(Ocoee No. 2 Dam flooded at 14,000 cfs)
On that day, I was at home in the Lebanon area and had to work. For a brief few minutes I thought about calling Katie, my boss, and trying to negotiate getting the next two days off; I wanted to raft the Ocoee at 14,000! But I came to my senses after a minute and knew I could not ask off work. It was too last minute, and I do want to be able to leave every job I work with a reputation of being reliable. So instead I spent my entire morning drooling over the photos friends were posting of the high water. This was not an unprecedented thing - the Ocoee has run up to 20,000 cfs. But it was rare.
Though I did not call my boss, I did call Stephen. I asked him if he was running it, and he said that he too had to work and was equally bummed about it. I asked how long he thought the river would run high like this, and he said the 14 grand would probably wash out pretty quickly, but that it would still run high water (around 2 - 3,000 cfs) for a week or two. I told him I was itching to get on it and had Sunday and Monday off, but if it was below 8,000 by then it wouldn't really be worth the three hour drive for me. He agreed. Instead, however, Stephen proposed another plan. Though the Ocoee would be too low by Sunday to be adventuresome for us, he said the Tellico River would probably be running about normal flow by then (it was currently at 11 ft, which is terribly high). I had never been on the Tellico River and desperately wanted to run it. I told him that sounded like an even better idea, so we decided to plan on R2ing it Sunday morning (Dawn would not be able to come because of work).
When Saturday morning came I received a text from Stephen explaining that he wouldn't be able to raft the Tellico the following day because of work. He was extremely sorry and wished he could, but it just wasn't going to work out how we planned. I was sad to hear it; I had been so excited about R2ing with him and getting to run the Tellico. As I saw my weekend adventure slipping away, I suddenly had another thought -perhaps Noah would want to run the Tellico with me!
Noah is a very dear friend of mine who is also a raft guide at Adventures Unlimited. He started guiding rafts the year before I came, but had already been working for the company for a few years prior. Noah was one of the first friends I made when I came to Ocoee. He was living a lifestyle similar to mine, in that he had chosen not to go to college and instead save his money to travel and fund his outdoor life. This past summer (my second season, his third) Noah took up kayaking - and he took to it fast. In mere months he was mastering whitewater in his kayak, unafraid to try anything. By the end of the season, Noah was traveling all over the Southeastern States running a multitude of different rivers.
When Stephen told me that he couldn't run the Tellico on Sunday, I messaged Noah on Facebook to see if he would be willing to R2. He and my friend, Sara, who's also a guide at AU, were both planning to kayak while Stephen and I rafted. Noah replied:
"No, Susan. You're going to ducky it."
About midway through the summer Noah tried to start getting me into the sport of kayaking. His passion was certainly contagious, but I was timid toward it because I couldn't roll a kayak. There is, however, this thing called a "ducky". It's also commonly called a "funyak". It's basically an inflatable sit-on-top kayak. You paddle it the same way you paddle a hard boat, but since you're not constrained in a hull and since it doesn't hold water (being inflatable), the boat doesn't roll. If you turn upside down in the middle of a rapid, you're automatically released and you simply have to pop the thing right side up ad crawl back on it. There's no swimming with it over to a bank in order to drain the water out, and there's no feeling trapped upside down in a cockpit. Now, if you can roll a kayak, that's undoubtedly much better. If you cannot roll a kayak, funyaking provides a way for you to experience the sport without the fear of swimming (not because you won't swim, but because it's no longer a big deal).
Stephen and Dawn have two funyaks that they usually let any of their friends use. One day during the summer when none of us had trips, Stephen sent out an invite for people to join him while he went kayaking, and he offered the two funyaks. Graham, a fellow raft guide and friend who trained the year I did, took up the offer, and so did I. Before we got to the river I had already decided I would run the meat of everything. I figured, if swimming is no big deal, why not do it big? My adrenaline pumped as I left the eddy at the put-in and ferried out into Grumpy's, heading straight for the sweet spot of Grumpy's ledge. I was also the first one out, so I had no safety. I T-ed up on the huge wave and, thanks to the whitewater skills I already had from rafting, felt my way through each stroke and ran it clean. I had never yet done anything so invigorating. The rest of the river was a whole new world. All those rapids I knew so well in a raft seemed so much bigger and so much more technical in a small funyak. I absolutely loved it. I only swam once on that run, and the next run we made right after it I paddled without swimming at all. I knew out of the gate this was a sport I could take to. I didn't doubt I would experience my share of swims, but it felt natural; it felt good; and it was fun.
(Me paddling Stephen's Aire Linx funyak - taken in the Doldrums on the Ocoee. This is the same boat I paddled on the Tellico)
Having had these few experiences in the funyak, when Noah told me I should ducky the Tellico my reply was:
"Well...okay!"
It seemed a little risky since it had been several months since I'd paddled a funyak and since I no longer had my summer strength. I wasn't entirely sure that I could manage, but I knew Noah wanted to kayak, and I figured I'd better push my limits while I'm young. The shear nervousness of reentering a sport I had little experience in made my adrenaline flow before I'd even gotten my car packed. There were three waterfalls on the Tellico, the biggest being a 15 ft drop. The more I thought about it, the more stoked I was. I checked with Stephen to make sure it would be okay to borrow the Linx and then asked Dawn if I could use her drysuit (since I was betting I would swim). They graciously approved of both, so I called Noah and we worked out the details of when and where we would meet the next day. When I went to bed that night, I found it much easier to go to sleep than the last two times I planned spontaneous trips, though I was just as excited. Perhaps my body really was tired, but I also think that to some degree I was getting used to this pattern of "be ready for a last minute trip". I enjoy living this way. It keeps me on my toes, and it's a huge thrill to pack up and head across state for an unexpected weekend of whitewater.
On Sunday, December 6th, I headed out at 6 o'clock in the morning and got to the Outpost around 10:00 am Eastern time. I collected the funyak, paddle, and dry gear from Stephen's camper and then spent some time with Old Man Dave before I left for Noah's house.
When I got to Noah's, we waited for Sara to arrive and then packed up the cars with kayaks and duckies. Noah's younger sister, Chancey, was also going to ducky.
The drive through Tellico Plains was gorgeous, affording panoramic views of mountains and valley farmlands in many places. As we wound our way through these mountain roads, we eventually found ourselves driving right alongside the lower Tellico. Once we started seeing vehicles parked on the curb with kayak racks on top of the cars I knew we were driving beside the portion of the river we would soon be paddling ourselves. I gazed down at it and studied each rapid as we passed by, scouting out the boulders and waves and other general features. I saw kayakers on the water and watched them boof off of rocks and carve into eddies. Some of them I waved at, and they waved in return.
When we got to the top my nerves kicked in. We unloaded the boats, pumped up the two duckies, and changed into our dry gear, then shuttled the cars to the bottom. When we were all reconvened at the river bank, we launched in.
The motions and movements for paddling the funyak came back to me immediately. It felt so good to be on the water. As we made our way downstream, the mild current provided a nice warm-up.
The first major rapid we came to was Top Ledge, a six foot waterfall. We all eddied out above the drop, but there wasn't much explaining to do. I simply watched all of them run the ledge and figured I would follow behind. I saw where they went and pulled out of the eddy to line up for it. I was familiar with the concept of boofing, but had never done it in practice. I paddled up to the edge of the drop, planted my paddle blade on the shelf and pulled back as hard as I could while thrusting my hips forward and leaning back. The front of my boat soared over the ledge...and promptly came to a stop. My inflatable ducky was stuck on the rock ledge from the weight of my body. Whereas hard boats can easily slide over rocks of all kinds, my funyak would not slide over this one. I was hanging out over the waterfall looking at my friends in slight dismay. Noah warned me not to lean too far right; if I rolled off on the right I would crash on top of a protruding rock that could do some harm. After several attempts to shove myself off the ledge, I finally threw all my body weight forward and held my position leaning over as far as possible. The boat tipped forward and slid slowly until it finally dropped vertically and penciled into the water, resurfacing immediately for a clean run. One down, two more waterfalls to go. I hoped they wouldn't be quite as suspenseful as that one.
The next waterfall we came to was an 8 ft drop. In the eddy above, Sara explained to me that there was a curler wave in the middle of the rapid you wanted to hit and cross over as you dropped. If you hit it with too much of an angle, it would roll you over for a nice sideways drop and swim at the bottom. I thought sarcastically, "Cool." I watched her run the ledge, and unlike the first waterfall, I had no visibility to the bottom. I couldn't see what I might hit after the drop, nor could I see my friends. I pulled out of the eddy and paddled up to the ledge with as much speed as I could manage. I ran it right down the middle on top of the curler wave, and when I hit the water below it was so shaky I thought for sure I was going to swim. I actually let go of my paddle with one hand and grabbed my nose (because swimming a rapid is no big deal, but God forbid I get water up my nose). But to my delight, I was able to steady the boat with my hips and completed a clean run. I cheered and so did my friends. I was so excited!
Up next, Baby Falls. The 15 ft drop. For many kayakers, this was a beginner's waterfall, having no comparison with some 30 and 40 ft waterfalls that experienced kayakers run. But I was undoubtedly a beginner, and this would be the biggest drop I'd ever run in my life.
(Baby Falls running a little high.)
(Baby Falls a little low. You can see some of the rocks on the right side here without much water running over them, but they must have been submerged when we ran it because I ran that river left line. Also, the darker water in the middle of the ledge indicates the tongue I am about to describe.)
I was so pumped. As always, we stopped above for briefing. Sara told me about a tongue in the middle of the ledge that was nice if you didn't want to drop vertically, but that it created a larger hole at the bottom that swam a lot of people. She told me it would be safer to run left of it; but this meant I had to paddle across the rapid just below a certain rock with not much room for error. After everyone ran it, I paddled out of the eddy. I saw the rocks Sara had directed me by, and I ran where she ran. As I crossed below that last rock above the tongue, I was right at the ledge but facing it with a 10 o'clock angle. I suddenly thought, "This does not seem right." As the front of my boat came over the ledge I planted my left hand blade on the shelf and pulled back as hard as I could to correct that angle. I soared over the falls. It was a brief moment in time, too short even for me to conceive. I hit the water and the funyak plummeted under, and promptly resurfaced for a third clean run. Before I could cheer I looked at my friends and they were already cheering. As I paddled into the eddy Sara called out above the noise of the waterfall, "That was a perfect boof, Susan!" She then also said, "Be careful, this eddy feeds right back into the hole and it will suck you in." Oh, excellent.
I was elated, but there was too much going on to think about my excitement. We were all crammed into the river left eddy and paddling to stay there, while also discussing our immediate next rapid - Diaper Wiper.
When I researched the rapids on American Whitewater's website, I had read that beginners should run the river right line at Diaper Wiper. It's a difficult rapid known for swimming people, and the right line is easier, whereas the left line is much more technical. This thought, however, never occurred to me when my friends said we would run the left line and shouted back to me, "Just follow us!" One by one they entered the rapid, and I followed suit. We ran down a tight channel that hugged some boulders on the left, and about midway down the rapid was a huge curler just in front of another boulder. The curler looked difficult because it was created by a cross current as the water flowed down that left bank, hit the boulder, and surged river right. I watched my friends hit this curler with a right hand angle and lean downstream to avoid flipping. For me it seemed intimidating, but I thought as long as I did the same thing I could make it through. When I hit the wave I must not have had a enough of an angle, because instead of getting carried to the right around that boulder like my friends were, I found myself being pushed right toward it. With no time to correct, my funyak washed up sideways against this large rock. Time slowed down in my mind as I considered that this boulder could very well be undercut. My friends had not warned me of this, and afterward I determined they most likely would have if it was truly undercut, but I didn't know. All I could think was that a cross current like this would probably wash away rock matter over time and carve out the underside of this rock. In an instant the powerful water forced my upstream tube to submerge. I reached up to grab the rock but before I could the small boat flipped and I plunged into the water. I clung to the side of the ducky and felt my legs get pulled under it toward the boulder. I swear my heart could've pounded out of my chest. But instead of being sucked into an undercut, that heavy cross current washed my body out to the right of the rock. As it did though, I felt my legs brush the inside of it. There was certainly curvature. In retrospect, the boulder could have simply had a concave shape without being undercut at all. I just don't know. But though I did not find myself stuffed into a dark airless place, I did find myself having my diaper wiped by this rapid. My body hit several rocks before I got to the bottom and somehow my knuckles were bleeding, too. When I did get to the bottom, I didn't have the strength the hold onto the slippery funyak and my paddle, and I let go of the boat. Sara was in a river right eddy and I chucked my paddle to her and swam faster to the boat and grabbed a metal ring on it. I drug it over into the eddy with Sara and crawled up on a rock to catch my breath. I was shaking all over. I smiled and started to laugh. Some kayakers were watching from an eddy opposite of us and I threw up a fist and cheered. They laughed, too, and smiled. I knew I was okay. I thanked Sara for grabbing my paddle and we headed downstream a short way to where Noah and Chancey were stopped. I then realized that Chancey had also swam the rapid. She was okay, but was too shaken up to keep going. She said she wanted to stop, but Noah encouraged her to paddle the short distance to Bald River Falls where she could take out and wait by the road with other people. She agreed, so we started downstream.
The first major rapid we came to was Top Ledge, a six foot waterfall. We all eddied out above the drop, but there wasn't much explaining to do. I simply watched all of them run the ledge and figured I would follow behind. I saw where they went and pulled out of the eddy to line up for it. I was familiar with the concept of boofing, but had never done it in practice. I paddled up to the edge of the drop, planted my paddle blade on the shelf and pulled back as hard as I could while thrusting my hips forward and leaning back. The front of my boat soared over the ledge...and promptly came to a stop. My inflatable ducky was stuck on the rock ledge from the weight of my body. Whereas hard boats can easily slide over rocks of all kinds, my funyak would not slide over this one. I was hanging out over the waterfall looking at my friends in slight dismay. Noah warned me not to lean too far right; if I rolled off on the right I would crash on top of a protruding rock that could do some harm. After several attempts to shove myself off the ledge, I finally threw all my body weight forward and held my position leaning over as far as possible. The boat tipped forward and slid slowly until it finally dropped vertically and penciled into the water, resurfacing immediately for a clean run. One down, two more waterfalls to go. I hoped they wouldn't be quite as suspenseful as that one.
The next waterfall we came to was an 8 ft drop. In the eddy above, Sara explained to me that there was a curler wave in the middle of the rapid you wanted to hit and cross over as you dropped. If you hit it with too much of an angle, it would roll you over for a nice sideways drop and swim at the bottom. I thought sarcastically, "Cool." I watched her run the ledge, and unlike the first waterfall, I had no visibility to the bottom. I couldn't see what I might hit after the drop, nor could I see my friends. I pulled out of the eddy and paddled up to the ledge with as much speed as I could manage. I ran it right down the middle on top of the curler wave, and when I hit the water below it was so shaky I thought for sure I was going to swim. I actually let go of my paddle with one hand and grabbed my nose (because swimming a rapid is no big deal, but God forbid I get water up my nose). But to my delight, I was able to steady the boat with my hips and completed a clean run. I cheered and so did my friends. I was so excited!
Up next, Baby Falls. The 15 ft drop. For many kayakers, this was a beginner's waterfall, having no comparison with some 30 and 40 ft waterfalls that experienced kayakers run. But I was undoubtedly a beginner, and this would be the biggest drop I'd ever run in my life.
(Baby Falls running a little high.)
(Baby Falls a little low. You can see some of the rocks on the right side here without much water running over them, but they must have been submerged when we ran it because I ran that river left line. Also, the darker water in the middle of the ledge indicates the tongue I am about to describe.)
I was so pumped. As always, we stopped above for briefing. Sara told me about a tongue in the middle of the ledge that was nice if you didn't want to drop vertically, but that it created a larger hole at the bottom that swam a lot of people. She told me it would be safer to run left of it; but this meant I had to paddle across the rapid just below a certain rock with not much room for error. After everyone ran it, I paddled out of the eddy. I saw the rocks Sara had directed me by, and I ran where she ran. As I crossed below that last rock above the tongue, I was right at the ledge but facing it with a 10 o'clock angle. I suddenly thought, "This does not seem right." As the front of my boat came over the ledge I planted my left hand blade on the shelf and pulled back as hard as I could to correct that angle. I soared over the falls. It was a brief moment in time, too short even for me to conceive. I hit the water and the funyak plummeted under, and promptly resurfaced for a third clean run. Before I could cheer I looked at my friends and they were already cheering. As I paddled into the eddy Sara called out above the noise of the waterfall, "That was a perfect boof, Susan!" She then also said, "Be careful, this eddy feeds right back into the hole and it will suck you in." Oh, excellent.
I was elated, but there was too much going on to think about my excitement. We were all crammed into the river left eddy and paddling to stay there, while also discussing our immediate next rapid - Diaper Wiper.
When I researched the rapids on American Whitewater's website, I had read that beginners should run the river right line at Diaper Wiper. It's a difficult rapid known for swimming people, and the right line is easier, whereas the left line is much more technical. This thought, however, never occurred to me when my friends said we would run the left line and shouted back to me, "Just follow us!" One by one they entered the rapid, and I followed suit. We ran down a tight channel that hugged some boulders on the left, and about midway down the rapid was a huge curler just in front of another boulder. The curler looked difficult because it was created by a cross current as the water flowed down that left bank, hit the boulder, and surged river right. I watched my friends hit this curler with a right hand angle and lean downstream to avoid flipping. For me it seemed intimidating, but I thought as long as I did the same thing I could make it through. When I hit the wave I must not have had a enough of an angle, because instead of getting carried to the right around that boulder like my friends were, I found myself being pushed right toward it. With no time to correct, my funyak washed up sideways against this large rock. Time slowed down in my mind as I considered that this boulder could very well be undercut. My friends had not warned me of this, and afterward I determined they most likely would have if it was truly undercut, but I didn't know. All I could think was that a cross current like this would probably wash away rock matter over time and carve out the underside of this rock. In an instant the powerful water forced my upstream tube to submerge. I reached up to grab the rock but before I could the small boat flipped and I plunged into the water. I clung to the side of the ducky and felt my legs get pulled under it toward the boulder. I swear my heart could've pounded out of my chest. But instead of being sucked into an undercut, that heavy cross current washed my body out to the right of the rock. As it did though, I felt my legs brush the inside of it. There was certainly curvature. In retrospect, the boulder could have simply had a concave shape without being undercut at all. I just don't know. But though I did not find myself stuffed into a dark airless place, I did find myself having my diaper wiped by this rapid. My body hit several rocks before I got to the bottom and somehow my knuckles were bleeding, too. When I did get to the bottom, I didn't have the strength the hold onto the slippery funyak and my paddle, and I let go of the boat. Sara was in a river right eddy and I chucked my paddle to her and swam faster to the boat and grabbed a metal ring on it. I drug it over into the eddy with Sara and crawled up on a rock to catch my breath. I was shaking all over. I smiled and started to laugh. Some kayakers were watching from an eddy opposite of us and I threw up a fist and cheered. They laughed, too, and smiled. I knew I was okay. I thanked Sara for grabbing my paddle and we headed downstream a short way to where Noah and Chancey were stopped. I then realized that Chancey had also swam the rapid. She was okay, but was too shaken up to keep going. She said she wanted to stop, but Noah encouraged her to paddle the short distance to Bald River Falls where she could take out and wait by the road with other people. She agreed, so we started downstream.
(Bald River Falls - This waterfall is not actually a part of the Tellico, but can be seen clearly from the river as it is the last portion of Bald River, which feeds into the Tellico.)
When we came to the inlet of Bald River Falls, I knew I didn't have the strength to carry the funyak up the dangerous route to run the waterfall. I had told Noah before we put on that day that I wanted to run it. Whether or not I would have if I'd not swam Diaper Wiper, I don't know. I'd like to think I would have had the guts; but it didn't matter now. I simply didn't have the strength. Noah didn't ask about it, so we made sure Chancey took out safely and then headed downstream. The next rapid we faced was Jared's Knee, a Class IV.
Jared's Knee was a blur for me. There were three sections to the rapid, and I remember dropping ledges, catching eddies, and hitting holes. It was technical, and I made sure that I followed my friends precisely. To my great joy, I ran all of it clean. Sara did tell me afterward about a large boulder that was undercut, but I didn't know which one she meant and couldn't picture it. It didn't matter now. I had run the Tellico River with only one swim, on the bluest December day I could ask for, with some good friends. I felt both fatigued and invigorated. We took out just above the bridge where we had parked the cars. Noah wanted to do another run, so I changed clothes at the car and got Chancey while the others paddled again. We shuttled Noah's car back to the takeout and made good timing, as we didn't wait long before they were in sight and hauling their kayaks up the bank. By now it was nearly 5 o'clock and the sky was overcast, making it feel a bit more like December. I was dry and cozy in my brown cargo pants, old leather boots, and grey sweater. The others dried off and we all chatted about the river while we snacked on bananas and kettle chips. Once all the gear was loaded, we piled into the cars and headed back to Noah's house. That night I got to go to Bible Study at Todd and Laura's house, dear friends of mine from the church I attend in summer. They live merely ten minutes from Noah. I couldn't imagine a better way to end that day. I spent the night there and the next morning roamed their farm and spent the afternoon visiting some more with Laura and my friend Kristin. When I left Laura's house, I went back to the outpost to drop off Stephen's gear and I spent some more time with Old Man Dave before heading home. I told him all about our run on the river, and he told me about his own adventures in Tellico Plains. If you ever want to sit and listen to a man with stories, go sit on the hill with Dave.
The Tellico River. There was something about it that ignited a flame in my whole being. Though I had funyaked the Ocoee and loved it, the desire to get in a hard boat had never lodged in my heart. But no longer. As I drove home that night, kayaking was all I could think about. Even now kayaking is all I can think about. I'm no longer afraid of rolling; I'm determined to learn. Rafting is not a sport that will ever fall by the wayside for me; I love it too much. But as one sport often leads to another, I know that as long as the Lord allows, kayaking will be my future.
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