Rio Desahue

So many things have already happened on this exciting trip to Chile... A few days running around the massive city of Santiago, A first descent, and lots of parties. With some good luck Ian found a 4x4 Cheve-Luv truck and bought it straight up! Wam Bam we out!

10ish hours later, after leaving La casa Astorga and the Maipo we arrived in Pucon the best central location for running the shit here in Chile. After some meager sleep we woke up and met up with our good friends Ema and Rodrigo of (kayakpucon.net). Everything seems the same after leaving this place almost 7 months ago... we ate some bread, avocado, tomato, and went straight to the river.

This time it was a new one for me... due to the lack of water last year we were never able to hit this one up. The Desahue was incredible! Start to finish this river impressed me... After hearing of this run time after time from my hommie LJ I had always wanted to lay some treats on it.

A common drop of the Desahue.

Ian ran the portage first... it looked like a grim landing zone.

Hitting a sik line off the shallow 30.

Setting it down.. a cool picture of myself.

Rodrigo on his favorite home section, with style.

Me on a nice log ducker that Rodrigo and I gave.

The entry to the left side of Ojos.

Layin´treats on the left side on her.

Fred getting the huckin dialed in good.

Right side of Ojos de Carburga. Monkey stats.

Fred killing a boof.

It has tons of clean rapids, big boofs, slides, and a few big drops for sure. Ian, Rodrigo, and I fired up the portage drop... a 30 foot boof into like 2 feet of water! Stout but good to go. Then we continued all the way to Ojos de Caburga a two channel 30 foot drop. We dropped both sides with style and had a sicko day no doubt. We did do one portage around LJ's drop due to a wood clog but it looked a bit gnarl anyways. Some new wood in there but it was all bomb and good to go.

After the river we met Ema at their new land on the side of the Liacura river for another Chilean style asado. With chicken, pork, steak, bread, and beer... Ahhh Pucon livin' baby it gets no better.

all photos by Fred (rfkayakers.blogspot.com)
Later E.G.

A lil Chilean 1st Descent

So alright we made it to Chile after a long journey through many different airports dealing with sending kayaks, paddles, and all of our gear we finally arrived in santiago and met up with Fred and some Chilean amigos; Nico, Sergio, and Marcos. I split off from the group for the first 2 days to go visit some friends in the city while they went straight to the Rio Maipo to meet our good hommie Pangal. After a few days of big city life I made it up to the river and was greeted with an big chilean asado and the hope of a promising first descent.

Loading up Sergio's truck to go up to the Rio Coyanco. Checkout his site at kayakpro.cl

The idea was to get horse's to carry our kayaks so we could make it deep into the upper drainage where we knew there was good drops and slides. Otherwise we would have to shoulder our yaks a very far ways up in the mountains.

Loading up the burros with all of our creekers.

The horse's crossing the river in hope of being able to carry our kayaks the rest of the day.

Hiking it up with our kayaks after the horse guy told us he wouldn't take our boats...

So what happened was the party from the night before had us pretty tried and the trail pretty much wne to hell about 3 miles up the river. So our huge group of 10 people stopped. Pangal being the nut he is wanted more so him and Ian went a bit further. I guess it was worth it because they did find some cool drops as the river entered a gorge and the small flow was constricted.

Ian upstream of us finding a sign of the goods.

Ian running the first drop then found after hiking another half mile upstream.

Pangal Astorga our host, running his first descent.

Me dropping the last boof on the only real drop we got to hit up after walking for about 3 miles. 

The rest of the river was just quick low volume class III with some fun small boofers and rock 360 potentials. The first day of Chile this year was a first D... even if it wasn't all to gnarl it was still cool to get out there, we will have plenty of time to scare ourselves soon enough.

After we finished up we headed back to our oasis in Cascada de Animas. A good siesta lead us to yet another big asado/party for Pangal's cousin. Me gusta el pisco huevon!

El Valle de Maipo desde la casa de nuestra amigo Pangal.

Later E.G.

El Rio Baker, Patagonia Chile

Check this out y'all. I went down to this river at the end of my 3.5 month trip to S.America last March. It was so sick I have to make it back there before it is all dammed up. This video covers Myself, Lj Groth, Rodrigo Tuschner, Juanito Urgate, and Swiss Severino rocking the shit on the massive river. This footage never got used for the Flow II or Last Descent so here it is...



Enjoy the video and check back soon for the Helmet Camera edit from the Green Truss. I only have 5 more days until I'm back in Chile so egcreekin is about to blow up!

Later E.G.

Yellowstone National Problem

Yellowstone National Park is an oasis of beauty, animals, geological hot spots, and rivers. The headwaters of the Yellowstone, Snake, and Missouri rivers all start in the highlands of this sanctuary. It is illegal to boat on any rivers inside the boundary of the park. This happens to be a big issue of mine. I was born in Bozeman Montana almost 20 years ago and have had this unlimited source of rivers so close to my back yard, never being able to use it.

Today I went and sat in on a court session for my little brother Nate-dog and 3 of his local friends. Due to their failed attempt of poaching almost 4 months ago all of them were sent to the headquarters of the park for judgment. They were threatened with 5,000 dollars of fines and 6 months of prison time being the highest possible punishment. After a 75 mile drive into the park and a 2 hour session in the court room they were charged with "Intent to kayak". With a $335 fine and 1 year of unsupervised probation they left the Yellowstone today for an entire year.

The Three Criminals left to right- Andy Walker, Erik Johnson, and Nate Garcia.

The gates marking no more kayaking for you.

Mammoth hot springs a huge attraction inside the park.

A nasty 70 footer yet to be hucked.

The epic Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone amazing class V canyons.

Another sick slide just dormant ready to be fired.

A sick set of drops.

Slides for days on end.

A dope rapid on the river they were caught on.

Yellowstone was set aside as a place for people to enjoy the beauty, see sights, and interact with nature. With all that in mind everyday people horseback ride all the way through the areas, leaving piles of shit, and beaten paths throughout the park. Snowmobiles run their loud and unclean engines while ripping paths up and down through forests disturbing all the natural elements within this area.

The reasons why kayaking down these amazing rivers is unable to happen is safety, and ruining a national park???? What's the difference between kayaking there in the park and 2 miles away at mesa falls? or on the Hells Canyon of the boulder? Kayaking is dangerous and we do it at our own risk. This is a very easy challenge to overcome. Put up signs, warnings, and permits? Then the impact of floating down streams? It is the most environmentally friendly sport I have ever done. No crowd, no trails, no building, no burning of Fuels; it is simple.

This is an incredible place, and I as much as anyone else, want to keep it clean and beautiful for generations to come. This is a flawed rule in a book of regulations that govern the park. In such an amazing place with such world class rivers this is a resource that could be used to help the park attract visitors and then bring in more money to use. The law is the law. However laws are made to be broken:)

Keep fighting the good fight "Y.L.A. for life!"

How you know you're in Montucky.

Later E.G.

A 90 footer in Mexico

This is a big one that I never got to update on my blog from last October in Vera Cruz Mexico. This is on the Rio Texolo near the capital Xalapa Mexico. I remember watching this beast get slayed, many treats were laid, he stomped it but then could not exit the pool with an imploded skirt so he took a dip. But in my mind he killed that shit like a true tree-miester. Now here are the photos to enjoy...

Tyler Bradt laying some Phat Ass Treats!






Dope-est shit I have ever seen stuck with that precision. It had a hell of a buck nasty entrance as well, high speed take off. Like drinking a bottle of Rum and steppin' into the Ring with Ed Norton ready for some Fightclub.

Later E.G.