Day #27, Oh Be Joyful!!!

WOW. Oh Be Joyful was everything it has been hyped up to be......it is SOOOOO steep. It is 1mile long and drops a total of 400 feet! Holy cow!!


We got to Crestted Butte about 2:00 am and camped right down from OBJ. We waited until noon for our friend Ian to drive up and then proceeded to hike up to scout everything. It was a pleasant surprise to see alot of SE boaters out at OBJ. Will and Alex from NC, Keith Yell and crew from AL, Jeff West and his TVF crew and a guy Nick who I met at the Ocoee were all there. Ian and I were super excited so we headed up ahead of Edgar to scout and talk to Jeff West and his crew. Jeff and crew were on lap 10 by the time we met up with them! We were told by Jeff and others (Will) that the river was at a medium -low level and was good to go, but was dishing out some boat abuse. I think we saw three or four broken boats at the campground from different folks. Ian and I scouted it and got some more beta from other folks but couldn't find Edgar. In the interest of brevity we ended up putting on at 5:00 pm, which was good and sort of bad. It was good because Jeff West and his crew offered to take us down. Bad because now the water was higher and it was everyone's (Edgar, Ian and myself) first time. All the rapids were A LOT bigger than what we saw earlier during our scouting. All the waiting around about killed me. I was already nervous, but excited as well. The sitting around all day looking at a big steep river can play games with your head. ;) We were ready, so off we went..........



We divided into two groups. David Levitt, Ian and myself were the first group and Jeff West, Edgar and Nick were the second group. David by the way was awesome. I had bumped into him a few times at the Green and at the Ocoee, but never really got a chance to talk with him. He is a super awesome guy and was really glad I finally got to paddle with him. The river started off with a bang. I peeled out of an eddy and 10 feet later I was dropping off an 18 foot water fall. It was super sweet. All the drops on OBJ have flakes at the lip, which makes for great boofs. After the 18 footer there was some boogie water with a couple of small boofs and then a 15 footer into a funky hole, which flipped me! Ugh! After the 15 footer we had more boogie water, small slides and boofs and then the bottom drops out! The river takes an S-turn into a 25 foot water fall. I boofed it like no other. Wow, it felt so good. I landed nice and solid and was totally pumped up. After the 25 footer there were more steep slides and boofs. Then the bottom drops out again! The big slide is Avalanche, which is huge and long! I dropped into the left side and had a great line all the way down. Unfortunately one person in our group pitoned at the end and now has a basketball size dent in the front of his boat. Ouch! We went through a couple of log jams.......very sketchy. We made our way down to the last two drops. The first one was center left line, but the last one we were told to go left. The center and right line go, but not very well. Oh, and Jeff told us he flipped there earlier in the day and tore up his hand. If Jeff West gets flipped by a rapid then it has my attention more than normal! Everything was going well until I got a little off line on the second to last drop and went into the bottom hole sideways. Not good. I surfed my butt off for a couple of minutes (literally) and almost got out three times. On that third "almost out move" I got window-shaded like no other and my left leg came out of my thigh brace. I was out of the hole......I thouht....I went for a roll, but was getting pounded by rocks and water and couldn't get up and over. I reached for my grab loop but could not get to it and hit something else and then I was able to pull my skirt and get out of my boat. I went down the entire last drop on my back and butt and then fell into a big hole. Ouch! I was exhausted and hurting. I have never taking a beating like that before. Everyone was able to get my gear and get me to shore. My back was really soar as well as my butt. I paddled to the take out and went to camp to lick my wounds.


My back and butt now have a huge bruise and a bunch of swelling. It felt worse in the morning. I was having trouble walking, so to be safe I went get x-rays. Nothing is broken. Thank goodness. Doctor said no kayaking for a few days. We'll see how that goes. ;)


I am a bit miffed about swimming. I think everyone who knows me knows that I am very competitive and very serious about my kayaking. I am doing my best not to be too hard on myself. I am trying to remind myself of something that a very good kayaker once told me, that "everyone is in between swims".


All in all it was a great river. Two HUGE thumbs up. I have never done something so big and so steep. I had a ton of fun despite the swim and would LOVE to go back and do OBJ again. We may head to Salida to take it easy and heal, so maybe next week. We'll see how the back feels.


Jason