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New Website: Long Read Sorry…
Well it came out early (we wanted to get
out of beta); but the word is out, yes
there is a new website out there that
some friends and I have made for the
creeks on Walden’s Ridge in Tennessee.
It came to us two-fold really. One for
me was living in Alabama for awhile, and
having
www.alabamawhitewater.com as a
resource, Mark D’ site is hands down the
best whitewater site in the country,
(and b*tt load of work for him we have
come to realize
J
) and an out-of state person can look
at his site and plan their trip or
vacation, and know where to go and what
to expect. The second dawn of
consciences was our paddling trip to
Washington State and trying to figure
where the water was (close to us, gas
was expensive out there, and time was
limited) Out of print dated guidebooks
and a list of runs wasn’t enough…Mark D’
spoiled us, and cell phones with
internet access are becoming a way of
life.
Also kayaking knowledge for the most
part seems to be tribal knowledge, and
the old school guys are getting out of
the sport, while the newer boaters have
to re-invent the wheel. For the sport to
remain as safe as possible, knowledge
must be passed on. We hope this new
website helps. This idea was also born
out of the passing of our friend Shane
Hulsey, if we could try to make kayaking
safer, we would try to help.
We also wanted to make a site that was a
“round table” of information to where
anyone with email, could send pictures
and text and we could take it from
there. By doing this, we think this will
make it easier to convey information,
with someone who doesn’t have the time
to learn a program or web interface,
especially when they get the credit like
a magazine article. Also it should make
it fun for someone to see their pictures
on the web, and the picture of the month
feature should be fun too. Imagine
printing off a cool picture of your
friend, yourself, or your favorite rapid
with the website letter head framed in
around your picture. Kayaking should be
fun for you and your friends.
Also we felt a need for a local forum
board for people to network for a closer
community; this should help someone new
to town or someone looking for new
paddle partners, reporting
wood/deadfalls on your favorite creek,
instant local information, or even
wanting to have fun with friends and
make new ones. I found this out
personally when I moved to Alabama,
Mark’s Forum was invaluable in finding
new people and instant information on a
local level.
Also we wanted a flowage, like the
Alabama Site, to where it was broken
down by watershed. The flowpage is in
Beta and needs tweaking, and we are
still trying to work out a bug, to make
a Windows Server 2003, talk to
Linux-Java code…but we are chugging
(more like tripping) along
J
.Thanks to Mark D’ for hosting the
flowpage page, and also a special thank
you, to Mark and Barry for creating the
code that makes it all work. The
flowpage has already helped some Bama
and Arkie boys get on Richland and the
Piney, and they could do on a 3+ hour
drive for some, 9+ plus for the Arkies
and take less a chance on having water
and having a plan B was easier due to
the site. Paddlers are cheap and gas and
time is expensive. The set points will
be fine tuned and will be based on area
wide rainfall events (and upcoming river
level reports to help tweak the
numbers). Also the river level reports
on the new forum, we hope, will help Rob
Maxwell and his gauge project. Rob’s
project is beneficial to the paddling
community and we want to help as much as
possible.
On another note, the ridge is endangered
from overdevelopment from out-of-state
retirees (look at Western North Carolina
for your benchmark) and other land use
owners. We felt it best that others
enjoy the natural beauty of the ridge;
in turn they would want to help protect
it for upcoming generations and
themselves.
They say mimicking someone is the best
form of flattery…well my hat has been
off to Mark D’ (Alabama)
and Fish (OzarkWhiteWaterPage)
for years. So it’s time to give back.
I would like to personally thank, Mark
“D” D'Agostino, and Barry Hart for
creating the flowpage,
Tony Diliberto for designing the
upcoming logo, Ben at
SteepCreeks.com for some of the
first articles, Abigail Bowen for her
contact in helping us with the map from
h*ll, Randy Hale of
North River Geographic Systems for
the map , Anita Pinner for
putting up with the bad grammar and
trying to prof reud the grammar or lack
of on the site,(< in my best, the doctor
from Star Trek voice> we’re kayakers
$%^& not English teachers) and for
beta testing the forum til she got
crossed eyed,
Phil Foti for testing the forum and
making it crash and burn in flames (give
the boy a bowling ball and he could tear
it up
J
)
Mark “V” Vincent for building the
hoss of a machine that made the website
and Milt Aitken of Net2Atlanta dot net
Inc. for putting up with a HTML walking
and talking problem ( I refuse to name
names).
One last note we are still in beta, but
here it is
www.waldensridgewhitewater.com
Please feel free to contribute your
pictures and articles and river levels,
or to flame the ##$% out of it, btw
that’s what the delete button is for !
Thank you
for taking the time to read this and for
all of your forthcoming help.
Sincerely,
Team WRWW
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