Oh, the Ocoee.
| River: | Ocoee |
| Skill: | Intermediate |
| Trip Date: | 06/06/2014 |
Well, I've written a lot of trip reports from the Ocoee, some filled with excitement and derring-do, and others that were just another weekend on the Ocoee. This is probably more the latter than the former, but it had its moments.
I had some extra time off for the weekend, so was headed up Friday through Monday. For our weekend cast we had a variegated crew. While I often make the drive to the Ocoee myself, this time I had the pleasure of having John McDonald along for the ride. I've probably paddled the Ocoee more with John than anyone (everyone?) else, so was happy to have him along. He's a solid boater, one of my favorite folks to boat with (with for a tendency to sit in one (or two!) spots on the Ocoee and just spin around, and around, and around!), and willing to keep running the Ocoee almost as often as I am.
Megan Mallard was the first to have contacted me about the trip. Ben was working, so she was on her own for the weekend. She'd run the Ocoee before, so no worries there. I'd never had the pleasure of paddling with her before, and was looking forward to it (yet not nearly as much as I'm not looking forward to the next opportunity!). She'd decided to go ahead and meet John and I at my usual stomping ground – Thunder Rock Campground.
Our remaining companion was John (err Jeff, so some reason I couldn't keep it straight all weekend) Johnson. Jeff wasn't really certain whether he was up for the Ocoee. It would be his PFD, and, as he said, the Ocoee had "such a reputation". But he'd sent me his paddling resume and he sounded solid (which proved true!). Even at the last minute he still wasn't certain, to the point that I'd decided we'd have to paddle without him. But a last-minute text provided a change of heart, and we had four of us on Sat. morning.
A quick setup of shuttle, and we were off. I learned a few things that trip. First, that Jeff was a better paddler than he thought he was. Second, that Megan has a REALLY solid roll (she kept showing it off in the strangest of places). Also, found one of the spots with an Ocoee token. We pulled into an eddy, and Jeff found one hanging from a branch. On his first descent, and I've never found one in any number of runs. (Pulled into an eddy? Hmm, perhaps there's something to that). He graciously gave it to me as trip coordinator, which meant a lot to me – thanks Jeff. Immediately after that I managed to pull of my first “hand of God” rescue – a sign the token was working!
For our second run that day, Jeff decided he'd stop on a high note, and we were down to three. We had "just a little bit more" Ocoee with the upper release coming in. Megan continued to show off just how good her roll was, and John started to introduce her to spinning around and around. I've never met anyone who can "stuff a gerbil" quite like John can.
For our 3rd run of the day Megan decided she could use a respite, and John and I set off for our final run of the day. We were both wandering around a bit, but nothing of note. Well, at least not until Hell Hole. I mostly don't like plowing directly into Hell Hole; I usually try to clip the left side for just the right amount of excitement for me. John had earlier that day reintroduced me to clipping the right side of the hole, and that was my plan.
John's plan, on the other hand, was to plow right into the center. And it was spectacular. I'm pretty sure his entire boat was out of the water, vertically, and spun around so I could see the entire bottom of his boat. Wow! We were the only ones on the water, or there would have been cheers from the crowd!
That was then immediately followed by dropping that entire distance on his head. Finding the combination of the spinning and slamming into the water from a height on his head exhilarating, John decided to take a break and swim Power House. That didn't go as well as he might hope, and, well, there are rocks in Power House.
It wasn't until we got back to camp that I realized quite how good a job John had done. We pulled out my expedition-class first-aid kit, Betadine-d and taped John together, and went to dinner at Herb's a few miles away.
After that we tried a game John had brought. It had rocks, and cards, and watching your stack of rocks fall down over and over again. It actually was a lot more fun than it sounds, and John is clearly more dexterous than I. We did find that stacking colored rocks while the lantern is running low is just as difficult as it might sound.
While our efforts mostly held John together, and held through the night, in the morning it was still not quite right. After a bit of mulling things over, and consulting via text with a sports med friend of John's, we set off for the Piggly Wiggley and a tube of Super Glue. The recommendation was to hold the edges together, and then glue it closed. Now you're thinking, "really?" (and probably so were we three), that was the recommendation, and coincidentally had just happened to the hero in the book I was reading the night before.
There are a few things we learned in that process. Super Glue is really runny, and if you apply it to a leg wound when the leg is vertical, it will run down the leg. Also, if when Super Glue is running down the leg and you pull your hands away to not glue them to your leg, the Super Glue goes all over the place. But a little persistence and probably a lot more Super Glue than we should have used, and John was glued together.
What the heck, off for another day of kayaking, right?
By this point Megan must have decided John and I knew she could roll, she'd come up with something else to try, as John had taught her to spin around the other way doing 360s and she was tearin' it up with a huge grin on her face I won’t soon forget. Calling that a successful weekend, she headed out as John and I queued up for another run. I think it was this run that John made the boof at Flipper, only to not quite make it out of the hole. Probably also this run where I missed eddy in Hound Dog, and got to follow John's roll with one of my own.
Another evening of dinner at Herb's, and another evening of stacking rocks. We fixed some of the rules we'd done wrong before, but John is still much better at not having his rocks fall over.
Monday morning came, and surprisingly John was still glued together. I think there's an advertising opportunity in there somewhere.
While setting shuttle I was disappointed to see that the water wasn't on (yet!). So much for the vaunted 24×7 water I was hoping for all summer with the flume busted out below Broken Nose. Wondering if it was going to be an ELF run, by the time I got back to the top the water was on. I decided I wanted to catch the front of the water, and John humored me. While we ran Cat's Pajamas and Hell Hole on the leading edge, we never quite got ahead of it.
Our final run for the weekend was, well, our final run for the weekend, and we set off for home with plenty of daylight to spare. But don't worry, I'll be back! And I have Super Glue in my first aid kit now.