Kayaking the Ohanapecosh River - 06.19.2024 - (~1600 CFS)

Definitely one of the most beautiful rivers I have ever seen. I had the great fortune to spend a couple days at the base of Mt. Rainier recently and get on this river for the first time. It was great times with great people. Couldn't recommend it enough.

[@kevinhill.8]

Dope Butcher’s Block line! That one’s tricky to nail. Glad R line at Elbow Room worked out, and I appreciate you sharing the details. You made it look good, though I’m sure that was spooky, esp since it was unintentional. That massive center sieve is no joke!

[@andylozovoy8367]

I'm sure most of you will notice how terribly my line at Elbow Room went. After having decided to run the drop, as I was getting into my boat, I became unsure of my marker indicating where to enter the drop. I got back out of my boat and stood up to get a point of reference. I saw what I thought was the marker I had picked, calibrated, and started to get back in my boat.
However, at river level, I mistook the marker that I had picked while scouting from above for another marker a couple feet to the right. As I headed toward the lip of the drop I realized I was off my line, but it was far too late to stop. I came off the drop WAAAAY further right than I should have been and directly next to a rock which blocked me from immediately trying to get back to the left. After passing the rock and making one quick attempt to head left that was rejected by a hole, I decided I wasn't going to make it and needed to start working on my contingency plan.
I paddled as hard as I could to get as far right as possible within the right channel to avoid the siv. Fortunately, this plan worked and I made my way cleanly down the far right side of the right channel, maintaining enough distance from the siv. I'm very happy, and extremely lucky, to have made it through the drop without incident, but am also disappointed to have misjudged my line and to have put myself in such a risky situation. I like to think that I'm able to make sound and measured decisions while kayaking, but when I got to the bottom of the drop I no longer felt good about the choice I had made. Despite my confidence in being able to run the drop in the way it should be run, it turns out I was not okay with the consequences of a mistake, which is something I should have been, and need to be, able to determine before running the drop.
This experience was extremely humbling and its memory will stick with me for a long time, which I'm ultimately grateful for. I think being mindful of this experience while kayaking in the future will help to more accurately balance my decisions and take stock of not only the risk associated with specific rapids, but the reality of those risks as well. Even if I feel 95% confident in my abilities, I need to have a clear and firm idea of the outcome should something go wrong, because 5% is a small number, but it's not 0%.
I have included the footage of Elbow Room in the video. Although I think most know this, I want to make it clear that, although my line might look pretty clean if you haven't seen the rapid before, there is inherent danger in taking the right channel at Elbow Room and the drop should only be run through the left channel or portaged.

[@lancekayaks]

Great day!

[@andylozovoy8367]

Can’t wait to go back.