The first week in August, I went to the Ottawa River. It's about 250 miles west of Montreal. My friends Bryan, Chris and I left Wednesday night, under cover of darkness. The first order of business was figuring out if we should bring party favors. We decided not to cross the border with anything illegal, so we stashed some on the American side, before the Canadian. That turned out to be a great idea for the ride home.

After nine hours of driving, we arrived Thursday morning around five in the morning and set up camp at River Runners Campground. We passed out and awoke about ten thirty, ready to saddle-up. After a couple of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches we were ready to go.

The water felt warm as we paddled across the lake to the first set of rapids. We got out of our boats to scout the first horizon line. We peeked our heads through the trees to get a good look at the river and to our surprise we saw an almost river-wide drop on river-left. The pourover was just above a beefy hydraulic on river-right. Local paddlers call the hydraulic Phil's Hole. Perhaps OH SHIT would have been a better name. Phil's Hole and the pourover overlapped. If we were to run safely past Phil's, we'd have to come in on a diagonal and paddle like hell to shoot the small gap in between. Chris, Bryan and I walked back to our boats, hopped in, adjusted our backbands, sealed ourselves in, and down we went. I went first, Bryan second, and Chris last. Everything went smoothly until we passed the river-left pourover. That's when Phil's Hole caught us in its tractor beam. Into Phil's Hole we went, one after the other. I could feel Phi's gravity pulling me in; I knew I wouldn't make it. I paddled hard right into OH SHIT, dropped my downstream edge, angled my boat slightly to catch more greenwater and leaned forward to punch through the hole as I dug in with my paddle. I passed under the whitewash and resurfaced downstream. I looked back for Bryan and Chris, but they didn't have the same luck. They both got worked in Phil's Hole for a while. Bryan eventually flushed out, but Chris didn't have the same luck. He couldn't get out of the whitewash and ended up swimming. It still wasn't over for Chris; he was pushed around the outside of the river-bend, where it was shallow and rocky. He got banged up against the rocks before reuniting with his boat and paddle at the bottom of the rapid, a great start to our three-day trip.

The afternoon went a bit more smoothly, at least for me. The Ottawa River has two main channels. Main Channel has the biggest water and world-class waves like Garburator and Bus Eater. Center Channel has some tamer rapids, except for a river-wide waterfall called Garvin's Chute, the most dangerous feature on the whole river. On day one, we missed the entrance to Main Channel and went down Middle Channel. Around lunchtime, we met up with a couple of local Canadians who took us down the rapids on Center Channel. About two miles into the paddle, we noticed another horizon line and began hearing a distant rumble. As we approached, the rumble turned into a thunderous roar and mist kicked high into the sky. It was like standing next to an airplane about to take off. We got out of our kayaks and scouted ahead. The Canadians portaged around. We climbed around the gorge and came up on a riverwide waterfall. It was about twenty feet high, with a two stage drop of about ten and ten more feet. The river charged over the falls, white and boiling with force. Our eyes searched for a clean line, but we found none. There was a rock called Dragon's Tongue at the lip of what resembled to be the cleanest line. Dragon's Tongue acts like a ski jump, adding kick as you pass over. It leads right into the jaws of the second drop. The Canadians mentioned that almost everyone portages around Garvin's Chute.

I looked at Bryan, it looked like he was actually contemplating running the boiling torrent. He looked back and said, \"I'm gonna do it, will you run safety?\" \"I got you,\" I said a bit worried because his line of decent was pretty far from the riverbank. Bryan asked, \"You gonna run it?\" I decided at that split moment that I was game.

Bryan came down through the tongue at a good angle and decent speed. He hit Dragon's Tongue, landed on the second tier, and flew down the last drop, where he was stopped dead in his tracks by a rock and the backflow of the re-circulation. He got pushed into a sidesurf in the hole. He was caught on the line in death-brace, trying to pull himself out. It had a real good grasp on him. Bryan boat was being sucked under and just as I was about the throw the rescue rope, he finally came free. \"NICE ONE BRYAN,\" I yelled, relieved that he was out. \"You goin'?\" he asked. \"Fuckin' Huck-IT,\" I yelled back.

As I came up to the falls, white mist filled air and her roar passed through my chest. I lined up my boat and committed to my line. As I approached the lip, I made a split second decision to change my line. I edged my kayak, leaned left, and paddled hard. I ran more left, which also meant away from the riverbank and out of reach of the throw rope. I aimed to clear Garvin's Chute in one move, skipping the second tier. I had enough speed coming over Dragon's Tongue that I cleared the length of falls and made a landing out in the middle of the falls. I looked back to see Bryan and Chris give me the thumbs up. We met at the base of the falls and looked at the footage Chris recorded on his video camera. After Garvin's Chute, the day was about as laid back as it gets. We went through some more rapids, none as challenging as Garvin's Chute.

As we neared the end of our first days paddle, we came across a bend in the river, where the rock wall formed large whirlpools. What a great spot, we played around for quite some time until I decided to hop in and swim. I waited for a nice surge to come off the peninsula and jumped in. Down, down, down, I spun. I saw small bubbles trailing down from the surface through the splintered sunlight, as my hair whirled around my face. Down I sank quietly and gently before I came up downriver. Bryan jumped in next and had a ride. Chris jumped in head first and sank to the bottom. He came up way down river saying his helmet filled with water and pulled him all the way to the bottom. Good times had by all.

After a long day of riverplay, we took out on the riverbank. We hiked steeply up to the main road only to see a sign for our campsite, \"River Runners Campsite 200 meters.\" We walked the two hundred meters to the campsite entrance and flirted with the hot girl working the entrance booth. Meanwhile, Chris shuttled back up to his truck. When we got back to our campsite we had some important business to take care of, we drank beer and hung our gear up to dry. Later that evening, we met some great people, ate good food, and sat around the campfire drinking beer until we were in the bag.

The next two days would prove more challenging, more fun, and full of surprises. The second day, Bryan ended up getting trashed again in Phil's Hole. But this time a second boat came down on top of him. Both boats were in for the tumble cycle. I gave up on passing the hole and punched though, like the day before. Chris chose to portage around.

The third day Bryan and this guy Rich felt lucky, don't ask me why, they ran Phil's Hole without scouting ahead. It was running at a different water level, so I got out and had a look. Phil's Hole looked squirrelly. The water wasn't pushing through as hard as the day before. It would be harder to punch through, so I ran a \"sneak route\" called Hero, just right of Phil's Hole. Six more inches to the left, I would have been in for the ride of my life into the beefiest part of Phil's Hole. I made the crux move above Phil's and made a clean pass within arms reach of Phil's Hole. I made it through but Bryan and Rich didn't follow my line. They tried punching through Phil's and didn't make it. They were in there together for a while. Finally, Bryan popped out and paddled over to me on the riverbank. I was still waiting for Rich to flush out. Rich was still getting worked. As we were about to set a rescue line, Rich finally flushed out of the hole and out of his boat. I signaled for Bryan to get Rich while I went for his boat and paddle.

The rest of days two and three were great. We ran some big rapids and playboated on Garburator.

The ride home was great. We planted more party favors on the Canadian side of the United States border for our next trip back up to Canada. After we passed the US border, we drove to our stash in the United States. We drove home happy, with a few new bruises, squinty eyes and permasmiles. What a trip!

Here is a link to an Ottawa River Web-Tour:
www.ottawakayak.com/theriver.php?page_id=25

Hey Boe, why don't you put this up on your Playak Blog? You've got three entries already so you know how to do it. Then you can throw in a couple of pics too and/or some video. That would be cool.

It will also show up on the Playak front page and therefore reach a greater audience than via the forums. Anything on the front page is also sent through the newsletter to a large number of people too! Let me know. Then we can delete this post. Thanks..