Wenatchee - April 20

Back on the Wenatchee again! As every year, we met old friends and made new ones. Hiked the hills covered by yellow balsam root flowers and blue lupins. Listened to the wild turkeys call in the evening. I was really hoping I would get to paddle more this year. But it was not to be as I managed to tweak my shoulder again. This time it wasn’t paddling – it was from trying to catch my gliderbag as it dropped over the side of a pickup truck. Bummer!

Wenatchee - June 22/23

Surf is up on the Wenatchee! Its the second time in my whitewater kayak this year... glad I still remember how to paddle. I only have some pictures of Pete (on Gorilla or whatever its called) but I got plenty of wave time too. We had Turkey shoot wave all to ourselves for an hour. Too bad the yellow Balsamroot flowers have come and gone already but Saskatoon berries are ripe and deliciously sweet.

Surf is up on the Wenatchee!

Wenatchee at last: July 21/22

Its been a cold spring and June was not very pleasant either. But finally the Wenatchee has come down to my personal favorite (between 7000 and 4500 cfs) and we made the trip down south. That's the latest time in the year we ever paddled the river in our 15+ years of kayaking.

Down there we met up with a bunch of VKCers and the usual Seattle folks. Good surfing, spinning, and I even caught many of the 'on the fly' waves I usually don't have such a high success rate with. A great weekend... need to paddle more often...

Oh and I almost forgot... thanks to the unseasonably late drop in river levels we were treated to Saskatoon Berries, sweeter and riper than I ever tasted before. Yeah to the Wenatchee!

Wenatchee, May 21 – 23

How appropriate – the poor weather on the coast coincides with the VKC Wenatchee trip! Although the water levels were just a touch on the high side (9500-10000 cfs) this turned into an excellent trip. Great to get some paddling in, meet a new crop of keen kayakers and not feel as if we missed great flying! Weather wasn't quite up to usual standard. On our first Wenatchee weekend for the season a week earlier (the river didn't come up until May 15!!!) we even hit the day that broke several rain records ... see Cliff Mass' blog). But the sun came out nevertheless and we got to enjoy the spectacle of the beautiful yellow flowers of Arrow-leaved Balsamroot.



I didn’t take many pictures (way too busy surfing, spinning… and rolling), but here are a couple from last weekend and the May-long weekend: ... (coming soon)

Wenatchee Paddling, June 19/20

Sun, warm weather (at least for our current wetcoast pattern) and lots of wave time at 6,500 and 7,500 cfs on the Wenatchee this weekend! Good conditions for Trestle/Rodeo/Turkey Shoot/Snowblind/Suffocator on one or both days. Grannies is different - much more of a hole. With the strange weather this year the river is still running at a good level and may keep going for another couple of weeks.

Strange also that there were only few other paddlers, but plenty of rafts. In the end we met all the usual WA paddlers and friends and a few new ones – nice meeting everybody again!

Getting back on the water is a nice change after too much weather 'guestimates' and 'parawaiting'. Although my 'parawaiting' percentage has significantly decreased this year, there are still too many days when the conditions are just OK and not stellar and too many of those 'you should have been here yesterday' days. But that will probably never change. It's the nature of paragliding - it's very weather-dependent and weather is just not that predictable. If you want to be there on the stellar days you just have to put the time in.

Wenatchee is up - May 16 - 18

Snow melt is very late this year (just as the snow was in November), but the Wenatchee is finally up!

As every year we meet the usual paddling friends. The group of WA paddlers, one long-lost friend who moved to the Kootenays years ago, and even some boaters from Vancouver who's kids and house and other business has kept them from regular river runs last year.

So together we surf some waves , run some rapids, enjoy the sun and a cool bevi at the take-out, and exchange stories from the last year. What a great place!

We also indulge in our latest pasttime - paragliding at Chelan Butte.

Wenatchee, Same Procedure As Every Year - May 10/11

About a month late this year the Wenatchee finally came up to good play levels and we hit the road south. And as every year on the first weekend the river is up we met a group of friends from Seattle at the put-in. How comforting: despite all the chaos in our busy world, here we meet again in the warm sunshine east of the Cascades. No email or phone calls needed just the rise of the river and the paddling tribes gather.




The Wenatchee doesn’t disappoint either: dry and sunny, excellent surf on Trestle, Drunkards and the smaller waves, in the evening chat about the paddling trips of the last season and other news. In the morning the customary stroll up the hill through meadows of yellow balsamroot and blue lupines to views of the snow-covered cascades and the Wenatchee valley below. Good to know that some of the nice things will always be here.