“Hey Shannon, have you seen the flow levels?” My noisy van makes it hard to hear her say “5000 and rising”. “Think we’ll still put in at the bridge?” Some garbled words and “I’ll see you there”.
Fifteen minutes later I’m at the Big Eddy parking lot and chatting with Mike, the leader of the trip on the Big Eddy. Normally, the Big Eddy is a class II river with one II+ drop called Fishermens. Last time we were down we noted a tree on river left and the the last drop into the take out pool had totally changed. This time was going to be a bit different, a bit more pushy, 2000cfs higher then the March run.
Butterflies, dang, I hate the butterflies in my stomach. ‘Okay, time to roll’ Julian prods me. The lagoon is flat, clear water. Compared to where I had flown from (Seattle), the water was even warm. Topping it off, it was a beautiful day. ‘ Dang butterflies’. Julian, a young blonde Argentine guide/instructor was paired off with me for my first kayak day. An evaluation day on the Espolon. We had ridden from El Campo to the little town of Futaleufu, picked out a bright yellow, large volume kayak for me, outfitted it and made our way to ‘The Secret Lagoon’.
We weren’t alone. As we hauled our yaks down to the shore I caught a glimpse of a tall blonde man in a speedo and kayak regale showing some dry land exercises to a young kid, well, a young guy probably not much older then my son. I recognized the instructor. This was Chris Spelius, exChile owner and kayaker supreme!
‘Lets rrroll’ Julian prompts again.
The heat of the day transforms into an evening chill. The lodge is toasty warm from Pedro’s cooking. Pedro spared nothing. There were two huge plates of meat. Two large bowls of noodles and three equally large bowls of different salads. There was not a scrap left. Looking about I realize why. Between the 6 guides (average age 25) and the 8 guests (average age 30), the average gender (mostly guys, just Helen and I to keep them in line) its no wonder fights didn’t break out over the food!
After dinner the chatter was about where we all were from, how the kayaking is back home or, in some cases, other parts of a global trip. Ferguson finally gets down to business
Eco Camp, foundly nicknamed El Campo by my newly found friend Mike. Mike is somewhere around my age and married on a little adventure escape. He is a bit taller, 5'10", then me, light brown hair, kind face and a great, easy going disposition. He seems in good shape, well, except for his knees which he chatted how they would need re-building if he kept up skiing so he decided to get back into kayaking.
Mike and I were the new comers to El Campo. El Campo is situated on the spit of land where Rio Azul and Rio Futaleufu confluence. Getting to El Campo is an experience unto itself.
The rythm of my days began to take on a pleasant pattern of review, shop, pack then review again. Such is the dance I perform as I approach a vacation departure date. My working hours have a similar pattern, review, work, document and review. Magically all is completed on the day before my departure. The last bits of three small bags are tucked away and one last review of where those nasty swiss army knifes and bottles of shampoo are. Have to make sure they are in the check-in bags.
All that's left is getting up at 4:30 AM for the limo that will take me to the airport.
I tend to get a little wacky while traveling home. The hours of plane flight with swollen feet and the endless people watching while behind international airport security make everything seem, well, wacky. Tens of thousands of people subjected to obsurd security measures. No one is immune. A fellow traveler called it sheep dipping. It's when you find one tic on a one sheep in a thousand and decide to dip all thousand. A bit overkill but, hey, what are our tax dollars for, certianly not for education or greenhouse gas reduction.
It was 6:30AM at the Dallas/Fort Worth airport. I had just checked through immagration and customs to find my self, once again, outside security. Sort of a welcome home and oh by the way, you have to go through security again. We want to make sure, that you are not a terrorist. I made my way to the domestic terminals and my flight back to Seattle. Standing in the all to familiar security line, I found my self between a bunch of kids. Kids in uniforms. Desert fatigues.
Chris took a few of us rookies out to the Futa Monday for a taste of the big water. We even had an audience from the fly fisherpeople. There was some big water ferry activity and, yes I did manage to flip (and roll!). The big action was down stream. (pictures to come). This has […]
Pictures soon I promise! It´s been an intense week. I´ve done six days of extreme kayak training (Chris sez its a battle of will). Spent many minutes upside down and hours playing in rapids practicing peel outs and delayed angle ferries (love them, no paddel movement). Finally got to the class II+/III play area. Expect […]
Four days into the trip. What a place! We are surrounded by mountains topped with snow. The valley has been from 50F to 90F. The water is between 60F and 70F. It took 31 hours to get my sore butt down here. The last six were on a rubber band airplane in clouds with a […]
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