The next big step

My moms birthday seemed like an unlikely day to take Florence to the river but she insisted so after looking around for trailer parts and fussing in the garage until 12:30pm we headed off the the Skaget river. The Skaget flows out of the Cascade Mountains in between Seattle and British Colombia. The views are amazing, snow caped mountains, glacial blue water, a perfect place for a test float. After much discussion and some reconnaissance flights in the RV

we decided to put in at the Cascade river bridge off the N Cascade Highway and take out at the Rockport Campground . The gauge level was on the 12600CFS according to AW this is 600cfs to high, not true, it was a fantastic level. Big fun boily water fast eddy lines and fun class II moves. Perfect for seeing what Florence can do.

Lea and i forgot to bring the camera on the float with us, but we did remember the beer and wine so it was ok. There is a brief video to give an idea of the speed of the water.

We had a great time playing around on the strong eddy lines and I was able to catch some really small strong ones, I am sure this will come in handy as we run harder and harder water.  Of course I also sought out the hardest lines on this modest class II trying to make it III-IV. I was able to scare Lea a couple of times so that feat good. Then before we knew it it was all over.

This has been one of the most satisfying projects I have taken on. Is it perfect? Not at all, its not even really completely finished, but that's life. From the moment I decided to build this boat in Aprill 2011 on the Grand Canyon until today I wouldn't have it any other way. Thanks to everyone who put up with me during this project, and thanks to Florence Catherine Skemp (Jun 9, 1912-April 12, 2011 ) for inspiring the whole project, I'll think of you every time I'm out in your boat.