Winooski River and news from Keith.

Well, I wound up doing that canoe trip on the river after all. Sunday morning, I met up with my co-worker Lee at his house in Plainfield. We were originally going to run it from Marshfield to Plainfield, but after driving the road and seeing the river along the way, we decided the water was too low for it. So we wound up going from Plainfield to Montpelier instead. There were a few spots where we had to get out and push, and lots of rocks were scraped, but it was a great time. Most of it was super tame flat-water stuff, but as the river gets past E. Montpelier, it gets a bit steeper. There are a few little rapids which were no problem at this water level, but looked pretty scary back when all the snowmelt was coming down. There's also a couple dams we had to portage around, which was also no problem. Got a bit better at controlling a canoe. And by that, I mean being able to keep it in a straight line without constantly switching sides. Not sure if I was doing it right, but it worked for me.
It's 10 miles on the road from Plainfield to Montpelier, and it's probably twice that on the river. It meanders quite a bit. The whole trip took about 4 hours. We didn't go hard, but we didn't just drift either... Anywho, here's a couple pictures.

The first dam we had to portage around. Maybe a 6 or 7 foot drop. The next dam, closer to town, is probably a 20 or 30 foot drop.

Looking downstream from the dam. The river had been mostly tame before this. Afterwards there were lots of fun little rapids.

The other thing I wanted to mention is that Keith Lannom (our old Team Green soccer coach, sometimes riding buddy, super host when I was in Utah, and all around good dude) is moving to New Hampshire! He's been in East Tennessee for the past couple years working for the Forest Service. He'll be working in White Mountain National Forest up this way. Not sure where he'll be living yet, but it'll be great to have him in the area. He's been married a few years now, and his son is nearly a year old! Time flies...

I went riding another new place this afternoon, and broke my chain again! It was the same chain I broke on Friday, so I was going easy on it, but still... I really don't get it. I've never had this problem before. I used the same chain the whole time I was in Mississippi. Replaced it last summer because it was worn out. I had to replace the middle chainring this spring (ripped a tooth off), and I thought maybe I had an 8spd one on there or something. Nope. So I don't know what's going on. I'm going to try either a Shimano or KMC chain next time and see how that goes. It's really making me mad! ARGH! Not to mention banging up my knees! Argh, ARGH! Which reminds me, on that canoe trip, a lady was on a bridge we went under at one point. She had a patch over one eye. She was friendly and said something like "Good for you guys" or something like that. I had a hard time resisting the temptation to say, "Avast!" or "Ahoy there!" or other pirate speak. She was sitting in a car, so I couldn't see if she had a peg leg...