Eastern Canada Trip – Volume 2

click here to download the Lachine/Gatineau Video

Music on the video is by Despistado courtesy of JadeTree.com

50 feet. That’s a really tall height. 60 degrees. That’s a really warm temperature. 25,000 CFS. That's a lot of water. Keen observations no doubt and merely a sampling of the knowledge that Chris has bestowed upon me thus far on our trip. Being a man of little formal education I am very thankful for all of Chris’ college. There's no doubt in my mind that he aced sarcasm class. Seriously, Chris is a real intelligent guy with a lot to offer on and off the water. That whipper-snapper is a much better paddler than myself, and I learn a lot from him every time we’re on the water. Enough about that cracka’. Let’s talk chicken soup.

As we had planned, on Friday we went out to Lachines on the St Lawrence. This river is certainly all it’s cracked up to be. I can’t believe I’ve never been there. Mistaaaake! I’m definitely going back. Video of this place really makes it look good but it’s just not the same effect as the real experience. There are three or four waves you can surf so if there is a crowd everyone isn’t always waiting on the same spot. Pyramid and Big Joe would be the best two waves you can surf and paddle back to most easily. Apparently the best way to surf there is to go with jet boat or jet ski assistance. We left our jet ski at home with our hover craft and the batmobile. Can’t forget that next time. It was either my camp stove or the jet ski. Don’t leave me in charge of packing next time. So, we went with the olden method of catching eddies and paddling back up. How barbaric!
Chris does a helix on Pyramid wave

I did a back blunt. wowee!

click here to download a small video clip of a couple moves we did at Lachines.

Understand that the St Lawrence is the largest river in North America, serving as drainage for the great lakes. The channel that these waves are in is the “small” channel, separated by islands from the rest of the river. And this part is like a mile wide, the small side. So that explains why you have a bit of a trek back up when you wash off the wave. Ropes, anchored to rocks, have been placed here and there to make the eddie hop possible without getting out of your boat. Great experience though. Montreal residents definitely have it made for play boating.

Saturday, May 21, we paddled the Gatineau with a cool crew of guys from the Ottawa area. The Gatineau River is another large body of water flowing from Quebec, and South, dumping into the Ottawa. The water is very tanic looking, almost black, really pretty.
About four to five miles long, this river barely missed a good opportunity of being a lake. But, with five or six good rapids in between the pools (lakes) we’ll let it squeeze into the river category. The level was 16 feet and a couple of the rapids included some nice waves. La Haute Tension (High Tension), the real reason we went to the Gatineau, is the most desirable wave. Located about mid way through the run we found this wave, but the water was too low. All that was there was a mean looking hole that we didn’t surf. If you want to see what High Tension wave looks like click this link to download a video. Chris got sponsored by Necky two years ago. This was his first day in his Vibe. Poor baby. Okay, proceeed!!! L’Anus De Lucifer, the first rapid, had a nice wave at the top.
Oneself doing a blunt there.

Le Mur, the next to last rapid, had a really nice wave at the top of it as well.
Chris does a nice aerial back blunt.

I washed on this one but hhheeehhhawww!

When you washed off the wave you went through this hole. There were a couple nice beatings there.

click here to download a small video clip of a couple moves we did at the Gatineau.

We walked back up and surfed the wave at Le Mur several times getting some decent tricks on a couple of the rides. Chris’ left hand smelled like fish at the takeout. Hm? Cool river though. Highly recommendable. Thanks to brothers ,Gilles and Rich Durepos, and their friends Bruce, Mark and Dave, for showing us down the river.
This is the pasture at the takeout. We grazed here for a couple hours after our paddle. It's a delicious blend of kentucky rye and crab grass.

We’re off to the Ottawa now. More posts coming soon. Wing ding ding dang diddly doo.

C eh, N eh, D eh. What do you got? CANADA!

Click here to download our first video installment of the trip, edited by Chris. This file is in Quicktime format, 16.3mb. PC and Mac users both should have no problem downloading and viewing this format. Music on the video is by Statistics
Also, the videos from the last two posts have been updated and should now be viewable by PC or Mac. Links are at bottom of this post to save you some navigation time.

Tuesday, May 17
Chris G and I departed my house in Fairview NC at 7:30am for our, hopefully, grand adventure to Eastern Canada.
Here is the truck all packed up in the driveway.

To cut short the suspense we have made it here and the adventure has been quite grand so far. Before I go any further I should say that Chris is a full time wise guy, therefore I have the pleasure of being mocked over nearly every word that comes out of my mouth. We have become good enough friends now that he feels that he should compliment me with the same annoying torture that he might inflict onto his younger brother or sisters. He’s a good guy though so I do take it as a compliment and don’t often crack under the pressure of his childish irritations and physically abuse him. If you ever meet him and he treats you the same it’s probably because he likes you, so don’t get too upset.

Back to the road: We cranked out about thirteen hours on I-81 and stopped in for a visit and night’s sleep with my good friend Dakota Potenza in Ithaca, NY. We didn’t really sleep with Dakota, but near him. Well, not near him physically but in a room next to him. I’m glad we got that issue cleared up. After a good night’s sleep we ate some instant oatmeal and headed a couple hours up the road to the Black River in Watertown, NY, where we took a short park and play hiatus from the drive at Hole Brothers play spot.
On the way we stopped at this waterfall, Taughannock Falls to take a look. It was quite immense.

Hole Brothers is a fun play spot where nearly every move is possible. I would absolutely love to have a spot like this close to my home. It’s not the largest or most dynamic spot, but really fun. I think a couple shots from there are in the video.
Us at Hole Brothers in New York. I think they should get with the times and rename it Hole Bras.

Here's the brotherly hole itself.

Onward with the journey, we crossed the border into Ontario, knocking out the last three hours of driving. Into Quebec, we stopped in a town just East of Montreal called Chambly, which is where we remain two days later. The Richelieu River flows through Chambly before it dumps into the St Lawrence. Richelieu is a pretty big river by my standards. Probably about 10-15,000 cfs of flow. I could be way off on that. Anyway, enough volume to form a two really fun waves where we paddled for a couple hours upon our arrival on Wednesday evening. We had an all day session on Thursday too. A local paddler named Francois (Frank) Bergeron showed us over here and paddled with us both days. He paddles a Vibe and is also in the video. There is one wave here that is about 3-4 feet tall and another one, which is a bit smaller.
Me on the top wave.

Chris on the bottom wave.

Both waves are pretty fast but very friendly. The Orbit Fish is incredible on these waves. So fast. This boat is noticeably faster than saaaaay…greased lightening, the gestation period of a rabbit, a ninja, or anything in between. We can’t wait to head over to Montreal today to surf at Lachine, which is supposed to be about twice the size, Twice the size of what you might ask? Maybe twice the size of a Holstein cow, or Uranus. ?? Anyway, the bros told us the wave was like 50 feet tall or something.

So take a gander at our video footage from Chambly. It was a real hoot and if you're ever around Montreal it is worthwhile to go surf there if it's going. PC and Mac users both should have no problem viewing this video in Quicktime format.

16.3mb
Music on the video is by Statistics

As mentioned at the top, each of the videos from the last two posts have been updated and should be viewable by PC or Mac now. Here are the links:
Music on the video is by Crux Commercial
Music on the video is by Team Necky May Memo
Music on the video is by Marc Girardin Strikes Again

Team Necky May Memo...we got the memo

Sorry to any PC users. You won't be able to view the videos because it is in a Quicktime 7 format. Quicktime 7 isn't available yet for PCs, just Macs. We will change the past three videos we put on here as soon as possible so everyone can view. All future posts should be viewable for all computers with Quicktime 6 installed.

14.6mb Quicktime 7 file.
click here to download the Team Necky May Memo video.

Music on this video is by Clutch, from their latest album “Blast Tyrant” www.Pro-Rock.com

Well, May has been pretty good to us so far, we’ve been able to paddle quite a bit, and the coolest part is that we’ve been able to paddle together as a team a lot as well. It’s often hard for us to coordinate our schedules between working, school, and our lives as secret agents.

We’d like to just say thanks to everyone who’s been viewing the blog and the new Team Necky site. We’ve been blown away by the response, and we hope you’ll keep coming back.

Here we have several photos shot by Spencer, Chris, and Myself, and a video of highlights put together by Spencer. Spencer does a majority of the editing of the videos on this site, through his company Effort, Inc…and if he didn’t edit a particular clip, odds are it was still shot with his video camera.

In the video you will see footy from:

The Green: Chris and Spe hit the Green several times this month, it’s breathtaking this time of year. Since there is so much interest in the Green these days we labeled each of the rapids on this part of the video, in case anyone who hasn’t been there wants to know more.

Triple Drop: click here to look at my Triple Drop photo gallery and here to look at Spence’s Triple Drop photo gallery.
Here is Chris G skying off of the first drop.

The three of us went to Triple Falls on the Little River in Dupont Forest, NC. Triple Falls is a really cool set of....you guessed it….three drops. The top drop is two tiered. The second drop is pretty much vertical, with a little kicker thing near the bottom that often launches you out into the air. I suppose the second drop is about 35 feet, with a clean landing spot. We didn’t run the third drop, as it was a little low for it, but its good to go as well. This was my first time running these fun drops, which are upstream of the infamous Hooker Falls. American Whitewater recently helped make running these waterfalls legal, as it was against the law just over a year ago.

For those of you who are skeptical about the Shock Stop system in the Crux, I put it to the test on this day. I pitoned really hard off the first part of drop 1. Although it was a hard hit, I really think the springs in the bulkhead worked, as neither I, nor my boat suffered any noticeable damage.

We must of run the second drop 7 or 8 times each, including two blue-angel runs (during the second of which Chris G almost got a Crux in the butt).

Saluda River: Click here to look at Spence’s Saluda photo gallery.
Here are Chris G and Joey before running the old mill on river right at high water.

And here they are running it.

The Saluda, in Columbia SC, has been running quite a bit this spring. Chris G and myself paddle here quite a bit, and at various water levels some really fun features form. Over the past couple of weeks we’ve gotten Spencer interested in the many small playspots that the Slauda has to offer, and he’s been tearing them all to pieces several times. Its an often overlooked river, it’s in my back yard and it’s a great place to play after work. The clips in the video are from a 10-11,000cfs release, and features the infamous Chicken Wing.

Some extras:
Click here to view a few photos from our last session at Secret Spot on the Nolichucky.

Also here is our new Crux commercial that will be featured in the next LVM click here to download.

Music on Crux commercial is by Despistado www.JadeTree.com

Well I think that’s it. Thanks again for all the hits, and please come back and check out more photos and video soon. Chris G and Spencer are heading to Eastern Canada this week so they should be posting some reports from their trip around Montreal and the Ottawa area.

jHo

Marc Girardin strikes again!

4 sick photos of Marc surfing his Orbit Fish. Click HERE to view.

This guy is awesome. Marc keeps getting awesome footage and photos in his Orbit Fish. I see why he got second in the world this year.

Here are a few words from Marc that he sent with the clips.

"I was looking for a wave to test my new Orbit Fish." I guess he got a new green one cause he had a red one before. "I called up a few buddies to find if there were any good waves going in France right now. As I found out, with a good water level, "the flipflap" in Pyrenees was really pretty, a little fast, powerful, and green... and that this wave works really well with the Orbit Fish ."

This video is a Quicktime 7 file - 6.2mb. If you don't have Quicktime 7 you probably can't view this.
Click HERE or on the photo to view Marc's new video.