Several paddlers enjoyed a full afternoon of skills instruction at the CCA's OC1 river-running clinic Aug.18 on the Lower Yough. The club collaborated with Calleva and Jordan Taylor's Paddlesport Institute to make this event available to members. Jordan, assisted by Laura Kurup, led the clinic in which Larry Lempert, James Pickett, and Andrew Steel participated. The level on the Ohiopyle gage was just over 2 feet.
A surprise microburst had slammed Ohiopyle the afternoon before with winds as high as 60 mph, leading to concerns that there might be dangerous strainers. The river, it turns out, was unobstructed, but we did encounter one major blockage: Ohiopyle Road, which is the first mile-plus of the standard shuttle route, was closed for cleanup of storm damage. We had to run a significantly longer shuttle by way of Bell Grove Rd, which caused us to put on at about 1:00pm, an hour later than we'd expected. We took out at about 7:00pm. Weather was great, in the 80s with some sun, and we had the river almost entirely to ourselves—I can remember only one group of rafts that went by.
Kudos to Andrew, who with no other-than-Mather-Gorge whitewater experience and in a L'Edge, a type of high-performance boat he'd never paddled before, handled the rapids impressively and made obvious gains as the day progressed. And to James from Pittsburgh, who paddles the Loop often but who pushed himself to nail new moves, such as a challenging peelout at the base of Cucumber. I felt emboldened to try some new things as well, including a so-called "creek line" at Double Hydraulic just to the left of the upper hole.
The emphasis was on running the rapids, but the day included some workouts on fine points of paddle strokes and tilting the canoe (or not), and tips on surfing.
I think all three of us came away with a welcome boost in confidence.
- Larry Lempert