It has been a magical spring here in West Virginia!

By Justin Owen

Videoboating in West Virginia has been something that I have looked forward to every year since I started. This year, I decided to make the pilgrimage a bit earlier in hopes of catching some of the more "elusive" whitewater that I had been missing. I definitely got my wish. As you may already know, many regions in the east were recently inundated with rain. As luck would have it, Fayetteville fell within this deluge.

In the past weeks, I have hardly had enough time to breathe between scrambling to work and whitewater. When not videoboating, I have been helping with the expansion of the Class VI Riverrunners base. I didn’t let the off river work slow down the boating though. I have been hitting up Manns Creek after work, making excuses to surf the dries waves all day, and firing up the Lower Meadow whenever I have a chance. When I go to work on the river, I have been on The New holding around six feet most of the time (epic play as well). With all the options, a wet West Virginia has to be one of my favorite places to be!

If you would like to check out helmet cam footage of Manns (one of the best creeks I have paddled), here is the link to some footage. Also, new Jackson Kayak team member Trevor Coffman has been working on a video of the dries which we should have up soon.

From Class VI Riverrunners,
Justin Owen