did, but we did not have enough left-angle and the monster hole zipped us straight to the lip of The Thing.

Will, Dana, and Mary dropping into the hole in Big Bean:

A friend had hiked up from the road to take photos of the boats dropping Carson. He snapped a photo of our boat on the brink of The Thing. There is a look of horror on my face as I try to straighten the boat out, Dana looks shocked that we ended up where we did, and my mom… she’s giggling. I guess she knew we would end up just fine.

About to drop into The Thing:

Scotto's Bachelor Party on the T

You can say what you want about the sanctity of marriage. You can say 50% of marriages end in divorce. You can say it’s an antiquated institution that’s no longer necessary in modern society. And to you I say this: If marriage is nothing more than an excuse to get all your best buds together to float some of the best whitewater in the world while pushing your liver to its limit, then I say it’s worth it (No honey, of course that’s not why we’re getting married).

We were loading boats and gear when those friends of mine who’re either irresponsible enough to take off work for a Thursday and Friday or unemployed enough not to have to, started showing up at Clavey HQ. There would be ten of us all together - Jeff and Tom of course; John Finger of Hog Island who can never say no to the possibility of not catching any fish; Frank Wheeler (the token Republican); our good buddy Tony Negro who would, in good buddy fashion, dutifully accept anything negative which might happen on the trip (ticket from the CHP, broken finger); my brother-in-law and public defender Mark Briscoe (he’d come in handy for sure); a couple of my barely employed buddies from LA, Crawford and Hansenmum; Michael Ingram, my physical doppleganger; and joining us on the second day of the trip would be Scott Armstrong of All Outdoors, who would row in with more beer and ice.

The Tuolumne is one of those funny rivers that isn’t really all that far away but always seems like it’s in another time zone whenever we start talking about a trip. A paltry four hours after shutting the doors at Clavey* we were rolling into Casa Loma. (*One of the fun things about closing the doors at Clavey for a long weekend is coming back to the complaints from the people who claim we’re never open when they come by. We’re open six days a week, all year long, with the exception of one to two river trips where we’ll close down on Friday and Saturday. This trip was no exception and we came back to the shop on Monday to a voicemail from a guy claiming he had driven to the shop from Wisconsin looking for an A-7 valve. You’d think it would be easier to have us ship it to him but some guys are looking for any excuse to get out of the house - “Honey, I’m gonna drive over to California for a five dollar part for the raft. Do you need anything?”

Tom had offered to make dinner for the All Outdoors Cherry Creek crew at the guide shack that night. Somehow Tom’s dinner became John’s dinner and we started our trip with Finger making an insane clam and spanish chorizo pasta and about four thousand raw oysters. We re-covered their gravel driveway with so many bivalve shells that future archeologists in the next millennium will come to the conclusion that Casa Loma was at one time covered by the Pacific Ocean. If I remember correctly, there may have been a beer in there somewhere also. If only I could remember correctly.

The take-out for Cherry Creek is the put-in for the Wild & Scenic run of the T. So Friday morning, Tony took off with the AO crew to run Cherry Creek while the rest of us took off for Meral’s Pool to rig the boats. The water on the Tuolumne is released from Hetch Hetchy and takes a few hours to fill the first rapid with enough water to make it almost runnable. So by the time the water began to rise, we knew the Cherry Creek crew wouldn’t be far behind. Tony’s a guy who’s run all the big runs in the Western US, but his brother’s drowning on Cherry Creek ten years previously had kept him from getting on the run himself. The first thing we saw on Tony’s boat as he rowed into Meral’s Pool that first morning was the huge shit eating grin on his face. With the exception of crushing the tip of his finger between the frame and the oar on the final rapid, they couldn’t have had a better trip.

I love the Tuolumne River. I love the camps. I love the whitewater. I love the hikes. But something I don’t love is the very first rapid, Rock Garden. I can’t think of better way to start a three day trip on a solid class IV river than to get stuck on the very first rapid. That must be why I do it every single freakin’ time. And this time was no exception. I was running a stern rig on an Avon Expedition with Briscoe, Ingram, Crawford and Hansenmum up front. Normally, a set up like this is perfect for the T - plenty of control from the oars and lots of power from the paddlers - but not me, not at Rock Garden. If you know the T, you know you come in right, hit this eddy that doesn’t exist in the center of the river after negotiating your way through a minefield of rocks, most of which are just below the surface and then run the left side which is totally choked with boulders but feels like the middle of the Pacific Ocean after making your way through the right side. In a perfect world, the first boater will hit the eddy, hop on the big rock and catch the stern line of the following boat and pendulum them into the eddy. That’s not the world I row my boat in.

Jeff, the old ex-T guide that he is, missed all the rocks and then slipped his boat perfectly into the eddy, hopped onto the big rock and waited for my stern line to be thrown his way. He’d be waiting for a while. About fifteen feet into a quarter mile rapid, I crabbed an oar, spun the boat 180º from where I needed to be and lost Crawford to a rock on the middle river. As luck was with me, it was then that I completely lost my downstream oar and bounced right past the eddy I so desperately wanted to be sitting in. About this time, two words came to mind and the first one rhymed with truck. One good thing about Rock Garden at this level, you don’t have to worry about going too far the wrong way - you’re bound to get caught on something and we were no exception. Its funny how you spend years on the river trying to stay away from the rocks and the one time you want to be actually stuck on a rock so you can take a breath, survey the situation, maybe put your oar back in the oarlock, someone will begin bouncing up and down like a five year old on an inflatable jumpie, trying to get the boat dislodged. “Hey! Stop that!” The offended paddler looked back at me momentarily and then began bouncing up and down again. What is it about men that even the laziest of us will gladly chip in to help when our help is desperately unwanted. I explained myself a little more clearly the second time, put my oar where it might be a touch more useful and threw a line to Jeff who was clearly excited to be starting the trip in such an auspicious manner. We got my boat in the eddy, gave Crawford a quick lesson in ,“How to hold on to a throw rope while being pulled across a raging river”. He heard about every third word I said but figured the gist of the conversation was, “Don’t let go”. And then we got back in the boat for the remaining 95% of the rapid.

Remember when I described the left side of Rock Garden as the Pacific Ocean? That being the case, I first hit Hawaii and then careened off Tahiti, the Marquesas and seven other lesser known Society Islands before finally jamming the boat between Australia and New Zealand. Thirty minutes later all said and done and we were finally through the first rapid. At this rate it would take us just under a month to get to camp. And of course if they turn on the water at Hetch Hetchy it means they at some point are going to turn off the water as well.

Rock Garden made me take a hard look at my rowing, my paddlers, my boat, the weight in my boat. I decided we couldn’t go into Nemesis with all the weight we currently had in the boat and made the crew lighten our load by exactly five cans of beer. The overburden of beer had clearly been the issue because we were now at the top of our game, punching holes, surfing waves avoiding all but the most inviting of rocks.

I’m one of those guys that, no matter how many times I run a river, I can remember a grand total of maybe three rapids. On the Tuolumne I remember Rock Garden, I remember Clavey and I spend the rest of the time shouting over to Tom or Jeff, “What’s the story here?” I don’t bother asking the name. I’m happy if I can remember, “Go left, move right, avoid the big hole in the center”. All I can tell you about anything between the debacle at the first rapid and Clavey is that we must have gone left, moved right and avoided the big hole in the center. In the midst of Ram’s Head, Tony and Frank were getting awfully warm so Tom was nice enough to oblige them with a swim. I would have waited for the pool at the bottom of the rapid, but I’m not as adventurous as some. At Clavey we took a brief scout and hit it perfect. Or so I was told. When we hit the hole, I came flying off the slant board and spent the remainder of the rapid trying to get up off the floor. And those are the three rapids I can remember.

We pulled into camp at Indian Creek and began running our livers through the gauntlet. The key to drinking and not getting fall-over, sloppy, drunk, is to involve yourself in some form of rigorous challenging exercise intensive sport followed by a light meal. We played bocci ball and ate 2 lb ribeyes. The bocci ball was intense. For my bachelor party I had surrounded myself with whitewater warrior athletes and I couldn’t remember a time when the competition had been more fierce. Of course, I couldn’t remember the last rapid we had run before getting to camp either. But I could sure remember those steaks. They were pretty good like Michael Jordan was a pretty good basketball player.

The next two days were more of the same. Fantastic food. Cold beer. Awesome rapids. And great friends. Scott Armstrong rowed in that second morning with more provisions in his cooler, sitting on the floor of his boat...not even strapped down. It wasn’t like it was jammed between the thwarts either. His boat had two thwarts - one under his seat and one in the center to brace his feet on on. The cooler was just sitting there in front of the center thwart, just sitting there. Believe me when I tell you a cooler sitting on a flaccid boat floor is not a stable platform to jump on from one boat to another. And let me tell you something else: if you ever have an injured person on your trip and you don’t want them to ruin everybody else’s good time, you want Tony Negro to be that injured somebody. He’s the most stoic bastard you ever seen. The Monday after getting off the river, he went to get his hand x-rayed. The single tip of his finger had become multiple tips of the same finger. God help the group if I get a hangnail. You will not hear the end of how much I’m suffering. But not Tony. Showoff.

Mr. Armstrong, Mr. Kellogg, Mr. Meckfessel, Mr. Negro, Mr, Wheeler, Mr. Ingram, Mr. Finger, Mr. Briscoe, Mr. Crawford & Mr. Hansenmum, thank you gentlemen so very much for an unforgettable bachelor party. My only question is, we own a freaking rafting equipment company, why do I always have to get married for us to shut the doors and get on the water?

The Milky Way in Tomales Bay

More stars in the water then there were in the sky.

Nicole and I pulled into the parking lot at Nick's Cove right on the money at 6:30 for our bioluminescence kayak tour on Tomales Bay. There was Jeff unloading kayaks from the Clavey trailer and most of our guests were in small groups chatting it up about the upcoming light show. We left Sebastopol at 85º and sunny a half hour earlier and now we were getting out of the car under the cold low clouds of Tomales Bay. We thought perhaps these weren't the best conditions but Scott Terriberry, our guide, was giddy with excitement. "No stars, no ambient light," he said, with the animation of a schoolboy waiting for his favorite NBA star to stop by the house, "makes for absolutely perfect conditions. We simply couldn't ask for more." His enthusiasm was contagious. We pulled on our gear, grabbed our kayaks and made our way to the rest of our group - one of the many heading out that night.

People have been asking us for years, " Do you do tours? Do you offer classes? Can you teach me how to roll?" And for years the answer was always the same - "No. No. No." But then the stars aligned and a couple of guides and instructors we'd always admired got freed up from their prior commitments and before you could say, "Yes. Yes. Yes.", we had ourselves an outfitter's permit, some insurance and a heck of a lot of sign ups. And so here we were on a moonless, cloudy night on Tomales Bay waiting for the sun to finally set so the show could begin.

Scott likes to begin any evening paddle in the light of day. This way everyone can actually see where it is they're going and get a feel for what the area looks like before nature turns out the lights. Sure we've all got headlamps, and they're top notch headlamps too, but they don't really replace the light of day. So with the sun still up there behind the clouds, Scott gets us all together for a little talk about safety, what to expect, how to stay together, etc. He traces our route across the bay with his finger, pointing out the oyster beds, the beaches, the gulch, the island. And with that all said and done, we carry our boats down to the water and away we go.

Once on the bay, Terriberry assigns everybody a number (I'm 15). So when the lights go down, we can all check in easily - all present and accounted for. The momma duck would hate to lose her babies. And with that the tour begins in earnest. Time: 7:30ish

In this group of 17 people the stats break down as such: 3 trained guides, 2 canoeist (in 1 canoe), 5 intermediate kayakers, 3 whitewater boaters and 4 beginners. 10 people (including canoeists) had their own boat. All 17 people were stable, comfortable and confident once we got on the water.

We leisurely paddled through the eel grass, over to the oyster beds and across to an officially unnamed beach unofficially named Pine Flat. By now the sun had set and the darkness quickly enveloped us. We counted off (15!) and Scott showed us how we could see the bioluminescence even in the beach as we dragged our feet back and forth in the wet sand. Cool! Time enough to squeeze the bladder dry and then back into the kayaks.

The water around my paddle blade explodes with light as I dip it into the bay. Awesome! I take another paddle stroke and thousands (maybe millions) of tiny one celled creatures light up in protest (or in frivolity for all I know) around each dip of the blade. I look over at Nicole's boat. The hull glows as it scoots through water. Motivated for light, I pick up the pace of my paddle strokes, pushing the kayak as fast as my little arms can make it go. My boat lights up like I'm in some sort of low tech Christmas parade. It reminds me of my childhood: dragging my pug, Chowder, across the carpet of the living room on one of those remarkably cold, dry, winter nights. The poor dog lit up like Chernobyl as static electricity from his fur and the carpet brought the darkened room back into the light. But this paddle on Tomales Bay was way better. First off, no pugs we're terrified in the glowing of light. And second, we were about to paddle into White Gulch and the the bioluminescence was about to go off the charts. Or as they say in Spinal Tap, "It goes to 11."

As we've all been totally riveted to the lightshow, Scott wants to make sure no one wandered off so we do another headcount (15!) before heading into the shallow mossy, fish filled water of White Gulch. All present. And now for the headline act. The bioluminescence explodes around the fish as they dart from our boats. Terriberry yells out as one of the little bastards jumps onto his lap. The silence of the evening is broken with cries of, "Look at this! Right here! Look at that. Oh my god!"

Originally, I had wanted to describe our experience with the bioluminescence as fireworks in the water. But the bioluminescence of the greater bay was but mere sparklers to the New Years Eve at Times Square that was the waters of White Gulch. Terriberry herded us into a little area he knew was thick with moss. Plunge your hand into the water and pull it out with great gob of moss and it drips bioluminescence like radioactive diamonds back down your arm and into the waters from whence it came. I pick up a glowing mass of moss and throw it at Nicole - I mean, if you're going on 40 years old and as excited as you were when you were 8 and walking into Disneyland for the first time, why not act like it?

The oohs and ahhs finally fade to the suggestion that we might paddle back to Nick's Cove and get a drink (I think it was me), and we all make the slow turn back to towards the cormorants of Hog Island and finally back to the dock. We load the kayaks and gear back onto the trailer while the rest of our paddlers huddle back into small chattering groups of excitement.

The feeling from everyone is identical: This was a tour impossible to describe properly and improbable that you might ever go on one better. A bioluminescence kayak tour on Tomales Bay is like the first time you meet a big celebrity - something you'll never forget and will tell everyone about for the rest of your life.

Tales of the Janitor or Confessions from the Stand Up Paddleboard

Posted by Tom Meckfessel

I arrive at one of my local surf breaks (one that I usually avoid because of the crowds -but it’s the perfect spot to SUP) at about a quarter to six in the morning. The drive from Point Reyes to Bolinas at this time of day can be as spectacular as my time on the water; the Olema Valley is covered with wisps of ground fog and I have to break for the occasional coyote. If I hadn’t checked my Mac for the surf report before I left the house, I would still know the surf was going to be smallish at best by how easily I find a place to park near the beach. And sure enough, the surf is small and there is nobody on the beach but me. These conditions are perfect for my paddleboard.

The beauty of Stand Up Paddling (or SUPing) is that it just doesn’t matter if there isn’t any surf because you can still go out, have some fun and get a good workout. I suit up and paddle out. The full moon is setting behind the Bolinas Mesa while the sun is rising over the Bolinas ridge and the early morning light is soft and yellow. I paddle out to the “patch”, a section of Duxbury reef known for its long gentle rollers. The view one gets from the stand up position is really quite unique. Because you are, in my case, six feet off the water and able to see approaching swells and sea life from a whole new angle. The water below me teams with life: harbor seals swimming about and fish swimming near the surface with the four ospreys checking them out from above. I catch a couple of small waves and am then buzzed by an enormous Stellar Sea Lion who swims right at me showing off a 3’ leopard shark that he has in his mouth. I feel a bit safer on the Stand Up – it nice not to have your legs dangling in the water for a change. I catch a few more nice long rollers and then decide to paddle over to the mouth of the lagoon just for the exercise. On the way, a pod of dolphins swims by. As far as different ways to start the day go, this rates pretty high.

Stand Up Paddle Boarding most likely got is start in the early days of Polynesia and is considered by many to be the original form of surfing. In the 1960’s the Waikiki beach boys used stand up boards to help manage surf classes, take photos of clients and gain a better view of incoming swells. In the past nine years Stand Up Paddling has had a resurgence with the help of surfing legends, Laird Hamilton and Gerry Lopez who are definitely pushing the limits of the sport - SUPing Teahapoo, SUPING the Grand Canyon. It’s also become popular in flat water conditions due to the fact that SUPing is an unbelievable core workout.

Surfing a SUP and paddling one in flat water involve a few similar skills (stance and paddle stroke) but differ greatly in board design and learning curve. I’ve surfed most of my life and can tell you that surfing a SUP is a little more difficult, a bit dangerous, involves quite a bit of practice and can humble the best of us. If you plan to venture out in the surf on a SUP make sure that you first have good wave knowledge and, most importantly, stay away from other people in the water until you have learned to control your board and kick out of a wave. Most beginning SUPs are around 12’ long and weigh 40lbs and in the hands of the inexperienced can be a formidable weapon.

SUPs that are designed for surfing are basically a long, wide, thick surfboards that range in length from 10’ – 12’6”. Because these boards are designed for the surf they have quite a bit of rocker so you are able to turn them once you catch a wave. While some of these boards work well in flat water they tend to push water in front of them (because of the rocker and upturned nose) and have a rather short water line (amount of board contacting the water) for their length. Flat water SUPs, like the Tahoe Rubicon, are designed with a displacement hull – like a kayak – and have much more board in the water. They are also flatter with little or no rocker. This all translates into a board that is more stable, tracks better and much faster in flat water conditions.

Paddles designed for the SUP are basically long canoe paddles that usually have a 20° bend at the throat of the paddle. This bend allows the paddle face to be perpendicular to the water when taking a stroke. The length of the paddle rages from 8” to 10” taller than the paddler depending on if you’re surfing or cruising. Here at Clavey our favorite paddle is the Sawyer QuickDraw Zephyr. Besides being beautiful, light and super strong, the Quick Draw adjusts from 63” to 90”, making it the only SUP paddle you’ll ever need.

The beauty of Stand Up Paddling is its simplicity. Board, paddle, water. That’s all you need. I’ve got more outdoor gear than the average REI store, so to me the simplicity of the sport is its beauty. As a guy who deals with gear all day on a regular basis, the idea of a new sport that involved so little equipment was - to say the least - very appealing, and not just to me. Drive by the Petaluma River in the afternoon and you’ll most likely find someone from Clavey HQ paddling down the river on a paddleboard. Come join us and rent or demo a board and check this sport out for yourself !