Leif and Natalie

Mist rising off the river just below putin, at dawn on race day This weekend, Natalie and I headed up to the 2009 Gore Canyon race. I had just finished the three day drive back from the Slave, but somehow I ended up driving late into the night to get us there. We woke up early in hopes of getting a practice run in before the noon start of the race, since neither of us had run Gore since last year. However, the putin was deserted, and while we were hanging out making breakfast, a ranger showed up and politely informed us that there was no parking at putin until after the race was over. We packed up and headed to the takeout, which was a complete zoo. It was probably a good thing that we went to takeout, since we got to attend the racers' meeting and, you know, register and stuff. Of course, there was a lot of sitting around waiting for shuttles and such, but by about 12:00 we were back at the putin again, ready to paddle a few miles of flatwater and then RACE. The race went we

Rollercoaster is a pretty nice, friendly wave in the Cassette rapids here on the Slave river. It's got some size to it, so large moves are not impossible, but it isn't too violent or trashy. The eddy is a little boring, due to the large distance that you have to paddle, but hey, at least you don't have to hike. We were lucky enough to get quite a few days there this year, as the levels changed around. Well, I'm not writing a guidebook here. I'll just let the photos speak for themselves. Begin photo dump!

Yes, I am still here. While I've been up here on the Slave, Natalie has been running all over the place, kicking ass at races , and posting libellous blog articles about me. But I'm not taking it sitting down. I've had a few adventures of my own. So many, in fact, that I haven't even had time to brag about them. Times have been crazy indeed. Since it's dark outside, it must be near midnight (since I'm in the Northwest Territories), so I'll just throw up a bunch of photos. Pow, enjoy. Maybe later I'll throw together some rollercoaster photos. If I feel like it.

I womped on good number of guy paddlers this last weekend at the Gnarrows Race on the Cache La Poudre to come in 4th out of 18 paddlers. For a complete pre-race to post race shit talk fest visit http://www.mountainbuzz.com/forums/f11/gnarrows-race-2009-a-26676.html The gnarrows race is hands down the best and most fun boater X ever. This low key event is attended by locals and is not an official event. There are no entry fees, no bibs, just plain old fun. The preliminaries are usually held in heats of four or five and the racers paddle from upper narrows all the way down through lower narrows, it is exhausting! The top two paddlers advance. Kevin, whom I call fancy no pants due to the fact that he was wearing a leopard print thong for the event, almost caught up to me on the last drop of narrows, but I eeked through to semi-finals. Semi finals and finals are held just on lower narrows. The key to winning these heats is to jockey for a good starting position. I had crappy star