Royal Gorge Whitewater Festival

Marlys and I have spent the last two days at the annual Royal Gorge Whitewater Festival at the Canon City Whitewater Park. Most of the races begin at Parkdale just upstream of the Gorge and the rafters and kayakers need to go through the Gorge on the way to the finish line in Canon.

Events started on Friday evening and continued through Saturday night. Besides the races and other whitewater events, e.g. King of the Wave (see picture), there was also music, beer, BBQ and various booths.

One of the booths was the Fremont Search and Rescue team put up on Friday afternoon to raise money for a new(er) rescue vehicle. Marlys, Judy and I set it up and manned it until about 5PM where the next group took over.

The main items given away for donation were survival bracelets made by various team members. They are pretty popular this summer with high schoolers and Broncos Fans (due to the number made in orange and blue). Marlys and I also donated a skiadirondack chair.

This was a pretty busy week for Marlys and I as the RGWF approached, because Monday evening we need to go to rope bag throwing training and then a float through town on the Ark, which was flowing at about 3200 cubic feet per sec. Last time we went through the Gorge at the beginning of the month it was flowing at around 500 cubic feet per sec.

On Wednesday and Thursday night we had rope training, so by Friday we were getting SARed out.

Beyond the booth, at the RGWF, the SAR team was doing the rope bagging of people and (water?)crafts that miss the take outs down river. Crafts maybe over stating what some of the "things" people came down river in during the "Build Your Own Boat" contest.

On Saturday, Marlys and I came back in to help with the bagging on the BYOB contest and then to pickup the chair we had donated, thinking it probably wouldn't get the size donation needed for it to go home with someone else.

We were surprised when we saw that the chair was sitting behind the booth instead of in front where folks could see it, but there was a good reason as it had gotten the needed donation and we now had to deliver it to its new home...The Whitewater Grill up on 8 mile hill.

For those of you following the development of this chair you probably noticed that there are no screw holes in the boards. Now I have to figure a way to attach the skis sans screws.

So what was going to be a week to relax a little is now one to build chairs for the two upcoming events in Canon, the Arts on the Arkansas and Fiddlers on the Arkansas. It all goes to a good cause.

Tomorrow we go to the Springs to pickup the cushions for the Molesworth Club Chair.