Daring kayakers navigate over Ohiopyle’s falls
OHIOPYLE – Stacey Walker paddled furiously as her kayak cut through the swirling, foamy water at Ohiopyle State Park. Approaching an 18-foot-high waterfall, she knew she needed to execute the perfect boof stroke, a move that, when done correctly, launches a kayaker into the air and over a waterfall.
As Walker neared the fall, she dug her paddle deep into the whitewater, close to the boat, pulling it backward past her hips. But she did the stroke just a few seconds too soon, and her kayak went over the falls at a steep angle, penciling into the choppy water below.
An experienced kayaker, Walker was able to resurface a few seconds later without popping off her spray skirt, a piece of waterproof fabric that circles her waist and stretches over the opening of the kayak.
“I penciled in and went deep,” she said. “At least I didn’t have to swim.”
The 26-year-old woman was one of about 200 extreme sports enthusiasts who dared kayak over the fast-moving waterfall that runs over a hump of rock and several craggy boulders in the Youghiogheny River during the seventh annual Ohiopyle Over the Falls Festival.
The two-day event, sponsored by American Whitewater, the Pennsylvania Organization for Watersheds and Rivers and the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, gave experienced kayakers the opportunity to navigate their way through some of the roughest whitewater at Ohiopyle before going over the fall, an act that is not allowed otherwise during the year, said festival organizer Barry Adams.
Walker, who has been kayaking for five years, drove from Baltimore, Md., with a group of friends and camped out at Ohiopyle for the weekend.
She said her and her friends drive from place to place whenever time allows, always searching for new and more challenging places to kayak. They kayak all year, despite the temperature. During the festival, the Youghiogheny River was in the 60s. Cool, Walker said, but not cold.
“It’s not freezing,” she said, as she stood on the bank, her spray skirt still hanging from her waist. Other kayakers, one at a time, took their turn going over the falls. Some of them went over smoothly, others cartwheeled, going end over end. Walker said she wanted to do some more kayaking and go over the waterfall at least one more time that day.
“It’s a lot of fun,” she said. “It’s an adrenaline rush.”
Walker, who learned to kayak while in college, admitted to being afraid of heights and said she doesn’t like to look down while she’s precariously perched on top of a waterfall in a kayak.
Kayaking over waterfalls can be dangerous, and the higher the fall, the more dangerous it becomes. Years ago, Jeff Snyder, attempted a 45-foot-high waterfall in Mexico. The official host of this year’s festival said he wasn’t able to angle his kayak enough to cut smoothly into the water. It landed flat, with a sudden smack, and the impact compressed discs in his back. Months of rehabilitation followed. Nevertheless, Snyder’s brush with paralysis didn’t keep him from squeezing back into a kayak.
The injury did, however, prompt him to try out a different form of kayaking known as striding. Using a 10-foot-long paddle and wearing an array of protective equipment – shin guards, helmet and breastplate – Snyder kayaks standing up, his feet wedged into small slits in an AIRE inflatable kayak designed especially for him.
A crowd favorite, Snyder went over the waterfall at Ohiopyle several times while standing, but said striding is not as dangerous as it looks. Humans were designed to stand on their feet, so it makes sense to kayak while standing, he said, adding that it doesn’t strain his back as much, since his legs absorb most of the impact when the kayak goes over the falls and hits the water.
Nonetheless, the 43-year-old man from Accident, Md., admits striding is not a sport for the faint of heart. Striding, like traditional kayaking, can be dangerous, but it’s the threat of danger and the challenge of navigating angry whitewater that keeps most kayakers returning to the rapids time after time, he said.
Snyder said if anyone had a reason to quit kayaking, it would be him. He said he’s been seriously injured several times. He broke his neck and his leg during separate incidents, in addition to the back injury he sustained while in Mexico.
“I can’t explain why I have to do it. All I can say is you got to do what you got to do. Kayaking is in my blood. It’s instinct,” he said.
Snyder said he kayaks the Youghiogheny River often and said going over the 18-foot-high waterfall is “a little exciting,” which is why kayakers from all over come back year after year during the Over the Falls Festival.
“This,” he said, “is one of the best places on the planet to kayak.”