I've been here before-- Oh wait, which rapid is which??!! By Julia Frangenberg

          This session at Keeners is my second time, and a chance to re-experience the amazing times I'd had surfing and discovering new skills last year. Prior to this session, I had gone to session 3 in 2016, when the Ottawa's levels were significantly lower than now, averaging at about -1.5 feet. The huge difference now is that the level is 14 feet!! I was shocked when my family and I drove up to Garb to take a look, and rather than seeing the Lorne that I was familiar with, Garb and all, I glimpsed a whole new big rapid, topped off with a massive wave/hole at the bottom which I was later told was the famous MINI BUS!!!! Before driving to Canada, I'd been looking at countless videos of pros like Paul Palmer and Dane Jackson surfing the house sized wave, and had idolized it since. When the beginning of Keeners finally rolled around, we ran the middle channel, which was filled with fantastic waves such as Angel's Kiss, Butterfly, and the intimidating but incredibly fun Big Smoothie. At the lunch site we were able to glimpse Garvins, which was even bigger, even scarier, and even more fun looking than the year before!!
          A couple of days later it was our chance to run the main channel. I was ecstatic to get a chance to explore more of the completely different Ottawa river. The first rapid we came upon was the Lorne, which sported a MASSIVE hole on the right that looked particularly nasty to get stuck in. the next feature on the Lorne that stuck out was Mini Bus. After I got too freaked out by its massiveness, after the others surfed it for a bit we headed to lunch, then butcher's knife. The new features that popped out on that rapid were the man eatingly massive whirlpools. After some of the other Keeners got completely beatered and sucked down all the way into the whirlpools, I decided to test a few out. This experience resulted in me being sucked into a quite vicious one and swirled around upside down so I couldn't breathe, which was AWESOME!!! After a bit of flatwater, we approached Norman's. In the middle lay--actually crashed--two humongous curlers morphing into one big super wave!! After that came the biggest, nastiest rapid of them all: Coliseum. Previously at a different session I had gotten a pretty terrible beatdown there resulting in me losing my paddle and having to hand roll up. However, that day it was much, much, much, much more intimidating. To the right: jurassically huge "white faced monster" hole. To the left: another hole of equal levels of intimidation. Downstream: three of the biggest, baddest breaking waves I'd ever seen, followed by a slightly "smaller" hole on the left. As the rapid seemed to taper out, there came a large horizon line. Steve-o made it super clear that we weren't to go anywhere near it, because it was a gigantic, pour over. On my fourth time of the week running it, all three of the breaking waves knocked me over one after the other, causing me to keep carping rolls and grow increasingly closer to death ledge (the dangerous pour over). Fortunately I rolled up and had time to quickly paddle left.
          The Ottawa river this week has pleasantly surprised me in so many ways, and I hope to discover much more in the next two weeks coming!