Messages

31

Downwind and Racing / Re: Brutal Downwinder

« on: June 14, 2017, 11:37:54 AM »

Looks great, I love Arlington runs but I'm kind of glad I didn't go. My shoulder was definitely dodgy for the first half of the run, and it was hard getting back on the board the one time I fell. If Rod was falling, I would have been wet the whole trip.

It was pretty fun for sure. Though it was just about as windy as it gets out there, at least for sane people, the swell was not nearly the size it can be. Probably not much more than head high. I'm not sure why, as it was a steady blast all the way from The Dalles, so plenty of fetch. I remember back in '97 when we had really high water the swell was generally smaller, so maybe that's it. Still, it's pretty fun to be able just stand there and be blown onto a bump if you get tired of paddling.

Boy they've done a great job attracting people to the new Arlington launch. Virtually no one sailing or kiting Maryhill, The Wall, or Rufus on the way out. Maybe a total of 6 people between them, despite epic conditions. There were probably 30 cars at Arlington. A far cry from the old days of trying to haul our gear up the rocks in overhead swell way back when.
It's pretty sweet to be able to paddle under the freeway and right into that nice park out of the wind and into the comfort of the grass and shade. Such a contrast to the chaos that lurks outside the jetty.
JP

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32

Downwind and Racing / Re: Brutal Downwinder

« on: June 13, 2017, 11:00:33 PM »

Well out to the east, Arlington was ripping. Gusting to about 45 mph, it was tough to get the door open and get out of the van from on top the jetty.

It was my virgin Arlington run as well as Russel's. Gorge veteran Rod Parmenter showed us how it's done. Here's on board video from the Rod cam connecting bumps for almost a minute.

s

33

Downwind and Racing / Re: VHF radios, DSC and MMSI

« on: June 13, 2017, 10:18:57 AM »

The technology available to get yourself rescued now is pretty amazing. I remember the first rescue we did here in Oregon involving a cell phone. The Sheriff got a call from an injured climber who had used one of those new fangled cell phones on Mt Jefferson, a tall rocky peak with no easy ground approach. This was in the days before  GPS. Instead of sending out a C-130 and a couple helicopters to methodically search the area, we sent one helo directly to the victim and he was in the hospital a couple hours after making the call. The PLB's are a no brainer to me if you're thinking of putting yourself in a situation where you might be hard to find.
JP

34

Downwind and Racing / Re: VHF radios, DSC and MMSI

« on: June 13, 2017, 12:44:30 AM »

Cove, glad to see you finally got a PLB. I'm thinking of getting one for solo mtb rides. After nearly severing my leg, my fantasies about being able to drag myself out for help were quickly squashed 

For folks out in the open ocean I'd like to add that probably the best thing to carry besides a PLB is a small signal mirror. After having been on quite a few missions as an Air Force search and rescue pilot, I can say confidently that nothing will get you seen quicker in daylight than a mirror flash. Get one with the little aiming hole in it on a lanyard and put it in your hydration pack. A mirror flash can be seen for miles and when you learn how to aim it you can hit an aircraft pretty easily.
You'd be amazed how hard it is to even find a 150' fishing boat in heavy seas. Forget the signal flares, sea dyes, and smokes. We used to drop sea dye and smokes that were in canisters about 4' long and you could only see them when you were right on top of them. Now 2 million candlepower parachute flares, those are very effective, but probably going to be hard to launch from a paddle board 

JP

35

Downwind and Racing / Re: Nice Grind today

« on: June 10, 2017, 11:04:46 AM »

Monday looks like it's setting up to be a little windy. Maybe windy enough for a double? Or Arlington?

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36

SUP General / Re: Forgot her leash

« on: June 06, 2017, 06:58:10 PM »

"The peeps from Utah, well, what can you say?"

What exactly do you mean by that Covesurfer?

I meant that I don't find it surprising that folks from land-locked states, where it's probably Winter (meaning that if they actually DO paddle at home, they haven't been paddling regularly) come to warm sunny Maui, rent boards (typically with zero instruction and probably few if any safety tips) and find themselves in trouble in the ocean. It literally happens almost every day here. The grim statistic is that one tourist a week drowns in Hawai'i (Inside Edition, May 2016). It looks so inviting and friendly much of the time.

Without experience paddling in rough water or even knowing what to look for as far as hazards, it's actually surprising that more people don't get themselves in trouble. But, plenty do. Here's a quote from a recent article in MauiNow.com...."Ocean drowning is the leading cause of fatal injury among visitors to Hawaiʻi, accounting for nearly half of the total of all fatal injuries, according to officials with the State Department of Health." The ocean is a great place to play but to do it and mitigate the risks involves having information about local wind and weather, sea life, swell and wave behavior, temperatures, currents, etc. Your typical visitor has no knowledge of those things. Put them on a watercraft of any kind and you have the potential for trouble.

The conditions off Maui can go from benign to extremely challenging and/or dangerous, even for experienced paddlers, very quickly. It's a bit more unexpected, at least in my view, when experienced paddlers end up in trouble, although the experienced folks are the ones that often push the boundaries while knowing the risks. The difference is that most of the experienced folks have a lot of time in the ocean, know the hazards, are less likely to panic and have some idea of how to self rescue if things go bad.

And that's not even counting all the cervical injuries at places like Sandy Beach on Oahu in the crazy shore pound. I was reading somewhere that there's a broken neck or back every week on Oahu, which wouldn't surprise me given the number of tourists. I was in Cabo last week and saw a guy playing in shore pound that was well overhead on a super steep beach.  It was shaking the ground and he was playing in it. Natural selection.

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37

Downwind and Racing / Re: Nice Grind today

« on: June 05, 2017, 08:24:03 PM »

Wow, that sounds hard. My arms still hurt from yesterdays death march. I did an easy 35 mile bike ride today instead. I'm going to go in search of surf early tomorrow. The forecast looks somewhat promising with light winds.

38

Downwind and Racing / Re: Brutal Downwinder

« on: June 05, 2017, 05:31:30 PM »

https://waterdata.usgs.gov/or/nwis/dvstat/?site_no=14105700&por_14105700_113459=546282,00060,113459

Blue crab, this is the historical mean discharge for The Dalles Dam. It looks like historically the flow will drop about 60k cfs in the next month. That would only get us down to about 400k cfs, which is still ripping pretty good. I don't know how low the flow has to get for the shuttle to run, but right now they have it shut down for safety reasons.
At least by then the water temp will be up a bit. Early summer is still likely to be suitable only for self sufficient intermediate and above paddlers. I'd take a solid strong teenager right now, but it's going to have to back off a bit before I'd take someone smaller or less experienced.

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39

Downwind and Racing / Re: Brutal Downwinder

« on: June 04, 2017, 10:39:20 PM »

Sorry to hear about your buddy Bill, that's a shame.

Today was my fifth Viento of the year, and if I was ranking them by difficulty, I'd say this was one of the easiest. Conditions weren't perfect, but at least there was wind the whole way.

There have been some brutal runs this year, fortunately I've missed the ones where the wind died completely. I know Russel and Joel have had a few four hour epics already.

We did ok for such a large gaggle of folks. When the cruise ship came through, Misako and I were leading and we went separate ways. She went to Washington and I went right. By the time I pulled over in the eddy past Mitchel, I couldn't see anyone but Don behind me. Finally I picked out the rest of the crew who followed Misako. After I waited for Don, the crew on the Washington side had put about 1/2 a mile into us. No worries, though, I knew if Don and I went into the eddy we would blow on by them and we did. Sitting down and not paddling! When I did stand, the little swell in the eddy was a lot like the Wells Express, really easy to catch and we just flew on by the rest of the group while they paddled on the treadmill. We rejoined them once they were good and tired and dropped them in the Swell to Wells section, where we waited and then ran into you Bill.

Pretty unusual season so far, but it can only get better from here on out, right? Actually, I just flew over Montana two days ago and it's still packed in snow, so we're screwed 
JP

40

Downwind and Racing / Re: Grumpy

« on: June 03, 2017, 05:45:18 PM »

I was tempted to go the Hatch, but common sense took over  I'll definitely be in for a Viento tomorrow if the wind cooperates. I'm not afraid to ride the eddies For what it's worth, I've done 4 Viento's so far and they've ranged from 2:10 with Russel when the river was at 469k and we kept a steady pace, to 3:20 with a whole pile of old dudes taking pictures and sitting and chatting excessively. The key seems to be having a lot of wind at the beginning of the run so you can get into the eddy past Mitchell and ride it past the red buoy. That seems to be the spot where the wind is the softest and the current is raging. Then jump out and get the Swell to Wells section. I'm pretty confident I could keep it around two hours if people aren't stopping a bunch and I take a cruise up the big eddy. Falling in especially counter productive this Spring, so don't do that!

41

Downwind and Racing / Re: Grumpy

« on: June 03, 2017, 10:28:52 AM »

Interesting watching Fiona go through the Hatch the other day in this video. She is almost at a standstill at the beginning of the video and each time she comes off a bump, despite paddling hard with 30+ kts of wind at her back. Now imagine a middle aged, semi-slow man paddling in the same spot 

s

42

Downwind and Racing / Re: Grumpy

« on: June 02, 2017, 10:35:32 PM »

You think your flows are going now......wait about 6-10 days. I got a feeling they will be increasing...I think most everything upstream from you is full or will be in a few days. 
So much still to come down yet above 8,000-9,000 or so.

Word. I just checked the Columbia at The Dalles. Half a milion frickin' cfs!

43

Random / Re: The Sunset Thread

« on: May 31, 2017, 09:31:07 PM »

Somewhere in Mexico on my L41 ST.
Dinner at the beach club the next night.

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44

Random / Re: Formula One is Next!

« on: May 30, 2017, 11:00:54 AM »

Hey, JP4, want to do a downwinder today?

Damn, I wish. Stuck in the metal tube all day. I can go tomorrow if it's still blowing.

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45

Random / Re: Formula One is Next!

« on: May 29, 2017, 09:57:53 PM »

"Or stupid stuff happens like your flywheel bolts break and that buzzsaw cuts the transmission right off the engine and drops it on the ground."

An old high school buddies dad used to drag race a lot in the 50's and 60's. He had the flywheel of his hot rod come loose, saw through the floorboard and take his lower leg off. Of course that didn't stop him from continuing to drag race. That was the story anyway.

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