The Green River, through Desolation and Grey Canyons, is a gorgeous trip, with amazing scenery, camping, and fun rapids. I kayaked it over 6 days this year, and had an amazing time. A great time following in the footsteps of Powell on a spectacular river in one of my favorite areas of the world.

The Middle Fork of the Feather is described in the classic CA paddling guidebook as “This is it! The Middle Fork of the Feather River is the best wilderness self-support trip in California.”  It is one of the original “Wild and Scenic ” designated rivers.  Class V and 3 days.  I’d seen photos, and read other trip reports.  I was excited to give it a go.   Flows looked good, and the plan was Memorial Day weekend.
A few days before, my neuropathy was acting up, making my foot numb, and I …

The East Fork of the Carson flows with the melting snow, and heads east down the Sierra Mtns, into Nevada.  It’s a class II+ run, but moves quickly.  We did a trip a few weeks, with the great folks from Current Adventures (http://currentadventures.com) who do lessons and trips all over northern california.  (full disclosure, I work for CA some).  We tagged along on the trip.  The rapids were fun, the scenery was great, the food was yummy, and the company was wonderful.  Highly recommend trip.

Brush Creek, a tributary of the Kern River in CA, is one of the most incredible stretches of whitewater around. It drops about 450 feet per mile, but is suprisingly managble. Lot’s of fun drops in the 5-20 foot range. Big fast slides. It’s just so good it has to be experienced. I did a bunch of runs over a few weekends in May, and even stopped to take some pictures.

Pauley Creek is a spectacular kayak run in Northern California. Tons of fun drops, a couple technical rapids. We got a good early season run in, though it meant hiking in through snow. Several good waterfalls. Video inside.

It’s been a slow year for whitewater paddling in CA so far. just not a lot happening. Although it’s gotten better over the last few weeks, we’re looking at a potential drought this year. I’ve done a number of low water trips down the North Fork of the American river, Chamberlain Falls run.

It’s been a grim winter so far for paddling, but one of the few spots that has water is Clear Creek, located near Redding, CA. I got on it a few weeks ago. Good times.

In 2008, California hosted the US national surf kayak championships at Davenport, CA. We had amazing conditions, and a great contest.

This past weekend was the national championship for surf kayaking, held at Davenport, CA, and organized by Buck Johnson. I went down a day early to get a practice session in. Friday was super fun. I was on the water from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., one of my longest surf sessions ever, stopping only for short breaks. Super fun. Throughout the day, it was a changing cast of characters, including some really strong paddlers, some people that are brand new to the sport, …

Kim and Geoff went to Bodega Bay, north of San Francisco, for a weekend of camping, surf kayaking and crabbing.