***Colorado Whitewater's 2024 Fall Dinner and Annual Elections***

This year's Fall Dinner guest speaker is Writer and Outdoor Athlete Brooke Hess!

Brooke Hess is originally from Montana and is a former USA Freestyle Kayak Team member. She is a cofounder of Ripple Skip Collective, a core expedition team member for The Grand Salmon, a first-time film producer, and was part of the principal cinematography team. She has her Master’s in Journalism with a focus on Science Writing and has an academic background in Fluvial Geomorphology. Her career has allowed her to work with various agencies, including NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, to condense complex scientific concepts into simplified topics to convey important findings to general audiences. Brooke brings a broad depth of knowledge of the Snake River Basin salmon populations from her Master’s thesis, as she reported on the necessity to breach the four Lower Snake River dams.

Date: Thursday October 24, 2024

Time: 5:30pm-9:30pm

Special Guest: Brooke Hess

Location:

14er Brewing & Beer Garden

3120 Blake St. Unit C, Denver, CO 80205

CW Members: $25 

Non-CW Members: $30 

No refunds, all ticket sales are final.

**a limited amount of tickets may be available at the door, pre-registration greatly encouraged 

Annual Elections:

We will be conducting our annual elections at this dinner. If you're interested in serving on the CW Board of Directors, please contact Laurie Maciag. You can find descriptions of the board positions here.

  

Previous Year's Fall Dinners

2023 Fall Dinner:

Guest Speaker: Eric Jackson, Pro Kayaker and founder of Apex kayaks

EJ was Born in Ohio, living in a single wide trailer as a young kid, with a father who was strict yet an incredible teacher of skills and how to live life. A loving mother who balanced out the demeanor at home passed at age 18.    

Paddling began at age 6 in a Grumman canoe on the “Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania” which also came with some kayaking in a borrowed boat. At Age 15, EJ and his dad got their first kayaks, Lettman Mark IV, made by Old Town while living in New Hampshire.    

They joined the Merrimack Valley Paddlers club in the spring of 1980, and one member new how to roll, Bob Oniel. Bob taught EJ to roll and then EJ taught his dad, and then they taught the rest of the club.

EJ’s Dad, Jim, became club president, and the club grew from 40 to 250 members in 2 years. EJ and his dad made over 100 fiberglass kayaks in their garage for club members at a cost of $100/each (materials only), and EJ did the work for free.    

The kayak was a rip off of the Phoenix Savage.

2022 Fall Dinner:
Guest Speaker: Dave Fusilli, Pyranha Pro kayaker/team manager and co-owner of Demshitz.

2021 Fall Dinner:
Guest Speaker: .

2020 Fall Dinner:
Guest Speaker: .

2019 Fall Dinner:
Guest Speaker: Peter Heller. Peter is a celebrated adventure writer, author of four award-winning books of literary nonfiction, and a critically acclaimed novelist. A longtime contributor to NPR, and a former contributing editor at Outside Magazine, Men’s Journal, and National Geographic Adventure, Peter has traveled the world as an expedition kayaker, writing about challenging descents in the Pamirs, the Tien Shan mountains, the Caucuses, Central America and Peru.

2018 Fall Dinner:
Guest Speaker: Abby Holcombe, Imagine chasing whitewater full-time in a 170 sq. foot RV with your parents for 5 years? Come join 14 year old Abby Holcombe as she talks about her favorite rivers across the country including; Ottawa River, Kennebec River, and many more and how all these rivers and their communities have left her with important kayaking and life lessons that she will always carry with her and skills that have led her to bigger kayaking opportunities such as the remote Magpie River she paddled this summer.

2017 Fall Dinner:
Guest Speaker: Tom Martin, Grand Canyon historian and guide book author. Tom will presented a 50 minute behind the scenes look at Otis “Dock” Marston’s book “From Powell to Power: A Recounting of the First One Hundred River Runners Through Grand Canyon.”

2016 Fall Dinner:
Guest Speaker: Scot Grossman, Jefferson County Open Space Special Projects Coordinator, gave a short presentation on the Peaks the Plains Trail project in Clear Creek Canyon.

2015 Fall Dinner:
2015 Colorado Whitewater Association Fall Dinner
Speaker: Landis Arnold

2014 Fall Dinner:
2014 Colorado Whitewater Association Fall Dinner
Speaker: Pat Keller

2013 Fall Dinner:
Over the Edge: A Passion for Big Drops, Overcoming Fear, and the Discovery of Mexico's Whitewater.
Speaker: Rafa Ortiz

2012 Fall Dinner:
2012 Colorado Whitewater Association Fall Dinner
Speakers: Zak Podmore and Will Stauffer-Norris; Source to Sea: What Remains of the Colorado River