Thread: location

Originally Posted by cevans

Stay at away from log jams and dams across rivers.

log jams also trees ( in the kayak world called strainers) across rivers and creeks suck water under them. They can easily suck a kayak under water and you also. Dams across rivers and streams have a roller of water under them, same for water falls. You will be sucked down and can’t get out. The hydraulics of the water flow will work against you. Both can easily kill you. Reading the water current flow is a very learning experience and is only taught to you by someone that has learned it before you and passed on. Reading the flow of a water current is developed with time and the experience of running it. There is no room in moving water for trial and error. There is I think still a club in Indy,that teaches the basics of white water kayaking. Indiana Canoe Club and they teach river canoeing and kayaking as well as survival skills in moving water. I took a couple of courses of whitewater survival in class 3 waters at East Race in downtown South Bend as a kayak course built up there. Most of the Fire Departments and Police Depts. train up there as the water can be controlled as to how it’s built. Also did a couple of whitewater schools at Natahalia Outdoor Center in Brycson City SC and Ace Whitewater School on Gaulie and New River in West Va. before working up to class 4 and 5 whitewater. I quit running the rivers in 2003 as it’s a young guys sport and the older you get, you eventually loose your reflexes and slow down and my beat up body doesn’t get along with being slammed into granite rocks any more. You also develop a fear factor with ageing. You have to overcome the fear factor in running class 4-5. Maybe it’s called common sense as we get older also.

I cannot emphasize enough about learning the reading of the flow of moving water. There is a different current under the water you cannot see especially when trees are across water and moving water around log jams. We avoided and always walked around them. More people in kayaks get killed by trees across water, log jams, and dams and wing dams as well. Some people never get the hang of reading moving water current and it’s always a learning experience as no 2 are ever the same with water rising and constantly dropping changing the hydrolics of the flow of water. You don’t have these problems on lakes, ponds, or strip pits.