Ocoee Week of Release & some Nanty!

We had some more visitors from Arkansas head out our way to celebrate the week release on the Ocoee. It started on Thursday when Andy and Diane came out to Knoxville and ended with us following them back to Arkansas on our way to Oklahoma. In between we got in two days on the Nanty and two days on the Ocoee. We pulled away one day early to head to the house to get things in order so everyone else got one extra day on the Ocoee that we missed out on.

First off was the Nanty. Again the water is chilly and the rapids are fun. Great little surf waves down the run and great class three rapid towards the end that is great for running eddy drills and moves on.
PIC
A local was there on day two who was throwing some big loops at the bottom of the falls. As hard as we tried we couldn’t hit one. The “store wave” was not the same as I last remembered it being. This time it was more like a box hole than a peak wave. Once you got in it all I could manage was some limited front surfing and some decent side surf cut turns. I missed the old glossy wave that you could surf and surf. Great time though, had a huge group of ten and we shared some great times over dinner.

Andy even played a little music for us!


After two days of the Nanty it was time for the Ocoee. We had one paddler that had not hit the Ocoee or the Nanty yet so she was really excited to do both. We had a ball making the run and it was problem free. This was on Sunday so the normal traffic was on the river. Tons of rafts and kayakers. On Monday, however, the traffic was dramatically reduced. I think we may have had half a dozen rafts all day and twenty or so kayakers. I felt as though our group of twelve owned the river. We would swarm in on a rapid and just take it over. It was great fun and Hell Hole was a ball. I heard that on Tuesday that the group only saw two other paddlers the entire day. This is very unusual for the Ocoee and is quite a treat!

Here is Dru in Hell Hole. Go to our webshots for other short videos from the day.


Dru in Hell Hole
Great group of folks and a great time on the water. We appreciate getting to paddle with everyone and look forward to doing it again real soon.

rt