I Pledge Allegiance to My……………. Homies Who keep It Gangster

Playa’ play on.

November is a good month.

It must be a good month if you get two moonlight runs in two days. 

Stateline falls bathed in moon rays.

It must be a good month if the green race is finally here. 

Boone Town represents. Me and the pit crew. Coop, Dave, and Cat always give inspiration. Sometimes they give shuttles, Beer, sandwiches and paddle your boat out. 

Cat’s got skillz. 

It’s a good month when you get to run the Gragg Prong on your Birthday! even if its really really low. still fun to slide down hill. 

My roomie bryan feeling good on his birthday. 

It’s a good month if you paddle the Boone Fork. 

It’s a good month when the Taugs gets all swollen and then runs for weeks at a time!

Mr. Crawdaddy is definitely having a good month.

Elkin’ leads to Forkin’

          On Saturday we woke up with a big decision to make. What to do today? We were planning on bookin’ it up to the Fork and doing some kayak rydin’ before the Race. However, in true Russell Fork Race Weekend Style; we got rained on. Natural Flow? Dam Release? Race? Elk? Linville? Watauga? Uhhh. I went to wake CooperBrew and he encouraged me to make it happen with his help of course. Soooo, I drove back to my house got another Boat and then went back to pick up cooper, then Eric Chance, then Dennis, then off to Elk Park, TN or NC or somewheres. We arrived at Elk River Falls and we were sad to see that the water was low, even though the Taugs was running around 1,500 cfs. We were Happy that the river had water in it and got fired up for our Pre-Lord of the Fork Mission. 

  Chance was real excited to get his first run down that Elk and is planning on spending as many work days as he can on the Elk; doing “research”. He is working for the Watauga Riverkeeper and they are keepin it real and representin’ for High Country waterways. The colors down in the Elk gorge were amazing Yellows and Oranges. The  warm hues were reflected on the water’s surface and make you think your riding a silky gold ribbon that flows over and around rocks.  It is, after all, Fall and one leaf fell onto The Chancellor’s helmet while we were doing the classic twisting falls portage. 

  The Chancellor is not intimidated by Waterfallz. Here he is doing “Research” on Elk River water quality. He really styled the Compression Downfall, even after watching me kinda land on my face and break my beloved paddle. Damn! After this we did a hasty paddle out and found our Hero Shuttle Men waiting at the bottom. Chance and I completed our Pre-race warm up in an hour and a half and were excited to be on time and in line for the Afternoon’s festivities!

  The Race went off without a hitch. Except that I was using a break down and there were like 35 GreenBoats out on the water. Anyway, The Corsica and I made a smooth run and only kinda pitoned once. The Fork Race is Soo Fun I dont really care what place I got. Everyone knows it’s all about the Bonfire and Moonshine anyway!

  The Fire was no disappointment this year. Everyone had a great time enjoying everyone else’s company. Wait… Not everyone. We were standing around watching some race highlights form the day when a scrum of Kentucky Teenagers erupted in front of Me and Coop. We scratched our heads and thought, “fighting..? at the Russell Fork…? Kayakers…? Noooo. About this time some poor fellow fell out of the scrum and onto his back on the ground. Another small group continued to fight their way off into the woods. WHOOAAA. This was the craziest thing I ever saw at the fork! The Cop showed up and restored peace and order as some of the belligerent  high schoolers scattered like roaches under a flashlight. This event did not phase the kayakers and the Sippin’, Gluppin’, and bonfire socializin’ continued into the wee hours. 

  The next day we made our way to the clear waters of the Russell Fork and the Chancellor continued to paddle downstream with style.

Breaks Interstate Park!

 

The Chanellor Styles it from the left side of the frame too! Coop hike in to quell his shuttle bunny angst. We did the classic fork hang out at Climax; took many pictures and soaked in the sun. Coop also found out that his Labrum is not torn!! some PT and this crazy dude is gonna be out on the water again soon. Watch out for Coop and Abby tearing up Taugs; getting that shoulder back into fighting shape!

The Chancellor goes down the middle. Probably one of my favorite moves on the Fork…espescially on race day.

This week in Boone: some more water fell from the sky! I’ve been slingin’ Mulch, Snowboard Apparel,  and sneaking in some WAH-TAU-GAhh in the evening. It’s all good in the Gorge.

This years Pumpkin is happy about something! I think he’s thinking Rain.

Pretty colors

The Fall is here!

The leaves are changing pretty colors and that makes the kayakers happy. Everyone knows that when the leaves change colors they are officially surrendering their right to the water that falls from the sky. They trees are on our side again! letting their leaves fall to the ground where they will direct the flow of water directly into their respective drainages. These leaves will also protect the water table from that evil force known as Evapotranspitation. To think just a couple weeks ago they were greedily stealing our water from the ground.

This is a picture of one tree starting to surrender to the kayakers.

If you know this drop then you may be one of those high country tire swing hunters, or just someone who has spent too much time looking for new things to slide down in the Boone area.

this drop was attempted by the boys in the Wet Dream Result trailer, It was stout and one of the bro-bras broke his foamie paddle.

I went to the Russell Fork and paddled with a truly eclectic crew of SouthEast raft guide Scum. The scumbags were real fired up and we preformed many forward strokes down the fork. 

I also found out why all those old school guys from the old LVM’s were so fired up at the Extrasport Challenge all those years ago. FREEWHEELS. Thanks to Coop my Freestyle advisor and sponsor. also, thanks to Arlyn Agababian, he’s a true scumbag playa and also the new found publicist for team Boone. 

David “Brian” Clarke is strokin it off the Gorilla even though his boob kinda hurts. I love Goooold! You can see me sitting in the Eddy down below with a look of pure amazement on my face.(Photo by Arlyn Agababian)

This is me taking the Corsica that sat in Memphis for all too long down the Green River Ganrrows. It’s safe to say the Corsica has experienced an awakening in the last two years. It really likes rydin’ down the rivers of the SE Appalachians; as opposed to hangin’ with my dad’s canoes in the back yard. BIG THANKS to popps for buying me this kayak when I was like 10. If you only knew what you were getting me into you might have bought me an abbacus instead. (Photo Arlyn Agababian)

This is the closest thing to owning a dog i’ve found lately. She is Rami and she is always praying for rain so she can hang with the cool kayakers at the WAH-TAU-GAH take out. She really likes playing Stick, running through the field, and watching kayakers get dressed and un-dressed. Rami, If your out there reading this on your laptop, go outside and do the rain dance so we can hang out soon.

Me and dave were gonna Brown this Stout but we were too busy trying to balance and canoeing the cascades of the Taugs in the Aluminum canoe. Hmmm, maybe next time. enjoy those pretty colors and get ready for a wet winter.

feels like home

 

 

 

people are friendly in West Virginia

This is one of those places that feels like home. However, you’ve been away for too long and you dont know if you dad is happy to see you or ready to kick your ass….

Cachu… Just broke free from the tree. and another is plotting to grab him. 

 

We've been gettin' born like every week these days!

 

nice hat dogg