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Grant, Pete and I headed east Friday afternoon to what would become 'the best trip ever' just like every other. Friday night we camped out at River Rats (5 bucks each, not bad) and pitched my tent. Aside from me tapping Pete on the shoulder in my sleep and apparently screaming something when some dogs came up and barked at our tent around 2am the camp served nicely as a refresher for the paddling to come.

Saturday found us putting on and running shuttle just as the water started to surge on the Ocoee River in Tennesse around 9:30am. We ferried river left at the top of Grumpy's, surfed in a few friendly waves and holes, stopped to stern squirt on a nice eddy line, recovered Pete's things (including 50 dollar sandals ?!?) at the bottom of Hollywood Hole (Diamond Splitter) after he had a nice swim in the eddy below Table Saw, met an awesome Strider guy, got Grant into some stellar surfing action in Hell Hole, and worked on our paddling technique all day long.

After taking off around 3 or 4pm from our first run Pete and I decided to make what we could out of the day and so Grant drove us in his van back to the top to start over at Grumpy's where we met a guy named Ian who proved quite fun. Grant meanwhile, drove shuttle and played in Hell Hole where we met him at the end of our second run. Pete conquered his nemesis (Table Saw) with a good tip from our new friend Ian. Ian pointed out the obvious which somehow I hadn't been able to explain -- the big curler wave at the top, river left, is the one that flips people so ferry a bit to river right before you start down the wave train if you don't plan on eddy hopping down the rapid. With this advice and some more words of wisdom about a cool move at Flipper, Pete and I felt extremely satisfied with our second runs and made a democratic decision that although we'd done the river before - after that run we'd both improved quite a bit!

A trip to the Piggly Wiggly and one to the Gas Station had us set up in the state park campground for an evening of fire, red wine (no, we didn't drink alcohol in a state park), a beautiful lake view, homely neighbors, and more tent-camping fun. Next time we'll remember: to tell Grant not to forget his thermarest and for Pete to find non-rotten firewood the first time around...hmm, good times.

Sunday morning woke us a bit later than expected and so the group put on at Hell Hole around 10:30am where we played all morning and left by noon for the long trip home. Grant, Pete and I took turns snapping some great photos of each other surfing there which was pretty cool since I'd never gotten up the nerve to go in it.

Looking back, I don't really understand why I was afraid to get in Hell Hole before now. Logically thinking if you've paddled and raft guided the Chattooga, a hole on the Ocoee should be no problem. I blame my illogical fear on years of listening to my father and his friends talk about said Hole, which by the way has changed a ton since the first time they saw it.