First trip of the year to the cabin

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Yesterday a buddy of mine and I decided to make a trip up to the cabin. The NOAA site said the water level was good to go... but it wasn't.

Still, we were there with a boat, so it was our duty to give it a whirl. The boat is a 16' with a 90 HP Yamaha, very nimble and lots of power for such a small hull. It's my buddy Lee's boat, and I'm teaching him how to run a river without beating the hell out of equipment.

This kind of an extremely low water level is ideal for showing him the ropes.

This is the launch in Talkeetna, and usually the water is halfway up the concrete slabs you can see here. The water to the right is about 2 inches deep, so we couldn't launch there.

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We backed the boat up about 300 yards down the riverbank until we could get the boat floating in a deeper bit of water. The water is barely enough to get your ankles wet beside the truck there, the boat launch is up to the right in front of the truck.

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Finally got her in. Next we float down to under the railroad bridge where it's deep, and get her up on step.

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Heading up the river. I was way too busy to take pics where the water was just a trickle, so this is pretty much the only area where I took a few shots.

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Still not quite spring there, even though there's lots of leaves sprouting all around my house right now.

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Made it up without touching once, but I really had to make that boat dance a few times. There was a lot more ice than I anticipated. Parked in the usual spot below the cabin.