Colorado 2008 Creeking stoke

By Joe Keck

Yo Jackson World!

First blood has been drawn from the 2008 Colorado creeking season! Yesterday, a solid crew rallied out to the desert near Montrose and fired Colorado’s classic early season run – Escalante Creek. The bad news is my camera died, so I have no pics for ya’ll.

However, for your ’08 adrenaline stoke, the good news is I have some uber-classic photos of another all time classic Colorado creek run – the class V+, super committing, Crystal Gorge. It has see-through water, amazing mid-summer aspen scenery and a mandatory 40 footer named Zoot Chute. The landing zone can be a bit shallow, so land a little flat, tuck up, and rely on the displacement hull of your Rocker to get you through smoothly. The season usually falls in July – look for flows of 300cfs for your first time. If you like these shots, check the photographer, Todd Patrick, at www.toddpatrickphoto.com.

On another note, the snow pack in Colorado this year is epic around almost all of the state. People have been asking when to come out and I generally recommend May 15 – June 15 for the best variety of the goods with the first two weeks of June being the best. If you’re mostly looking to hit the classic Colorado steep gnar (Vallecito, Crystal Gorge, Yule, Big South, Lake Creek) then come after the peak toward the end of June or early July so the gorges are low enough. Colorado often gets over-looked for freestyle, but in addition to highly rated features in Buena Vista, Salida, and the world class M-wave, Glenwood Springs has added a fantastic year-round feature on the Colorado river. The new feature is just upstream of the legendary South Canyon wave, which gets kicking between flows of 2,400 – 3,600cfs. Look me up when you get here – I’ll go boatin’ with ya.

Git sum,
Colorado Joe

P.S. I’ll see you all, along with the rest of Team Jackson, at the Lyons Outdoor Games May 30-June 1.