Happy Birthday Dad!

Pretty awe inspiring place even if you don't throw yourself off the edge


Lower Mesa Falls

I found these pictures on the internet (we only had one camera and more pics are on the way), but for now you can get a feel for what were talking about here.

Happy Birthday Dad, I love you and hope you had a great day!

So I get a call from Matt on Monday morning asking if I want to tag a long with a group of people that are going to run lower Mesa Falls. I have never ever heard of Lower Mesa Falls before in my life, but it sounds cool, so I commit to the trip. I got online and googled it, and what I saw horrified me. It was a kayaker plunging off the top drop of this two tiered beast of a waterfall. So whatever, we get up the next morning, load up the cars with 6 boats and all of the gear and people neccessary to paddle them. We make the 2 hour haul up into Ashton, and finnally find the overlook of the falls. We walk out to the viewing area, and I see what I have been fearing all morning. A HUGE F*%^*^% waterfall roaring off in the distance!! The mist is higher than the falls, and it is soooo much bigger than it looked on youtube. We park the cars, hike the boats the mile and a half to the river. As we got to the rim of the canyon, we were met with a fairly challenging cliff. So we scaled down and roped the boats up, and somehow everyone and thier gear got down without a hitch.

We eventually made it to the river and got set up. We had the camera up on the rocks to get a good shot of the big drop, saftey after the first drop (not like it would do a damn thing), a saftey boater at the bottom, and me up top getting a first hand account of the horror that was about to take place.

Matt drops the first drop clean, in perfect position for the next one, and dissapears off the horizon. Just a couple really long seconds later, I hear the hoots and hollers downstream. He gets back up top beaming.

Someone asked who was going to go next, and before I knew it the words came out of my mouth saying I'll go. I instantly found myself wondering why I did that. Somehow I managed get myself into my boat, and my boat sitting on top of that little triangle rock in the eddy mere feet from the ledge. Spray in the face, the thundering of the falls, let me tell you, it was as scared as I have been in a long time, and every second of it was awsome. I droped the first drop and nailed it, hit my second line (as well as acouple rocks) and managed to flip upside down and take the remander of the big drop in that position. Lost the paddle on impact and swam. Made it to shore with boat and paddle in hand. I ran it a second time, had a much better line! Had a booty beer for pennance.

Ian from Kentuky went next with a solid top drop, and a super sick line off the right rooster tail. Boofed it clean!

Kevin followed, good first drop, went way left off the second drop, landed flat and suffered a nice little compression as well as putting a few holes in his tounge with his teeth. Maybe a mouthguard next time buddy?

Charlie was next, he stuck his first drop sick, went off the second looking great, buried himself at the bottom, and swam up with a broken paddle.

The sign at the viewing area says the falls are 65 feet. I have heard it is not quite that big, but give or take a few feet, and it is still alot of elevation in not a whole lot of time.

My camera is broken for the time being, so thats why I've been sluggish in the photo department. Kevin took a few shots of lower Mesa so when I recieve his email, I will post them up on here.

frozen pizza, flat screens, and a great dane named bella

View from camp last night

My house on the hill

Well guys...I am indoors! At least for now. I am housesitting for the next week and I plan to take full advantage of the hot water, and refrigeration, and ac, and a bed, and clean clothes and no mosquitos, and not having to cook my food over a campfire, and all of the other amentities that normal folks not living in the forest get to experience on a daily basis. The first thing I did when I got here today (after driving around for an hour trying to find the house) was take a shave, and a hot shower and it was amazing! I sat down with the hot water all the way turned up and enjoyed every second of it. I'm watching Independence Day right now on a huge flat screen, sitting in the ac having a great time. Unfortunatly, I droped my bottle of whiskey on the driveway, I was unable to find a straw and was forced to stand there watching my whiskey pool up on the pavement. I am reminded of my mistake everytime I walk out to the truck now, because the driveway reeks of Evan Williams.


So I was kayaking the Snake the other day and out of nowhere this plane comes screaming through the canyon like 100ft off the deck. Litterally just above my head and it was awsome. It was one of those stunt planes, and it was badass for sure. I've been alternating my paddling between the Gros Ventre, Greys, and the Snake river, the GV and Greys are drying up quick but theres still fun to be had. The hole Taco is still sick, and Big Kahuna is begining to come in, both are easily accessed with trails from the road down to the water, so that is great news in the park and play department.


I met some people the other day, mostly east coast kids working on this ranch. I ended up going to the carnival with them, had a few beers, and a good time. The rides were a little intense for me, but I worked up enough courage for the ferris wheel and although short, it was a good view. They had this demolition derby deal thing, but the cars just race around a dirt track in a figure 8 trying to not smash into each other crossing through the middle. It's things like that, which give me hope for the Pathfinder later on down the line. Which by the way sustained another injury the other day. The muffler pipe is now disconnected from the muffler. I gave my mechanic up in Missoula a jingle and asked him what he thought. He told me just what I wanted to hear and the truck is going to be just fine afterall.

It just started to pour down buckets of rain, were talking thunder, lightning, the whole deal, and the yard is flooding, but I am glad that Mother Nature was able to cut me a little slack and wait for me to find a place to sleep dry before unleashing her wrath.

Everything is great, come on out for a visit and see for yourself.

you call that a knife? Now this is a knife!

I forgot to tell you guys that I found a big buck knife the other day, just laying on the ground. Custom handle, good blade, a bit intimidating and it even has a leather sheath to stick it in. It spreads peanut butter, cuts rope, and I even gave a couple throws towards a tree, and it has good balance to it. A great find all the way around. I camped out on Greys again, went fishing in this huge hole a little ways downstream of snaggle tooth. I could see the fish, but I just couldn't catch them. Lucky enough some guys were fishing and they caught acouple, and gave me one to fry up for dinner. I think I'm going to change tactics now...I made a little fishing contraption like they use down in costa rica and I stuck a hook and a worm on it, and my first cast I got a bite. I only dug up one worm, so it was shortlived, but it was a good lesson. When fishing for food, use a worm and a hook, and leave fly fishing to be figured out when dinner isn't on the line.

I boated the Snake daily yesterday, had my fill playing around in Taco and had an easy shuttle back to the truck. Thinking about the Gros Ventre this afternoon...Maybe more worm fishing too! I start housesitting Saturday, so I only have another 2 days before I can clean out the truck. Rachel said I can stash some stuff in her garage in Dubois so between getting a good cleaning and droping a little weight, I'm going to have a happy truck here pretty quick. Everything is good.

we can't have it all...or can we?

I caught my first fish here in Wyoming...But not if fish and game are asking. If there asking, I haven't fished since I've been here. I was up this little creek, (the same little creek where I hooked myself in the eyelid) fishing this little hole, and end up pulling a little Brown Trout out. Didn't eat it, but I crossed over a barrier in the fly fishing world for sure. The weather has been beautiful during the day, and cool and clear at night (perfect for sleeping mosquito free).

So I'm applying for jobs and all that..and on the applications they want an address. (Go figure..) So I go to the Post Office to get a PO Box and they tell me I need an address for that too... Still trying to figure this one out, but my best idea so far is to go to the homeless shelter and see if I can use thier address. I am having some pride issues with that, so we will see how it turns out. Any thoughts??

Ok, so it wasn't a life changing experience or anything, but it's a good story and I'm going to do my best to tell you about it. Friday afternoon I am napping in my hammock in a nice spot, in between 2 trees right on the river. I hear voices and look up to see a kayak, a canoe, and a raft float by. We exchange greetings and they continue down the river. That was all the motivation that I needed. So I packed up camp and set off to drive down the street to run the lower Gros Ventre. I drop my boat off, run my shuttle, and then get picked up by a suburban full of girls, get droped at the put in, and paddle the run bymyself. The water is sooo much lower than the last time I ran it. Anyway, I have a good run, debating whether or not to go again, decide not too and I take my gear off. About that time a caravan of rafters, canoeers, and a kayaker shows up. The same people I saw floating from my hammock. So I get my gear back on, hitch a ride up, and end up doing 2 more laps with these people. Were having beers in the warm springs afterwards and this dude in a Breedlove guitar tour bus shows up. (A bit out of place in the wilderness if you ask me) Anyway, we introduce ourselves and start talking. A bison comes to soak in the warm springs, so we called it good and move to the parking lot for another beer. Eventually Somer (the raft chick) heads back towards town and the rest of us set off to go make camp. So with Phil and Thad from Utah, and Brandon in the tour bus in tow, we set off to find a spot to accomidate a 50 ft fully loaded tour bus full of thousand dollar guitars. It doesnt take long to find a good camp site, and we get dinner going and were just hanging out over a few beers...well that turns to whiskey and before long its 2am and time for bed.

The next morning we wake up and go meet up with Somer and her friend, and we get Brandon all geared up and shove the boat off down the creek. We have a good run, and then go to meet Phil and Thads' friend. We get Brandon geared up and stick him in a kayak this time and try to teach him how to roll. We do the snake daily run and it turns into an all day ordeal. I mean, were talking complete junkshow! Between the booze, the inexperience and the messing around, we spent most of the day chasing down runaway canoes and kayaks. This hydrolic they call Taco is in now, and it is awsome. Just a munching, retentive, almost 0 consequence, half river wide hydrolic. So Phil paddles his canoe in for the surf. Quickly gets gobbled up and he's out of his boat, just getting worked in the hole. I paddle into the hole to try and help. So here I am side surfing this hole, Phils canoe is just getting recirculated back in the hole and Phil is taking a decent beating, comming up long enough for a breath and getting sucked back under. So I'm in the hole in my kayak, holding on to Phils canoe (not real sure of how to fix this problem), Phil is getting thrashed appearing for a half second at a time, and then all of a sudden he's gone, and he is not comming back up... I start thinking that he's screwed and I'm going to have to go for a swim to go find him in the whitewash, but then he gets spit out downstream. Anyway, Phil is safe but his 11 ft boat is still stuck in the hole, with me holding on for dear life trying not to flip my own kayak over in the process. Eventually the canoe and I get worked free and everyone has a good laugh on the bank. Somer decides to give it a shot in her raft with Brandon. Those two get worked for a while too, but there ok. I surf the hole with another kayaker for a bit and then we continue down stream. We stoped for a bit in a big eddy and I tried paddling and rolling one of the 2 whitewater canoes. I can paddle just fine...it's the rolling back over that is tricky. It doesn't make much sense to me why someone would canoe when they could kayak (especially with the drawbacks of a canoe, but whatever, to each his own. We end up meeting another raft full of people floating down and they feed us more booze and eventually end up giving us a ride back to the trucks. That night, Somer, Phil, Thad, thier Buddy from Utah, Brandon in the tour bus, and me all camp out along the Greys. We all dig around in our food boxes and come up with an excellent dinner. (desert was a trout Brandon caught minutes prior). I cleared the 10 guitars out of Brandons shower in the bus, and he let me take my first hot shower in 3 weeks. Slammed a pbr mid shower and got out feeling like a million bucks. The rest of the evening was spent by the river, hanging around the fire, under the stars, in great company, and listening to Phil and his buddy playing music on 2 of Brandons 50 something guitars. After a long day on the river, it was a close to perfect ending. Brandon traded Thad a guitar for a kayak and it was a great trade all the way around. Brandon is hooked! Since technically he is supposed to be touring around publicizing Breedlove Guitars not bumming around with a bunch of boaters, he had to take off yesterday, but we talked him into staying and showing up in Idaho late, and he left early this morning before the sun. When the rest of us woke up this morning, we made some coffee and ran Greys again. Everyone had messeges on thier phones from thier jobs (being monday morning and all) and everyone decided it would be best to head back home and back to thier jobs.

It was a great weekend with a great crew of people and the plan is to all hang out again soon. It was pretty hilarious by the end of it. 1 car, 2 trucks, my pathfinder, and a 50 ft tour bus with all the ammentities driving around the wilderness looking for campsites and whitewater. Its pretty cool how no one knew each other prior, everyone was just doing thier own thing, and somehow we all managed to meet up and have an amazing weekend. We are all going to stay in touch and with any luck go boat with each other again in the near future. Plans are already underway.

Happy Birthday Truck!

Well guys, she made it! The big 184,000. She's traveled across the country , up and down, back and forth,this way and that way, up the mountains, through the rivers, and truly through the woods. She has got the wounds to prove it, but she is a great truck with tons of fight left in her.

In other news, Lunchcounter has been out of control for the last week. I have been switching back and forth between board and boat, and having a blast either way. There have been more surfers as the flow has droped, and it's too low for kayaking now, but it was sooo good while it lasted. I showed up ready to jump in my kayak and surf yesterday, met Russel from Utah and decided to paddle the run instead. Surfed when we floated down but just kept getting blown off the back. No pile, just a big green wave. After we ran the shuttle though, I cam back and surfed it with the board and had a few good waves. The run seems like it will improve with a little less water, but as far as Lunchcounter goes, not again until next year!

I have been camping out up in Curtis Canyon. Took a bath in the creek last night. In this dammed up pool. Was numbingly cold, but extremely refreshing after I had my sweats on. Bought some chicken from the store and grilled that up, and it was a nice change of diet. I also bought a tupperware thing the other day, and now I can save leftovers, which is nice not having to eat everything I cook right away. Had a whiskey and fell asleep in the hammock by the fire under a clear night sky.

Not sure whats in store for the weekend, but at the very least it's time I figure out how to catch a fish. I saw some guys sticking thier hands down in the river rocks trying to pull fish out, apparently they got some earlier, but I did'nt see it. But it's something to think about!