The Vermont Paddlers Club

The dryway...a classic New England summer run.

After spending most of my 2005 summer down on the Dryway I considered myself a dryway veteran. I think me and my Kingpin are becoming part of the features down there.

I was surprised when I saw fellow VPCer, Will run the dryway in his creek boat most people take playboats. Laugh, oh did I laugh!! A full winter of smack talk began!!

Fast forward to Summer 2006, Will finally succumbed to the smack talk and decided to talk the talk and walk the walk. Will joined me for a weekend on Dryway in his playboat.

What followed was two days of extreme smack talking, no swims, a lot of surfing and hell of a lot of fun. So much fun in fact he decided to join me again the next weekend.

The dryway is based on the Deerfield river and is classic New England run. The rapids rate between class 3 to the infamous Dragon's tooth and Labyrinth 4's. This river can be as hard or as easy as you want it to be. There are a surf waves dotted throughout the river with the big finale at Labyrinth one of the most difficult waves to catch and surf on the river...at least you get plenty of warm up before you get there. There are numerous slot moves raging from easy to hard.

I knew Will had paddled the dryway before but I think we brought him a whole new experience.

The second time there was Demo fest...Will was eager to Demo a new boat in particular the EZG50. Unfortunately due to my coffee & croissant stop and I am sure Will will say my socializing, we arrived a little later than expected and EZG50 had disappeared for the day. So he had to endure another day of the Amp.

At the end of the Dryway we didn't have time for our projected 2nd run so we headed down for some beat downs on the GAP (fife section). At which point Will decided to demo a poorly outfitted RX. A friend of mine described the various lines from the road and we watched as eight boaters came along. They had whole load of personal carnage by either swimming or flipping neither looked a nice way to go down the Gap.

I decided I wanted to surf the Hole at the Bottom of the Gap, while Will opted to go for this strange task of Seven moves along the Gap?? Something that apparently if you can do you know you ready for the Dryway!! A bit late if you ask me..

I don't think we achieved our set goals but we did impress the spectators by running it upright.

We finished the evening by stopping at my favorite food place the Biker Bar then headed to socialize with the rest of the VPCers (Ryan, Norm, Chrissie) I think they were staying in the local state prison, No visitors after 8pm, No alcohol and no over crossing the boundries on the camps even if you are all friends... Thankfully we were allowed in for a quick hello at 8.10pm. Some beers and a few hello's later we headed out (10pm) to recovery for the next day paddle.

The next day we were joined by Ryan, and 3 of his friends who had never paddled the dryway before.

But first Will and I had to make sure we did two runs...Will when I said we would do a Bomber run I meant it. As soon as the water released we put on. 40 mininutes later and no stopping we were back at the top for our second run...Fantastic.

The second run was a lot more entertaining, great surfing, rock splats, to rescuing swimmers. Oh and the quaking of knees at Dragons tooth.

The run was thoroughly enjoyed by all, there was little carnage considering the newbies who did really well.

Again the day was finished at the Biker Bar...Beers and Burgers yummy.

Two weeks later I return with another VPCer Julie Prior, I had talked her into doing a day trip so I could demo a new boat. Bleary eyed and half a sleep we hit my usual coffee and croissant place and Julie experienced the same socializing..Sorry guys it isn't my fault I know so many people...

A friend Marc, kindly agreed to show Julie the lines, as we apparently we going to be in for a fun day, I could just barely roll the demo boat in the flat water.

Julie had a blast she surfed every thing possible like a pro and she even followed Marc to the T, quite hilarious watching them both run Dragons tooth upside down...Okay okay so that's my general line through there too..Thankfully I managed to roll my demo...it was a close call though.

Sadly I didn't get to see Julie run Labyrinth, I heard she did great and even managed to try to surf the wave there.

I mentioned the subject of a second run!! But I think the first one had sapped all of Julie's and Marc's energy so instead we enjoyed the sunshine and socialized as per usual.

Tired and Happy we drive home from another excellent paddle at the Dryway..and there is still a whole load of Summer left. Dryway Fest anyone??