Norge Part II: Gorges

Dropping into a locked in gorge is a special experience, and one of the unique elements of whitewater kayaking. There are few other sports that present the opportunity to explore the depths of places rarely seen and touched by other human beings. These special places often require intense committment, offering some of the most challanging whitewater experiences, both physically and mentally, for a boater.

We were fortunate to have the opportunity to explore two wonderful gorges, with very different characters during our adventures in Norway.

The Frya Gorge: Several gorges with fun rapids, and a chance to get rowdy at the end.


The hike down to the gorge.

The Frya is a smaller creek flowing out of Lake Furusjøen and into the Lagen River. Relatively unknown, and often overlooked, the Frya Gorge is a pearl of the Sjoa + CO region. We were very fortunate to get on this one at good water levels thanks to some rain the few days before.

The Frya begins as a boulder strewn creek with some mellow class III rapids before digging its way into several deep gorges containing a variety of coninuous boulder garden style rapids with fun boofs and interesting lines. However, the nature of the Frya remains relatively tame, with no rapids harder than class IV+.

But this is what made the Frya so enjoyable. The whitewater was fun, but because it did not demand your complete and undevided attention at all times, we were free to lean back and simply enjoy the sights and sounds of such a remote and unspoiled piece of river. In places, the Frya is squeezed down to less than 2 metres, while the gorge walls, covered in places with yellow moss, arch in overhead. It was very peaceful to be able to just sit there in a clear pool and take it all in.


The clear water and overhanging walls of the Frya Gorge

It was in the depths of the Frya that Tyler related to us a well known Norwegian fairy tale. Norwegian children are told that the hanging lichen growing on the pine trees, which resembles stringy geen hair, is in fact the hair left from the arms of trolls roaming the forests. I personally like the fairy tale explanation better than the text book one!

Once the gorges come to an end, the Frya opens up momentarily before spilling into a final spectacular gorge. The upper section is unrunnable, but we were able to walk the rim of the gorge, and scramble down and put back in just above the exit drop of this last gorge, and fire up the awesome double drop. The first drop is a 10-12 footer that falls into a boiling pool in a tight mini gorge, which is then quickly followed by a 8-10 footer out of the gorge and into the pool below. This was by far one of the coolest drops of the whole trip!


Justin on the lead in to the last drop.


Logan launching off the first drop.

The Finna: A long, tight gorge with steep drops

The Finna has a very different character than the Frya. A bigger river, the Finna has some bigger rapids, some of which are must run, in a very committing gorge. Overall, the Finna felt alot like Vallecito in SW Colorado, except longer at 9 km's (most of which is gorged in) and with slightly smaller rapids than Vallecito, mostly in the class IV+ to V- range.


The Finna put-in drop on the Skjerva. The Skjerva joins the Finna about a 1/2 mile below here.

The put in for the Finna is actually on the Lower Skjerva, a steep lower volume creek that joins the Finna after a fun 1/2 mile of so, and offers a good warmup for the river below. Once the Skjerva joins the Finna, the flow doubles and it is not long before the Finna enters its gorge.

However, before even getting to the gorge, we ran into trouble. Underestimating the speed and power of the river, Ben found himself face to face with a nasty undercut, and was forced to swim after being uncerimoniously shoved underneath. Luckily, we were able to corral him, and his gear shortly below and hit the restart button.

Right below where Ben swam is where the Finna takes a sharp right, and drops into the first major rapid at the entrance to the gorge. Once through this rapid, the walls rose sharply up from the river, and we were locked in.


Chris going deep pn the entrance rapid to the gorge.

The rapids began coming in quick succesion. Most of the rapids consisted of technical moves through big holes and pour overs. I was difinitely impressed by the power of the water through the drops, which were willing and able to spank the slighly offline boater. Despite the power of the rapids, they were relatively forgiving and had good recovery pools.


Tyler & Tyson lowering the boats on the only portage in the Finna Gorge

Though the gorge was locked in, it was possible, although difficult to scout the majority of the rapids, and it was awesome having Tyler and Logan to route us through the countless horizon lines, saving us from having to check them out ourseleves. Looking back, many of the rapids are a blur, though the two that stick in my mind are the must run and the very last rapid.


Looking above as Tyson gets ready for the boof on the must run.

The must run was a great rapid, consisting of a relatively straight forward entrance followed by a hard ferry to the right, and over an eight foot boof. I was up first, caught the eddy on river left, and then started my ferry to river right, and the boof. However, I miscalculated my ferry and got pushed into the flow against the left wall and melted into the boil/hole below. Knowing that the line went, I just waited to pop up and deal. Luckily, the boil/hole spit me out into the deep pool below and I rolled up, and proceeded to watch the rest of the crew come through. Half of the boys made the boof, and half didn't, making me feel a bit better about my botched line.


Ben missing the boof line on the must run....


...and catching a bit of a tooling











Justin, nailing the boof line

The next rapid of note for me was the very last one. Looking down at the horizon line, all we could see was a mess of white, and an ominous bend below where the gorge bottled down even tighter. I should note that as the gorge goes on, it just keeps getting deeper and tighter, and at this point the needle on my fun meter was definitely starting to get close to the red zone. I was still having fun, and was loving being able to route through the rowdy rapids on verbals. But the tight gorge added to the pucker factor, and I was beginning to feel like I was ready to enjoy a cold beer on the downstream side of the gorge.

So, dropping in behind Tyler, we crashed our way through the rapid, and towards the ominous bend. As we came through the bottom of the rapid, Tyler turned around and, probably seeing that my eyes were as big as saucers, yelled to me, "We're Done!" The ominous bend turned out to contain the tightest portion of the gorge, where the Finna is squished between dead vertical walls to less than 3 metres wide. However, there was nothing in there except for a nice current and a good acoustic reveration of our hoots, hollars, and cheers!



The quality of whitewater in Norway is simply amazing, and in our whole trip we paddled nothing but amazing whitewater on spectacular rivers and creeks, making it hard to pick a favorite. But if I had to, the Finna would definitely take the crown, and reflecting back, I would place it in the top 5 favorite rivers list.

Stay tuned for the third and final installment of Gravity Sessions trip to Norway: Slides and Waterfalls!

The Box

Last week Joe, Alex and myself left Denver to drive 9 hours up to the Clark’s Fork Box just outside of Yellowstone National Park. We met up with Barry and Orion from Bozeman for this two day, 24 mile mission through this 1200' walled granite gorge. We rolled into camp at 3am, it would have been much later had the Monatana boys not left some nudy pics as markers to guide us in. This was a nice welcome and made pitching a tent this late at night a bit easier.
We started off with the short Honeymoon section, this provided us with a much needed warm up for what was to come. The first portage came right after the Honeymoon take out, the Green Monster, and thus began our 4 mile flat water paddle to the Anklebreaker portage. The flatwater was simply amazing, nobody was in a rush to get downstream, we were all just taking in the scenery and watching the canyon walls rise the further we ventured. The put in below our first portage:



Our first day lasted about 11 hours, including our hike up to the canyon rim where camp was set up. You really don’t grasp how remote and committing this run is until you enter the box section with your first of I think six portages. To me the scariest part of this wilderness adventure was hiking these portages. Most of what we were walking on was loose sharp rock on a steep pitch. It was very easy to loose your footing and take a long tumble down these sheer and elevated mank piles, potentially loosing your gear or worse yet breaking a limb. I had one close call where I lost my footing and dropped my boat and paddle over a 20 foot ledge, barely keeping myself from junking over. Luckily they landed in a pool of rocks down below where I could recover them. A look back at the ankle breaker portage:



Our first rapid was Double Suck, Barry showing us the boof line off the ledge:



Next up we had Deep 6, named for how long it tends to keep you under before ejecting you. Alex and Joe having clean lines down the left:





Things started to really drop at this point, bringing us to Balls to the Wall. This is a sieved out steep rapid with a manadatory run out. Orion finishing off the upper section:



Our last big rapid for day 1 was Snolieguster, this has a tricky lead in to a river wide hole, followed by a perfect 8 foot boof. Here is the hole:



Followed by the boof:



We decided to try a different route up to the rim, something a little more direct to where we were camping. A look back at ball buster portage and the start of our hike out:



Little did we know that we would be free climbing a 30 foot 5.8 section with loose rock and moss, for sure the most sketch part of the day. This is what we climbed in the dusk:



Once past that obstacle, we had to navigate through a mosquito and grizzley infested marsh to find camp. A fitting end to an epic day for most of us. Two unlucky fellas still had to run a 3 hour shuttle (which actually took them 5 because they were so blazed.)



Day 2 started off with something underworld, I think it was called Chauncey's Underworld. Here is Barry blasting through the meat:



Dillworth, one of the most continuous rapids of our 24 mile adventure was up next, then the picturesque Calendar Falls:



After Calender Falls we took a lunch break on one of the many black sandy beaches along the way. The very next rapid we found this mangled kayak, apparently from the group that was in the weekend before us at really high water. It looked as if a hand grenade had gone off in the stern of the boat:



The next rapid was Deliberation Corner, the most ominous and technical drop of the run. The river seems to really constrict here providing ample gradient, with the walls feeling like they were closing in over you. We all decided to shoulder the boats and walk down to the must run boof over a sticky hole. Joe nailing the 10 footer:



Right around the corner was the Gates of Mordor, Alex dropping in:



The run out leads into Dave's Chasm, the canyon narrows to about 20 feet in width:



The last major drop of the Box is the must run Leap of Faith, this right below the Sunlight Strainer portage, or as I like to call it the F'ing Joe portage. Here is a shot of Orion dropping out:



Looking back up at Leap, breathing a lot easier knowing that we only have the class IV run out to go:



The shuttle ride back provided a picture perfect end to our journey:



Excited to be out of the shuttle vehicle:



The crew:



I am already missing those blistering portages I did in my dry suit, it really encompassed what expedition kayaking is all about. You put an exceeding amount of effort getting into the canyon , then your rewarded with some of the best V whitewater in the States with the colossal feeling of accomplishment on your paddle out.
Huge thanks to Barry for taking us 4 newbies down, we were very fortunate to have such a great guide. Thanks also to Cutch and Evan for the great description in the Whitewater of the Southern Rockies.