Thursday and Friday Mike had off so we decided to go do the Gauley since it had been cranking out 3800 cfs for several weeks. I left at 1 AM after only about 2 hours of sleep. When we got there they had cut it back to 600 cfs and we were bummed, but after 14 hours of driving and no sleep, so help me god I was going to paddle dammit. I took the Mongoose due to fear-factor associated with a new class V river. I was bored out of my skull. Iron ring was interesting but it was so sketchy I carried it. Peewee flipped in the 2nd hole and flushed down the left crack upside down and Mike splatted the rock in the middle with an OK but less than perfect line. I didn't like the look of it. When we got back to the put in Peewee pulled his rafting mascot, an inflatable alien out of the woods. That provided amusement for awhile until it was bedtime. We went to the campsite at the put in and met a bunch or really cool climbers from Canada. Turns out they were really good climbers and were also neat guys. One was a physical therapist who helped massage a knot out of my shoulder. They were drinking a keg of homebrewwed beer and we talked till late in the night. At about 11:30 something funny happened to me and I just started talking about things that had happened to me in my youth. Squatting in abandoned buildings, bad cop stories about evidence tampering, riots in NYC, eating out of dumpsters. My past seemed so odd to me, almost like it was someone else's and I was telling a story about their life. Then I tried to stand up and the world fell away from me. I worked my way over to the picnic table and slept out under the stars.
The next day they had cranked the Gauley up to 1200 which was way cool. I grabbed the Mr Clean Mike and I set out to have a good time. At Insignificant we tried to catch the river right eddy in front of the undercut. Mike made it, I got squirted bad in the eddy line and ended up getting washed under the undercut rock. That sucked. Then we started working on involuntary squirt recovery. At Pillow Rock I got backendered and launched into the air when I hit the cross curler. Mike got a good picture of me trying to roll up and splatting the pillow, then I got flushed into the toilet bowl and squirted there to. Damn that Mr. Clean likes to squirt. We had some fun splatting the VW rock then took off. Lost paddle was fun and was by far my favorite rapid. Even at 1200cfs it was fun. Iron Ring was sketchy still, though less sketchy than it was at 600cfs so I portaged. Mike aced it and I got a great picture of him holding onto his duffec stroke while the hole tugged at his stern. It was one of those times I was in awe at his paddling ability, and let me tell you that doesn't happen too often. The rest of the river was uneventful except for my boof of the rooster tail at Sweet's falls and dropping onto dildo rock. It was fun, glad I didn't break my boat... At the takeout the moon was out and it was really beautiful. Mike and I ate dinner and then headed out to Ohiopyle. On the way there he got pulled over for going 80 in a 65. The police officer let him off, that lucky son-of-a-gun.