Playground
PUG LIFE. PHOTO: JOHN WEBSTER
LOCAL LOVE
WHY THE GUTTER IS IDAHO’S BEST-KEPT SECRET
NORTH OF BOISE on Idaho’s Highway 55, with Old Chub beers in hand and a barbecue just big enough to manage a 12-pack of Oscar Mayers, a crew of programmers, veterinarians, marketers and business professionals ditch their suits for sprayskirts. The magnetism that draws Idaho’s river folk
to an old fish ladder of diverted mountain runoff has held fast for decades. The Gut- ter is home to a tribe of grey-haired paddling people playing hooky from their desk jobs to immerse themselves in the humble pastime of gutterballin’, running figure-eights around the drops in the Gutter’s near-perfect, year round whitewater. Since long before the sculpted high-volume
whitewater parks of Cascade and Boise—50 miles to the north and 25 miles to the south, respectively—the Gutter has been quietly nestled down a backroad in Horseshoe Bend on the Payette River, attracting its own brand of dedicated mischief-makers, looking for a slightly less sophisticated class of park ‘n’ play.
24 | RAPID The Gutter’s 100 yards of short drops,
holes, surfable waves and powerful eddy- lines are also a tried-and-true destination for pre-season training, just a couple hour drive from the home of the world-class North Fork Championship. The real draw, the draw that keeps locals
coming and out-of-towners tuned into Horse- shoe Bend’s radar, is the massive wave that arises when a submerged air bladder—usu- ally functioning as a dam—is partially deflated during peak spring runoff, diverting water through the four-tiered fish ladder. The phenomenon is a rare sight; the last
bladder deflation took place two years ago. As children whisper about the arrival of Santa Claus or a visit from the tooth fairy, the pad- dlers of Idaho wax poetic about the Bladder Wave that kicks off the paddling season in the earliest days of spring. If the water level in the reservoir is high
enough, the dam’s manager in Horseshoe Bend will make the call that brings paddlers
from across the country. Along the Gutter they camp, in tents and under tarps, in the chilly spring air, waiting for the swell that will humble them for a new year of paddling. “We surf on the wave, throw little blunts
and do low-angle cartwheels,” says 17-year Gutter veteran, Mike Voorhees. When Voorhees
isn’t paddling the North
Fork, he dodges work and takes the long way home, stopping in Horseshoe Bend. He’s raised his three sons to be paddlers, starting them on the Gutter at age six before moving on to “harder stuff.” Aside from a feisty Hometown Throwdown
hosted by Jackson Kayak in 2010, the Gut- ter has stayed outside the limelight of the paddling scene. “They love dialing down their skills, trying
different strokes or going backwards into ed- dies,” says paddling photographer John Web- ster, a frequent visitor to the Gutter. “The older guys, that’s their jam.”
KATRINA PYNE
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