So I took a couple of days off last week to go up to Denver with Aaron to try and get some peace and quiet to write my conference paper. I got a good chunk of it done but still have to finish it and then polish it, which will take a bit of work. Anyway, when I got back to Echo I had some friends come in to town. Ly and Jeff rolled into town late Friday night and then the Breck girls, Alissa, Kirsten and Karen showed up Saturday afternoon. I had some trips during the day but we had a booze cruise through the Gorge lined up. We got two boats plus another one from RGR and a couple of guys in a mini-me as well as a hand full of kayakers. We got a bit of a late start trying to let the weather blow through but then we decided to get going regardless of the weather because it was getting a bit late and it looked like it might hang around for a bit. We cruised up to the put in with thunder and lightning all around and jumpeed in the boats and set off. It was awesome. We had a thunder cruise. The lightning was striking the gorge rim all around us as we cruised through. The rain was pounding down and hammering everything. We eddied out above sunshine and soaked up the ambiance. It was truely epic. The thunder cruise. After a good safety break we jumped back in the boats to get through the hard rapids before taking another break at corner pocket. More extensive safety checks were made (involving plenty of beer) were carried out. By this time it was getting a bit dark so we set off to finish the cruise. We finished off and got to the take out only to have Arthur realise that he forgot his car keys so a bit of shuttle shuffling happened, with a few food stops, before we made it back up to Echo. At this point pretty much everyone was feeling pretty done for so we all turned in.
Sunday the girls had to leave but the guys were staying around for another night and another cruise. I had to work again so they chilled out all day and when I got back we started sorting out a bighorn cruise. The plan was to take a 10ft raft and surf everything we could find. We had a good run down the river and I let Ly and Jeff try and guide a little, which they actually didn't suck at. Well except for Ly who did well at guiding but managed to fall out of the boat numerous times because he ... well he just fell out. Anyway, we got down to double dip and couldn't manage to get the boat in the hole so we gave up and went down to satans suckhole to try surfing that. We got in just fine and as we paddled hard into it the nose caught and we got whipped sideways and dumptrucked. We all got thrown out. I grabbed the stern line and pulled the boat out as I was flushed and Jeff got out fine as well but Ly was recirculated a good few times which made thigns fun for him. Anyway, we got regrouped and back in the boat and finished off the run. After taking care of the raft and everything we headed to town for some fried chicken but KFC was closed so we had to settle for Safeway. Once again by this point I was pretty much done so after checking out the bar for a few minutes I crashed out. The guys left in the morning and I was bcak to work.
It was good seeing everone from Breck again, especially Alissa who it looked like was going to be too busy to make it out to visit. We also had one of the most epic trips ever with the thunder cruise, which is probably the best gorge cruise I've had all summer. We did have a few pictures so check them out.
Echo Canyon Rafting
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