Artificial Intelligence

My buddy Lou and I are just back from a weekend of paddling. On Saturday, we ran the Lower Yough in Pennsylvania, a staple east coast summer run. Our plan afterwards was to camp overnight in Western Maryland, and then figure out an adventure for the following day.

We were headed to camp and in the middle of debating our Sunday plan when we drove past a sign for the Adventure Sports Center International (ASCI). That’s the whitewater course at Wisp Resort near Deep Creek. It’s been around since 2007, but neither of us knew anybody that had paddled it. We always thought of it more as a venue for competitions and racers…but maybe it could be a venue for us in our packrafts? The course is open to the public (through purchase of a day pass) when it’s not hosting a competition.

I gotta say, it felt surreal driving up to the top of a mountain to get to whitewater. But here we were, at elevation, in a parking lot overlooking the course. As we unloaded our boats, we heard shrieks of excitement from a raft group running the initial drop…and then heard the same group again and again, in the same drop, as they took additional laps. It was the first of many signs that this wouldn’t be like any other day I’d spent on the river.

If I was designing an artificial river, it would look like ASCI. The riverbed is built to mimic natural features. The perpetual flow (~425cfs) comes from a pump system that draws from the ski resort’s snow-making reservoir. And the shuttle back to the start is by way of a conveyor belt. The design is very well thought out, and it’s an engineering marvel.

The convenience factor also looms large. There’s a locker room, a giant parking lot, and “lifeguards” along the banks. There’s also a path to accommodate non-paddling gawkers (or hecklers, in the case of Lou watching one of my runs).

Right out of the gates, things felt different. The concrete banks make for some wild surges, the rapids are deceiving, and the gaggle of onlookers can lull you into thinking you’re on the log ride at Six Flags. I found I needed to pay attention to the water and not the spectacle.

Adding to the challenge, the mountaintop setting means the usual visual cues to read rapids just aren’t there (rivers should be in canyons, no?). The lines through the drops also periodically change by way of “wave-shaper” plates on the river bottom. Overall, I’d say the course is class III+, but there were class IV characteristics in some of the runouts. I think swims would be exciting (we didn’t find out).

This was a super-fun and super interesting experience! The biggest surprise wasn’t the actual paddling, but the mental ride that came with it. I was a little out of control, and yet I was within a totally controlled environment. That’s such a counter-intuitive mix that I had a hard time getting my head around it. I felt the need to stay on my game, even as I knew the risk was low. I think that’s why I was super-tired after only a handful of runs.

In the natural world, I always say I want to let the adventure come to me. But I may have decided ahead of time how this adventure would go. As a result, I misread some of the rapids. Waves that looked like stoppers were easily punchable, and playful looking seams were sometimes a little devious. My lines got better with each run, but I learned a few things. My day reaffirmed that whitewater is never truly predictable, even when it’s engineered—or maybe because it’s engineered?

After a handful of fun laps, we both talked about coming back, we swapped stories, and we shared how different this experience had been compared to what we expected. We then switched our energies to finding ice cream in the ASCI gift shop, a final reminder that this was no ordinary day on the river.

In the end, the whitewater was awesome, the spectacle was amusing, and the convenience was over the top. The course also taught me an unexpected lesson: I shouldn’t predetermine any experience. Discovery should be part of my nature, even when it’s wrapped in concrete.