1998
A SEASON OF "SPLENDOROUS" SWIMMING
by Dan Monski
YoYo Folks!! The MONKEYBOY spent a lot of time swimming in the whitewater jungle this year. He thinks he finds the jungle water to be as refreshing and invigorating during these swims as the tranquillity described by NEAR-DROWNING VICTIMS when telling their tale! I've heard BAD BOYS say "it's better to stay in your boat and DIE, rather than swim." This may be a little extreme, but I think the basic premise of this statement is true. Most of the swims I have witnessed, talked to others about, read about and experienced myself, all could have been avoided with more time and concentration dedicated to self-rescue in the boat by rolling. The swims were worse than the consequences of staying in their boats and continuing to try to roll. People tend to panic and jump out of the fry pan into the fire. I recommend that you stay in your boat and try rolling again, even if you roll a bit to get a breath of air. You may avoid a swim. BEWARE of heroic tendencies. You may wind up in trouble attempting a foolish rescue.
Let me tell you about a "TAIL" or two to help explain! OH YEAH!! The MONKEYBOY'S a BAD BOY---BIG DOG swinging HIGH through the WHITEWATER JUNGLE! Maybe, I don't know. But I do like swinging high sometimes. Things happen when you're playing with danger. Be careful and avoid messing around unnecessarily. Diverting attention and using poor judgment can lead to an unexpected, costly mistake. Sometimes the vine breaks when swinging through the trees, or your tail loses its grip, and you stumble or fall. But if you don't fall swinging in the trees or down in the water WHAT A RUSH!!!
I think one focus we humans have when pursuing athletic activities is to perform at our best. There are certain clear signs that our "BEST" may have been compromised or undermined somehow, such as flipping over and having to roll. But if you do roll suddenly, that becomes a triumph in and of itself. Another sign of compromise is swimming. The point of knowing how to roll is not having to swim anymore. So swimming can be perceived as not having mastery of all the basics yet. Let me make it clear that this is just PERCEPTION not reality.
I am writing this to offer an alternative excuse for all of the swimmers who have ever swam while paddling (except the Boogie Boy who swims without even getting into a boat. The new BODY SURFIN' BOY'S swims need no excuse).
This past paddling season I swam a whopping FIVE times! The previous year I swam twice. My expectation for this year was to improve by lowering my stats. (In other sports, winners have the highest score. Maybe I was confused at first!) I guess, if I wanted to accomplish that, I should have sat in the eddies and played with my buddy. Sorry, I'm not an eddy flower, and I'm trying to make a point. Swimmers may be those who are pushing their limits and finding the breaking or falling point. This can be true no matter what their skill level.
I was kayaking with a large group of paddlers this past spring on the Baptism River during spring runoff. We had gathered at the first play spot which was a fast surf wave with eddies on both sides from which to enter. There is a rock wall just downstream of the wave that most of the water piles up on, strongly pushing water around to one side, creating this dynamic spinning eddy. If you're in the eddy, you are unable to maintain your position, and you can hardly control your position in relation to the other boaters. When I flipped overI was right on the eddy line in the current after surfing the wave, and I was intending to enter the eddy when I was pushed up against another boater who was struggling with the eddy himself. I attempted to roll, but my paddle and arms were stuck between and below our boats. The water was FREEZING, and I had last remembered seeing the rock wall coming up fast before I flipped. I quickly switched sides to roll on, but I was rolling against the other boat which kept me down. I feared broaching underwater on the rock wall so I wet-exited before I sensed contact with the wall. When I came up, I was spinning into the eddy with no bottom to touch as if I was toilet refuse being flushed. I did finally step on a ledge to get on shore, recover my wits from the cold swim, and get my boat. I felt slightly foolish for swimming without encountering a feature with some action in it. So now I wasted my first swim on an unnecessary circumstance. GREAT---my first score!!
I really wanted to make my next swim worthy of itself, so I traveled all the way to Washington, D. C. to indulge in some Olympic-caliber swimming. I met up with Eric Jackson, BAD BOY Extraordinaire of the U. S. Olympic Canoe and Kayak Team, Rodeo Champion, World Kayak Federation President, and Extreme Race Champion, to run Great Falls of the Potomac River, and paddle to D. C. to watch the Capital fireworks show. WOW! THE BEST SHOW EVER!!
I was doing great, executing moves that E. J. directed and led. He even had me run drops first so he could talk to the others using my run as a lecture example. So he felt confident in my leading the way. We came to a notoriously difficult feature named "The Spout" and scouted the drop. He again asked if I wanted to lead this as he sat and explained to the others about my run. NO PROBLEM, I thought. On some of the previous drops, people had difficulties of some sort. On the rest of the drops, everyone had difficulties---everyone but me! I was saving mine for last. I felt totally comfortable with this feature. It was right up my alley. I believed I had gotten my approach down, plunged over the precipice, and came up at the base of the falls. It felt as if I was under an intense spraying shower, hitting me in the face from my left side. "COOL! I made it." I just had to paddle, and I'd be out. So I began to paddle forward, thinking I was heading towards the far wall, clear of the falls. This is when my belief of success betrayed me. Suddenly I felt the sky falling like a mad crash of sky-blue boulders burying me in the river. It made a horrendous noise as it pounded on my boat deck burying me under the falls. As it turns out, there's a huge boulder on the river right side at the base of the falls. When I came up, I was facing the falls and the water on the river right side of the falls was splashing me in the face so I couldn't see. That is the direction, I THOUGHT, the falls were so if I paddled forward I'd be along the cliff wall on river left at the base of the falls. What I did was paddle directly into the falls and it pounded on meHARD!! I came up fine, but I was in the SAME position, facing the SAME direction, with the SAME amount of visual obscurity. For some reason I was confused by all this, so I paddled forward AGAIN. POW!!---under the falls and less welcome this time. After some heavy pounding I gave up and figured the swim might work better. The falls pounded me hard and whipped me around. I wasn't making contact with any rock or anything, but I wasn't coming up to the surface. For the first time in my kayaking days, I opened my eyes to see where I was and how to get out of trouble. I couldn't cope with darkness any longer. I needed to shed some light on my world! I found myself upside down (I had no idea I had been inverted) and held below the surface. I swam and struggled against time to get to air, but the water was so aerated I couldn't rise near enough to get to the surface. I gagged and took on water (and maybe a few air bubbles) and rose to the surface. By the time I came up and got to shore, the other three paddlers had all gotten in their boats and paddled over the drop. One of them was out of his boat and swimming towards me, and the others were retrieving boats below the falls. I guess I wasn't the only one that didn't make it over the falls. I MUST HAVE been gone a long time to miss all of that! I find it interesting that one moment I'm waving to the camera and the next I'm struggling for my life. It was as if I had walked the plank intentionally. There were no premonitions or warnings. Eric had JUST come back from Rich Weiss's funeral (an Olympic paddler who had died in a kayaking accident) in Colorado the day before. A few hours after my swim, he was to lead a group of paddlers down the Potomac to D. C. for a 4th of July celebration picnic. I thought about the bad timing it would have been for Eric had I not gotten to the surface to breathe when I had.
I'm always looking to the horizon, wondering what's over the next hill, down in the valley, over the ridge, or around the corner. I wonder this whether I'm in a car, flying in a plane or in my kayak. A number of paddlers and I were running the Lower St. Louis River one day. The slot at the rapids called Octopus was being run with a lot of exciting action. Not everyone was doing it---but certainly ALL were entertained by it. There was a beginner who had a nasty grinding swim through the lower section of Octopus after we finished with the slot at the top, so the day had a sourness to it already. But I was fine. I had never done this section at this level, and had only done the Lower St. Louis once before. I had been informed of the necessary routes on the features, so I felt comfortable exploring areas of the river usually unavailable to get to at higher water. I just had to be sure and make the necessary moves when I needed to. I was curious as to why certain slots and channels are not run. I wanted to get a look at these when the river was more revealing at lower water. It would also be easier to maintain my precarious positions of viewing with the water less threatening from reduced velocity and energy in the current. We approached the left channel of the "Swinging Bridge" section. I knew I needed to be FAR, FAR LEFT to run the drop, but I wanted to see why the middle channel was never run. I also wanted to see what features it had. Maybe it could be run. There was a five-foot ridge thrust vertically at a steep angle blocking the view a number of yards above a FORBIDDEN slot. I knew not to go there, but the current was mild, and I have excellent balance, and I'm still a ways above the drop, so I have time to recover in case of a mishap, and I NEEDED to satisfy my curiosity. You know-that "'cuz it was there" stuff. (Hey, Curious George was a monkey, wasn't he!) So I stood up in my boat and cautiously peered over the ridge. What a disappointment! There was no reason to even consider running it---maybe ever. So I slowly lowered my body, easing it into the cockpit, wobbling ever so little PLEASE! Knees that fit TOO tight into the cockpit are hard to balance with. I was having difficulties getting my skirt on after settling in, but after attentive focus and struggle I was sealed in.
I had slipped, further than desired, to the next MICRO eddy edge while getting my skirt on. (I'm calling it an edge because it wasn't any wider than a few inches of slow water, rather than a full-fledged eddy.) My desired crossing was going to be an attainment move now. So I looked around to evaluate my surroundings and saw another narrow slot downstream in the ragged ridge of rock separating the FORBIDDEN slot from the runable slot. It was narrow and just a few feet above the unrun slot, but I felt I could do it if I just kept my forward speed up to cross through the open slot in the rocks, offsetting the downstream flow of the current. I'm facing upstream, sliding backwards, ferrying across and lining up with the slot. At the slot, I intensify my strokes to shoot through to the other side. Just below the undisturbed surface of the water was a "curs-ed" rock, you know, the curs-ed thing that wrecks your whole plan. This PLAN was always one you were so sure of that you hadn't needed an alternative plan. This surprised me so much and happened so fast that I had no way to respond other than leaning over to tuck and kiss the only dry spot on me GOOD BYE! That's right! I had an unexpected route change take place.
There was video footage taken, and you can see when I hit the rock, blocking the slot between the channels, my boat enders as if popping a wheelie, as I glance off the rock and slide backwards towards the FORBIDDEN slot. I looked back over my shoulder, keeping my boat in line with the slot. There in plain view behind me, leaning way over into the slot, was a rock wall positioned as if choking off the chute. The chute does not appear much wider than the boat, but I'm too committed to stop and take measurements. I expect a heavy hit on my back and head, if I don't get wedged, as I drop over the edge towards the rock outcropping below. I quickly formulated a plan. I figured: a heavy blow to the back will knock the wind out of me, so I won't take in water as I gasp for air. A blow to the head will most likely knock me out, also probably cutting my breathing so I won't take in water, helping me survive. It was as good as I could do on such short notice. I leaned forward, narrowing the thickness of space my boat and I occupy and plunged smoothly through the chute. People later said I was buried in water as I went over, as if I fell through the water, rather than riding on top. They said I disappeared through the drop. I never made contact with anything until I pinned at the bottom, wedged under the falls. I was pinned upside down, backwards and facing the falls downwards underwater. I sensed I had stopped and wasn't moving in the turbulence, so I figured I WAS pinned. I feared there may not be enough room to wet-exit, being pinned vertically against the drop, but it was all I could try. As in past swims, after wet-exiting, I didn't come to the surface. I hovered underwater for awhile. Soon I rose to the surface as I cleared the "boil pit" of aerated water. My boat then bobbed a number of times, pinned again and shot out. Through the whole ordeal, I never made direct contact with rocky surfaces---EMERGING UNSCATHED AGAIN!!! Within a few weeks, I returned to the forbidden slot to see how ferocious it really looked. I decided to go ahead and stick my head in this lion's mouth---INTENTIONALLY. This time, facing forward, I triumphed without incident, opening a slot to those--- "risking few".
Hey, I've got an idea! Let's talk about "unnecessary swims". These are swims where a little thought during rescue will prevent the situation from escalating. A group of paddlers were on the Lower St. Louis again and had gotten through the MEAT of "Swinging Bridge", so we're ending our day as we approach one last small drop. I'm up in the channel looking at the rock formations around me, envisioning what it becomes at higher water. The others are ahead of me, going over the small drop. A paddler goes over the drop, and "demonstrates" a set of intense cartwheels to everyone. This caught my eye, so I approach for a better look at the "show". By this time the paddler is being referred to by distress calls as "a swimmer". I see him recirculating again and again, struggling to get out. His boat, float bags and body all litter the hole. There is a paddler JUST out of reach for the swimmer and the hole to get a grip on. I think to myself, "I can swoop down and grab him as he surfaces and drag him out as I pass through the drop. I can do this, probably even without putting on my super hero costume." SORRY BOY! A paddle cannot make you fly. Nevertheless, I proceeded with my plan. I got hold of him, the drop flipped me and pounded me into the hole. His boat was downstream of mine, holding it and itself sideways in the hole. I couldn't recover attempting an Eskimo roll, while being held in the hole, so I wet-exited. I then was pounded out downstream to emerge on the edge of the recirculation. I surfaced along the rock ridge, so I expected to have hand and foot holds to stop myself. I searched, but found it too tall and perfectly smooth without anything to grab. I must have pushed the swimmer out of the hole, only to wind up in it alone myself. I was being sucked back into the hole and couldn't stop. I tried grabbing my still-captive boat and pushing off with it, to no avail. I took another hit in the hole and came up. The whole time I had kept hold of my paddle, so I attempted to paddle my way out---out to freedom! I was a liberated man-and I COULD NOT BELIEVE WHAT I HAD DONE TO MYSELF!! There was a "garage sale" of gear, and my boat was still held as payment to the river gods. We needed to negotiate extraction of these items. Scenes like this are great entertainment to the spectators of the park from their first-class viewing positions on the Swinging Bridge overlooking the rapids. We all took a bow when the show was over, but didn't answer the calls of "Encore! Encore!"
My last swim of the season was on the Upper Gauley River at a spot I had had a close call at the previous day on the river. I tend to squeeze as much as I can out of a river when I'm running it, especially the first time I run it. So I know the play spots when I run the river again. I was running this section the previous day with that Bad Boy Eric Jackson. What a treat to explore and play a new river with the TOP U. S. rodeo boy. I was straggling behind when we were running this one rapid, and I happened upon a dynamic chute with a turbulent eddy behind a wall. It caught my eye as a possible ender or retentive spot so I caught the eddy as I passed. WOW!! It sucked me in, but I held my angle and slid in for some ACTION! BOOM! I got a little, so I hit it again. This time it sucked me in and ate me. It spun me, flipped me and ground me in the turbulent slide and eddy line. I was lucky to roll and get away from the BEAST. The following day I paddled with another group I was familiar with from a past trip to the southeast. For some reason, I decided to try the spot again. As soon as I caught the eddy, it sucked me in. It spun me to the side as it flipped me over, ground me down, pinning me in the eddy line turbulence, like a wrestler pinned to the mat. I couldn't roll! I couldn't even roll enough to catch air at the surface---not on either side. Panic set in as I thought I might be stuck in the hole, so I wet-exited. When I surfaced, I found I was and had been clear of the hole. A paddling companion helping me ashore said I was just in the corner of the eddy line. He told me that the previous day he had seen someone swimming there too. He said he thought it was a "bad spot". It felt like it to me!
This was my fifth and last swim of the season, as it's now too cold to swim any more. My stats are now on public record and final for this season. Next year I'll understand my goal intentions better, and maybe follow my own advice and try to stay in my boat.
*The buddy in kayaking is the handle attached to the sprayskirt pulled on to detach the skirt from the cockpit rim of the boat. (especially important to be familiar with when wet-exiting). They teach you to be familiar with your buddy . It'll save your life if you know how to get out of your boat if you cannot Eskimo roll for some reason.
** Attainment moves in paddling are pursuits of upstream paddling, maybe even uphill if the water feature is a drop with an elevation change to get up.
