AR Kayak Adventures

Celestial.

2008-12-03T11:25:00.000-08:00

Rio Paucartambo Peru

2008-01-08T16:28:00.001-08:00

“The bus is full, the next one leaves on Saturday” This was not what we wanted to hear, “What day is it today? “ I asked Jonathon we had been traveling in Peru long enough now to have lost track of the days of the week, just the way I like it to be.
“I think it’s Wednesday “he replied. “That sucks” I said “we need to leave tomorrow morning at the latest”

“Well let’s find a private ride” he said. From then on Jonathon was on a mission to find the 5 of us a ride to the Paucartambo River in Peru.
He succeeded and we left that afternoon on a 4 hour ride to a bridge just downstream of a town that shares the same name as the river.

We got there by dark and camped by the river below a small village where most of the adults spoke only quichua a native language, only the kids had learnt to speak Spanish.

We woke early the next morning and put on a fairly small river flowing at about 7 to 800 CFS.
I had wanted to run this river ever since I saw a film of the first descent completed in the early 1980’s
What I didn’t know was that this river would turn out to be one of the best multi day runs I have ever done.

The Paucartambo starts way up in the mountains at around 10 000 feet about 200 miles later it flows into the Urubamba river way down in the upper Amazon basins jungle.
On its journey it flows through remote and difficult canyons, once it gets going after a flat water paddle at the start, it barely ever stops, endless perfect white water with only a few portages mostly solid class 4/4+ with some fantastic class 5 rapids thrown in on a fairly frequent basis.

I catch an eddy right above what appeared to be a 20 foot drop, I had been leading for a while now pushing into rapids without scouting trying to move quickly, we had 7 days worth of food but were late in the season, it was November and the wet season could arrive any time no one wants to be on this river when its high and it could flash in a matter of hours.
Looking over my shoulder I realized that this time I had over committed and because I was just 4 feet from the lip of the drop I could see from my boat that the drop had no exit the whole river disappeared under huge boulders.
I gave a stop signal to my friends; Ben scouted the rapid from the opposite bank, and immediately told me it didn’t go.
There was a cliff above me making it difficult to get out, but a ledge about 10 feet up offered me my only option, I managed to climb up dragging my boat with me, and continued to climb up stream to ferried over to join the others in our first Portage.

Just downstream a huge class 5 rapid took us an hour to scout and only 30 seconds to run.
After more big rapids on the limit of being boat scoutable we reach another huge rapid where 90 % of the water slammed into a huge boulder after dropping over a evil looking ledge, we were tired and decided to camp here amounst the boulders in the heart of Orange canyon a appropriately name canyon due to all the rocks being colored orange, we were never sure why but guessed it might be some kind of mineral in the water because only the rocks that were under or had at some time been under the water were colored Orange, a weird looking phenomenon.
Orange Canyon was full of sieves but we got through it the next day and entered a flatter area for a while before entering another steep canyon.
More great white water, and a fabulous, scenic canyon, one time I remember floating between rapids in this deep beautiful canyon , I looked up and put my arms up in the air feeling the joy of just being in this place.

Day 3 on the river proved to be the biggest including a section flowing at 250 feet per mile, with what was now about 1800 CFS.

I stalled in a big hole, got threw it but had lost all my speed and I was blinded by the water, instinct and the look of the rapid from the eddy above it, told me there was another drop coming up I had time for one stroke and then I hit a much bigger second hole, fortunately my kayak went deep really deep under the hole, it resurfaced quickly but clear of the hole, I was lucky, and had time to send the other’s on a different route through the same rapid.

We reached a huge class 6 rapid that required a portage over big lose boulders at the bottom of a land slide, portages often seem more difficult and dangerous to me than actually kayaking the big rapids and here I took a big fall while carrying my loaded boat hitting my head on a sharp rock, my helmet saved me.

Shortly after our portage we were scouting once again, this time in a walled in canyon.
The first part was unrunnable but fortunately portagable, the second part looked like it was good to go but at first glance was impossible to scout.
We were all unsure how bad the holes we would have to run looked from are vantage point upstream of the rapid.
“Where do we go” asked Ben “I’m not sure but we will figure it out” I said trying to sound confident, really I had no idea and got in my boat not sure where I was going but felt if a ferried around a bit above the rapid it might become clear.
There was a small cove in the cliff wall just downstream of the eddy I was in, the water was whirling around and getting pushed around the corner into a giant hole the worse spot on the rapid, however there was also a rock ledge where I could get out and climb downstream to scout.
I managed to back my boat into the cove and found a hand hold on the ledge, Todd threw me a rope that I could attach to my boat in case it got away from me while I was getting out, getting out of your boat on to a small ledge while its bouncing around in a whirl pool that your convinced is a plughole into a sieve is not easy, at least not mentally, but somehow I found myself and my boat on the ledge.
It took a while and some rock climbing to be able to scout the rapid but eventually I came back to within sight of my friends with the good news -- the rapid was good to go.
Some of the crew still didn’t like the idea and now I was in a position to help them portage so they took that option, Jonathan and I ran the rapid and we all ran another easier rapid that allowed us to exit the canyon, out into the sunlight and to a perfect beach for camping at the end of are longest day.

Fun white water continued on our 4th day and the next day we had half a day more on the river and we made it down to the confluence with the Urubamba River.

The Puacartambo River here at the confluence had close to 5000 CFS, it was amazing to think that just 4 and half days ago we put on in the mountains with around 700 CFS!

There is a road at the confluence that eventually would get us back to Cuzco but all the locals we met said they would be no bus, however there would be a 40 foot motorized canoe going upstream at 5 in the morning, we camped in the yard of a local family living in a bamboo hut raising chicken and gathering fruit from the jungle.

The Canoe arrived just as the sun was coming up the next day, he stopped and picked the 5 of us and all our kayaks up, and there was more than enough room in his giant canoe.
He powered upstream against around 8 to 10 000 CFS, ferrying from eddy to eddy he had impressive skill, soon we reach a part of the road that the buses do drive to and then had to with stand about 17 hours on two different buses back to Cuzco, riding not far from the famous Inca ruins of Machu Picchu.

The Paucartambo was easily one of the best river journeys of my life and my friends shared my sentiments.
I would like to thanks them for making this happen. I paddled with-- Todd Collins, Ben West, Jonathon Blum and Scott Baker.

Rio Cotahuasi Peru

2008-01-07T12:14:00.000-08:00

The Cotahuasi river in southern Peru is said to flow through the deepest canyon on earth, it is a spectucalar canyon and a magical experience.

Great continous white water flows almost the entire distance from put in to take out, endless class 4 rapids.

In a few spots the river is only 1 meter or 3 feet wide and yet the surrounding canyon walls are 10, 000 feet tall!

It is a committing run with a long hike in with mules to portage 300 foot Sepia falls.

After we ran the upper reaches of the Cotahuasi [ previous posts ] we joined the rest of our team at the put in for a 5 day run down the main Canyon, we had 7 kayakers a river boarder, 1 gear boat and one paddle raft.

The river in October was low, still really good for Kayaking but our rafts had a few problems including flips and one bad wrap.

Every night we camped under the stars amongst giant boulders or one time at an old Inca ruin!

It has to be one of the best multi day trips in the world, I want to go back.

Flat water Canyon , Rio Cotahuasi , Peru

2007-12-27T15:59:00.000-08:00

Flat water canyon on the Cotahuasi river lies just upstream of the normal put in for the multi day section of the same river.

Its name would suggest that it would not be of much interest to a white water kayaker, but it is far from flat, it fact it has some great class 4 and 5 white water.

It got its name from a group that scouted the canyon from the rim and thought they saw nothing but flat water, the next group who found a way in and had this information and expected a mellow trip but instead found a classic white water run, Seeing the funny side they named it Flat water canyon.

We had just completed a upper section of the Cotahuasi before we hiked into the normal cotahuasi put in and caught up with the rest of out group ready to start a 5 day trip on this run.

Our big group all camped together at the put in. We had left our kayaks at the start of the trail, there were no mules left to take them and so we had made arrangements for them to come in on the mules the next morning.

Because of this we realised we had an opportunity to get up early, hike half way back up the trail and meet the kayak carrying mules coming in, then hopefully find the put in to flat water canyon.

Todd had not kayaked the day before with us so his kayak was already in, he really wanted to run the canyon and so between us we carried his kayak back up the trail with us.

About 2 hours later we came to what we believed was the trail of off the canyon rim down to a feasible put in.

There were a few locals walking the trail to the very small villages that dot the canyon in this area. We asked them if they had seen our mules carrying kayaks, 1 person said " yeah, they will be here in 15 minutes " another said that they had not left the trial head yet and would be 2 1/2 hours!? Ha , welcome to south America I thought, no one really knows but they all want to help and would never say " nope, sorry I don't know " most move to there default answer " media hora " they say -- half an hour, most things in South America if you ask the locals seem to take half an hour even when they take 5 hours or more. Knowing this we all sat down on the trail in the baking sun and waited.

This time we got lucky and I had to take back my thoughts because 15 minutes later we spotting our kayaks bobbing along on the backs of very hardy mules.

We talked to the mule drivers and fortunately they knew exactly where we were trying to go and knew where the trail was, we were in the right place and they were able to take the mules down to the rim, from here we had to shoulder the boats as the trail is way to steep for mules, one of the mules drivers even showed us the way down and helped us at the really steep parts of the trail, with our kayaks.

The trial was the worse part of this whole run, steep with lose dirt, and the wind was so strong it came close to knocking me of my feet as it would gust against my kayak on my shoulder which acted like a big sail.

Th run itself was really fun continuous white water, technical at this low flow, mostly class 4 - 4+ with maybe 1 or 2 rapids in the class 5 range.

We took out at our camp site after another great day on the water.

The rest of are crew were either resting or visiting the local village perched high on the canyon rim.

We decided to stay here one more night, and start the lower section of the Cotahuasi the next day.

Upper Cotahuasi Peru

2007-12-24T09:24:00.000-08:00

These are shots from 2 different sections on the upper Cotahuasi in southern Peru.

The true Upper was creeky sieve avoiding class 4 and 5.

The other was a short but really good section of class 4 with 1 class 5 rapid we took out were the hike into the 5 day section on the Cotahausi starts, however it would be possible to keep going down to Sepia falls, portage the falls which is a huge multi teared drop and would be a long fairly brutal portage.
Then put back on and run Flat water canyon [ coming up in another post ] into the 5 day section.
We had a group ahead of us doing the hike in and so needed to catch up, when we reached the take out one of our mules who was loaded with a lot of our food had been left behind so we became mule drivers for the rest of the day. The hike past the Falls is spectacular.

The Rio Cotahuasi offers incredible amounts of white water we managed to run a lot of it, but there is a lot we didn't get to. Got to get back there. Peru is Amazing.

Photos below = the short section above the start of the traditional hike in to the classic 5 day run

Communicate

2007-12-23T13:46:00.000-08:00

“ What’s down there Andy” “Well, umm, one drop leads to the next drop which leads to a perfect slide which leads to a series of more drops all of them go in the middle, Its sweet”

Set perfectly under a waterfall with volcano backdrop, this river looked fun even though it was really low maybe only 50 to 70 CFS, just enough water at least for the more channeled part of the river.

Ben, Scott and I did laps of the put in drops before we headed downstream, not to far down we decided to walk around a braided section that was to low to boat.
Soon the channels came back together to form one channel and we found a fun 15 footer that we each ran 3 times, more fun drops and slides followed, we were very relaxed, at this water level this was a no stress river, just enjoying the fast shoots, slide’s and boofs in the Chilean sun.

Not far down stream the river split again into 2 channels both looked impossibly low, I was leading and decided to try the left channel I had to push my boat over a few rocks but made good progress.
I looked behind me as I always do to check on the progress of my friends, they had disappeared out of sight, my immediate thought was they must have taken the other channel, I was thinking I should have gone that way to but I was a little annoyed because I believe in sticking together on the river or at the least letting everyone know what you intend to do.
I went a little further downstream to where I could eddy out and wait for them; it didn’t take long for me to realize that they were not coming so I ran the rest of the left channel which dropped steeply into the right channel just downstream.
I expected to see them here or at least see them coming down the right channel, but there was no sign of them.
I was getting confused; maybe one of them is pinned? I got out and hiked up the right and left channel’s but still no sign of them?
The right channel looked good at least much better than the way I had come and because of this I came to the conclusion that they had over taken me and were now downstream looking for me, probably thinking I was downstream of them. This must be it, where else could they be, I thought?
I took off downstream concerned because I was boating alone on an unknown river but motivated to move quickly so I would catch up.

I got to what looked like a significant drop not big but the whole river pinched down pretty tight; it didn’t look to bad, but looked like it had more punch than anything else so far.
I had been boat scouting much bigger stuff now for over a month while on a kayaking mission in Peru and Chile, my confidence was high perhaps a little too high, I made a half hearted attempt to stop but there was no real eddy and it looked good.

I committed to the drop as I came over the lip I realized my mistake, the drop pinched into a bad hole, I couldn’t get enough of a stroke in to be able to boof the drop due to how narrow it was, in a matter of a second I went deep really deep, I knew I was about to get beat down in the hole I had just plugged, I flipped underwater and resurfaced upside-down in the hole.
I set up to roll and somehow jammed my paddle across the gap underwater, I remember thinking this no longer feels like 50 or so CFS how can the water be this powerful ?
I freed my paddle and tried again my rolled failed.
I’ve been paddling a long time and have developed a very reliable roll it’s been a long time since I had a failed roll, I tried again and failed again I switched sides and tried again and failed again.
I was running out of air but on this last attempt I had realized my true situation and the reason I could not roll.

I was underneath a deeply undercut rock, the left bank was made up of bedrock and the undercut created a cave perhaps 10 feet or more deep.
The hole kicked into the cave and recirculated upstream back into the drop, on my last roll attempt my shoulder actually hit the under side of the rock when I was less than half way up, immediately knocking me back over.

I was quite far under the rock and felt in deep trouble.
Ironically just the night before the boys had asked me when the last time I had swam was, a typical conversation between paddlers that usually brings out some good stories.

My answer was about 4 years ago when my paddle snapped after running a large drop and the broken paddle shaft ended up stabbing me in my hand, it’s hard to roll with half a paddle stuck in your hand. It had felt like I was going to drown at the time but now it just made a good story.
How does that saying go?—“We are all in between swims”- I knew when I told my story that my time was over due, I don’t have a problem with swimming but this was scary and it felt strange and very unexpected to be alone.

I pulled my skirt and swam it took we a while to reach the surface due to the highly aerated water, when I did the first thing I witnessed was rock, rock in the wrong place, above my head!
I was maybe 5 feet under the undercut and going not only deeper into the grotto but back upstream towards the maw of the hole.
I kicked hard towards daylight fortunately I did have some head space and therefore some air, kicking wasn’t working, right now is when I needed my friends and there ropes.

I knew the only way out would be hand holds in the rock. I grabbed for anything, the rock appeared to be basalt which was good at least it wasn’t smooth granite.
Nothing, nothing, my figure nails just scraped the rock in desperation. I kicked again and managed to reach further, got something, salvation, a solid hand hold near the mouth of the undercut, I pulled with one arm against the current, suddenly blinded by the bright Chilean sun I was out or at least my head was. I reached downstream for a new handhold, I felt my paddle with my feet that were still getting sucked into the undercut, and I paused to pull it out with my foot.

I threw the paddle onto the bank above me with my free hand then grabbed again for a hand hold downstream, lucky for me there were a few good ones and I was able to pull myself out and downstream.

I climbed up onto the river bank exhausted and cold but happy to be alive, still not really sure how or why this had just happened, could I have really misjudged the river that much after so many years of kayaking, was I getting to blasé, disrespectful?
Or was it just weird circumstances that lead to my misjudgment, or perhaps a combination of both?
There was still no sign of my friends. Where the hell are they? I felt annoyed like they had let me down right when I needed them, I could have died, where were they? Are they OK? Have I let them down? What the hell is going on?

I watch my empty boat getting recirculated under the rock coming out from under it and doing cartwheels in the hole, flushing, going under the rock again and back for more cartwheels in the hole, it was drowning, that could have been me, I am so lucky! I could have drowned alone in not much more than 50 CFS!
I position myself downstream to a spot where I may be able to grab my boat if it does flush all the way out, after 20 minutes it’s still doing rounds.
It looks as though if I cross the river I may be able to catch it from that side as it does cartwheels. Getting across is risky and tricky, there is a slide downstream and a short section of fast moving water between the hole and the top of this slide it’s a narrow window but the only real way across, swimming down the slide would not be fun but not too bad so I go for it airing towards the slide and away from the hole.
I make it over just before the top of the slide, position myself next to the hole and wait for my moment, the boat comes from under the rock executes a good 3 pointer and I managed to catch the end grab and pull her free.
Emptying my boat of water, I realize that I left my paddle on the other bank, the last thing I want to do is swim back over to get it, but hand paddling does not look like it will work due to a tricky seal start, back into the river. I will have to swim again.
So that I don’t have to swim back to this side once I retrieved my paddle I attach my rope to the boat swim over with one end of the rope and then pull the boat after me.
Finally I am reunited with all my gear.
It must have been 45 minutes since I last saw Ben and Scott?
I breathe, relieved, frustrated, scared and worried for my friends.
What to do? Should I hike out? Where are they?
I scout downstream the river looks fairly easy and I can see the bridge that signifies the takeout.
I put back on and run the river down to the bridge, as I am doing so I finally see Ben walking over the bridge.
I am very relieved to see him but react badly in my confusion, “Ben, where have you been? Where is Scott? I nearly drowned, where the hell were you? “

I may have over reacted a bit, perhaps looking for someone to blame for what was at the end of the day my mistake.
I could tell by the look on Ben face that he felt really bad about what had happened and gradually I calmed down.
It turned out that Ben and Scott had shouted at me as I entered the left channel to say that they were going to portage both channels because they looked to low and therefore hard on there boats, they thought that I had heard them and took off to find the trail, it took them a while to bush whack to the trial but eventually they put back on the river and with no sign of me assumed I was downstream, from there description they must have put back on just downstream of where I swam, they paddled down to the bridge expecting me to be there, below the take out bridge is a nice 20 footer, its possible to run this and then walk back up to the take out, they went down to this drop thinking I must be there, because we had all checked it out before running the river.
When I wasn’t there they started to worry and it was right when Ben was walking up to the Bridge that we saw each other.
To finish the day off on a better note Scott and I put back on and ran the 20 footer together while Ben took Photo’s, it made us feels like we were back together again as friends and as a team.

At the end of the day this incident occurred at least in my mind for a few different reasons one was simply a misjudgment on my part, but the biggest reason was a break down in communication.
I had been paddling with Ben and Scott for the last month and half we knew each other well and were aware of each others capabilities.
Over all we had excellent communication and were a strong team but on this day for one short moment we let are guard down and this simple break in effective communication could have cost me my life.
We were lucky and learnt a lesson I have been taught before, indeed most of the bad incidents I have either been involved with or heard a lot about could be put down to either bad or misunderstood communication.
Mis heard guide lines, river signals gone wrong, boaters not knowing each other on a difficult river, I think it is mandatory you know each others skill levels especially if you are leading.

Or when there are too many paddlers in the group, this is something we all should consider more for it can be very hard to communicate effectively to a large group of paddlers, a large group to me is anything over 5, it starts to get hard to keep an eye on each other to make sure everyone knows what’s going on especially so if there are different levels of experience and skill.
Personally I have strong feelings about this and refused to paddle in a large group unless I feel I know everyone with in that group.
Some of the best military units in the world such as the SAS only work in teams of 4; each person within that team knows each other like brothers and can communicate in silence, in situations where it would be much more difficult to do so in a larger or unknown group.

Communication is key and being able to do so quickly and effectively should be part of the fun of our sport, we should be individuals working together as a tight team and not individuals simply paddling the river with strangers for there company.

If you paddling with strangers start with something easier than the weakest paddlers limit, give your new team a chance to get to know each other.

Paddle alone if you wish, you know the risks but when you paddle with friends be responsible for yourself and for them, work together make sure everyone knows the plan, this is surely what brings us together as river people, enjoying, sharing and rising to the challenge together as a team, this is a big part of what our sport is all about.

Colca Canyon Peru

2007-12-23T13:29:00.000-08:00

Lower Salmon River, Idaho.

2007-07-17T18:57:00.000-07:00

Wet Planet White water recently sent myself and Heather Herbeck on a reconnaissance mission to scout the lower salmon in Idaho, our mission which we willingly accepted was to calculate if the river is suitable for over night raft supported kayak classes.

We joined a trip put together by Winding waters a rafting company base in Joseph -- eastern Oregon.

After a 5 hour drive from the Columbia river gorge in Washington State, we arrive in Asotin near Lewiston Idaho.

We joined the Winding waters team and drove to the put in.

After unloading mounds and mounds of gear.

One of the guides noticed a bright light coming from a short way behind our pile of gear and tied off rafts, at first it was thought to be a large camp fire or strong headlights but Morgan [ the guide ] went to double check and came running back with news of a small but growing wild fire !

We immediately filled buckets of river water but are efforts to put the fire out were futile against the rapidly growing fire, so we had to row all are rafts gear and kayaks across the salmon river to the protection of the other shore.

Fortunately we had a satellite phone and so were able to call the sheriff for help.

After a interesting night watching the amazing advance of this fire [ which was successfully put out by fire fighters a few hours later] we started our river journey from Pine bar to Hammer springs on the Snake river. A journey of 3 1/2 days, and 53 miles.

The first day to a great camp spot at cliff rapids is fairly flat with some fun class 2 rapids, surf waves and good eddy lines, we had around 6000 cfs for our trip which is quite low but makes for good definition in the rapids and is a good level for teaching kayaking.

The Photo at the top is looking upstream from cliff rapids camp.

Day 2 has much more action with some big class 3 rapids and some awesome play spots, including lower bunghole a great surf wave which gives up spins and aerial moves on surfers left and right.

Snow hole rapid is probably the biggest on the river at this flow with a class 3 main line and a river left class 4 line.

After this day Heather and I decided this river would be fantastic for teaching both beginner and intermediate kayak classes as well as more advanced playboating clinics.

Its also a very beautiful place with incredible camping and warm deep water.

These 4 shots show the Lower bunghole waves, with me surfing on the second wave.

Heather in the middle of the main line on snow hole rapid, and a shot looking down the river left class 4 line with more holes and some undercut boulders

Our next night on the river was spent on a huge beach at Meloney creek where we learnt of the fascinating native American history on this river and the snake river [ Nez pearce tribe ] there is evidence of them collecting bark from the ponderosa pine at this camp which they would eat and perhaps use as a form of dental floss?

There is also a lot of history here from there war against the US army and there flight across this very barren land when they attempted to flee to Canada, they had the skill to cross the Snake and lower salmon in flood without losing any people or domestic animals more impressive when we were told that the US army were incapable of doing the same thing!

There is also evidence of Chinese houses on the lower salmon, Chinese immigrants having been shunned by the local community came to the wilderness in search of peace and gold, they built small stone houses close to the river utilising large boulders by building dry stone walls on and around them to create small rooms with a fire place next to the door way, which is a Chinese tradition, 4 people would have lived in a tiny house no more than 15 feet by about 10 feet.

The Chinese house and fire place.

The 3rd day on the river was also fun with good play in the first part of the day including one mystery move spot where I was able to get some down time over head height in a necky vibe.

There was one more class 3 rapid here China rapids. after which we floated out of snow hole canyon which we had been in for all of day 2, here there is a fairly long stretch of flat water but with some class 2 rapids which contain violent eddy's and whirlpools great to play in for fairly advanced kayakers but also strong enough to be a bad place to swim.

Shortly we entered Blue hole canyon a steep stunning canyon with really fun big wave trains and lots of big horn sheep the last rapids are named sluice box and Eye of the needle, after this the Salmon joins the snake river below hells canyon.

We camped at the confluence of these 2 rivers sleeping in Idaho with a view of Oregon across the snake.

The point of land which separates the two rivers before there waters mingle was a place the Nez Pearce used for there Vision quests, a time when young men would stay here for long periods of time with no food, often staying to the point of starvation, which would allow them to see visions [ or hallucinate perhaps ] possible a form of meditation ? All I know is it was a great place to be.

From here to are take out on the Snake is mostly flat with just a few swirly class 2 rapids so we strapped all the rafts together and motored out turning an all day paddle into a 2 hour motorised float.

These photos show the confluence of the Salmon and Snake rivers and the Vision quest point, as well as looking downstream on the Snake river.

Wet Planet are now planning to run 4 to 7 day beginner to advanced over night kayak clinics on the lower salmon with raft support, check the Wet planet link on this blog for there contact information.

New Zealand.

2007-04-02T18:42:00.000-07:00

I just got back from a 2 month kayaking trip in New Zealand.
It was my 3rd time to this fantastic country, this time I was guiding another kayaker for half of the trip and then doing my own thing for the second half.

Tried my hand at Skydiving and paragliding while I was there, and drove around in a classic Mini cooper with 3 kayaks on the roof and a bike on the back ! lots of fun.

I took a lot of non paddling shots on this trip, the scenery is amazing, but words and photo's do not do the place justice.
Best thing to do is go there.
Here's a taste :

2007-03-26T15:14:00.000-07:00

River of Everest.

My muscles screamed for oxygen as my lungs and heart tried desperately to feed them in the thin air, at this altitude every small movement seemed 10 times as hard as it does at lower elevations.
I needed time to relax, recover and not have to reach for the next paddle stroke, I needed time to not be drenched in ice cold water as I forced my kayak through the next hole, the holes seemed endless, my strength was fading fast if I flipped now I wasn’t sure I would have enough strength left to roll up, a swim here would be the end of me.
I need an eddy and I need one now!
My friends were below me not far downstream waiting in there boats they were my goal I must reach them, I must stop and breathe.

I hit yet another rock, this time I didn’t bounce off of it as well as the other rocks that I had found unavoidable in this pin ball machine of a rapid, my bow stopped and my kayak spun out, I went with it, completing a full 360 spin it was all I could do but I was momentarily out of control.

I hate that feeling and it made my heart quicken a beat when I thought it could beat no faster !
I focused on my goal, my salvation. I must reach that Eddy.

I had been in Tibet for 4 weeks kayaking some great white water reacquainting myself with old friends, making new ones and discovering an amazing country and culture.
We were fully acclimatized to the altitude or at least thought we were and were working well together as a team.
We felt ready, and headed to Mount Everest.

It’s a long and bumpy ride from Lhasa to Everest but perhaps one of the most spectacular journeys I have undertaken.
The road follows and passes rivers we had either run already or ones we stopped to do on the way the most notable of which was a section of the Yarlung Tsanpo, where we picked off the easiest section we could find, the river was high and huge it didn’t take us long to decide against running the massive rapids downstream of here creating some of the weirdest and largest white water I have ever seen.
Somewhere along the friendship highway, a road that would eventually take us back to Nepal, we took a left a completely random left onto a dirt road in the middle of now where with no signs, our driver said nothing but we all knew this was the true road to Everest.

At first we followed a meandering tributary of the Yarlung, at one point driving into the flood plain of the river to get around 2 large trucks stuck in the road after a head on collision, but soon the road sent us sky wards up and over a 5000 m or 16,500 foot pass that switched backed all the way up and then even more so on the way back down, eventually down to are river the Rong Bok Chu that flows from the north face of Everest.
The Rong bok river flows in a northerly direction then heads east and starts to bend south effectively doing a half circumnavigation of the mountain before it dives into the Upper Arun where the Arun river screams off the Tibetan plateau heading for Nepal.
Our first glance of the river was a little disappointing a class 2 braided mess of scrappy shallow channels but further upstream it looked like those channels had joined forces and the gradient increased creating some good looking and extremely continuous white water.

We had learned from are experiences in Tibet so far not to take what we saw in the rivers lightly because it was always harder and steeper than it looked, we called it ‘The Tibetan factor’ where at first sight class 3 somehow morphed into class 4 once on the river, with no eddy’s and very little Oxygen!
Every river we looked at we would calculate how hard we thought it looked and then add ‘The Tibetan factor’ so far it had proved a worthy formula.
Our put in on the Roug Buk was the highest we had attempted yet at 5200 m or a bit over 17’000 feet and despite spending a day in the village of Rong buk at 5000 m to acclimatize I was certainly a little daunted at the prospect of hard white water when just walking up from the river to the village had me out of breath! We would have to take it slowly and pray for eddy’s in the land of no eddy’s that is Tibet.

Rong buk village is with in sight of Mount Everest and only 12 Km down stream of Everest base camp, unfortunately on this day the Mountain was blocked by clouds we were all disappointed not to see it, but this was monsoon season, we had come here wanting the rain so the rivers would be high.
I guess you can’t have your cake and eat it ?

The following day we rode up the remainder of the dirt road to Everest base camp a 12 km ride on a horse and cart, there is an environmental project here to stop motor vehicles driving all the way to Everest base camp and it also supports the local villagers as many tourists chose to ride the carts in the thin air rather than walk.
We, like the mountaineers that also come here, needed them to help carry our equipment and kayaks, each cart was just big enough for one kayak and one person and most were just bits of ply wood and old bicycles wheels somehow managing to stay together with a few well placed nails.
If there was a river on the moon I am sure this is what it would look like, everything is gray , there is no plant life up here just gray rocks and silty gray water it’s a desolate place.
During are ride the clouds were starting to break revealing tantalizing glimpses of Mount Everest, by the time we had reached base camp we had some good views of the massive mountain, it was hard to believe we were over 5 200 m and yet the summit still seemed a world away towering above us like some giant unapproachable being, making us all feel very small and insignificant.
My respect for the mountaineers that have taken on the challenge of climbing Everest increased 10 fold when I saw it for myself, but I was here to go down not up and what lay down stream looked perhaps just as challenging.

At base camp the river is slow and shallow flowing from a massive glacier at the base of the mountain.

Downstream however it dives into a giant glacial moraine where it drops at around 400 feet per mile until the moraine backs off and the gradient eases.
Upon reaching this moraine and scouting most of the group decided that walking around it was the best option, the rapids inside the moraine were marginal at best and some were completely unrunnable one missed line or eddy meant the chances of surviving were slim, this on top of the very thin air made any attempt to paddle through the moraine very difficult and serious.
Dave Thomson and I decided to give it a go, we came up with a plan of exactly which eddy’s to catch which rapids to portage and how we would minimise the risks and try to solve the problem, things went well we worked well together we had run Devils gorge of the Susitna in Alaska together as well as other difficult runs in B.C. and Tibet we knew each other well our strengths and weaknesses.
I knew on this day Dave was on fire and would style the challenge. I just had to do the same.
The moraine went smoothly perhaps the worst part being a portage along loose scree above a class 6 rapid.
It was here in the exit of the moraine where I momentarily lost control spinning of a rock, Dave shot by me on his own path.
I had to focus, I needed that eddy my friends were in badly my strength was losing to the combination of class 5 + and the lack of oxygen.
Suddenly I was there one last move to make, come on, one last strong stroke and boom my world changed I was safe in the eddy.
My friends had made the portage and were ready to go.
“ How was it “ they asked “ it sucked” I gasped with my head down trying to suck in air, they laughed and peeled out to run the next set of rapids.
I couldn’t move, Dave had eddied out further downstream and raised his fist in the air towards me in celebration, we had done it, we made it through what appeared to be the hardest part, one of the most dangerous places I have been let alone paddled thorough and we had made it.

I looked upstream at the maelstrom of rocks and water I had just come through and smiled, it had not sucked but the guys had known that the moment they had laughed. Now I was laughing too, what a crazy thing it is we are doing here, but how good it feels.

The rest of the river on that first day down to the village was incredibly fast class 4 white water which we all ran successfully.
Lugging are kayaks back up to camp in the village was exhausting, this is what its like to climb Mount Everest I thought but I am still over 3000 m below the summit!
I looked up at the mountain, it was now a clear sky, I could see the whole thing and stared at it in disbelieve and contentment, I had wanted to see this mountain ever since I had visited the Himalayas 10 years earlier it seemed like a fitting time for the clouds to part, perhaps you can eat that cake after all.
The next day we put back on the Rong Bok and ran the rest of the good white water, experiencing good quality class 4 to 4 + white water sometimes getting squeezed through tight slot canyons but always runnable and very fun, after a long day on the water we met are driver at a road crossing below all the best white water, from here we ran 9 km of very fast class 3 and 2 in about 40 minutes to the next bridge, here the river braids and flattens into class 1 - 2 channels this is where the river bends east and eventually south where there is another short gorge before a mandatory take out above the Upper Arun gorge.
We decided to take out here and head for the unrun upper upper Bhote kosi but that’s another story.

The river from Everest proved to be one of the best experiences I have ever had both on and off the water one I know I will enjoy remembering for a long time.

Thanks to the team --- Dave Thompson, Daz Clarkson, Sammy Robinson, Tom Hughes, Darryl sergesson. And also to Chris Jones of Tibet wind horse adventure, Liquid logic and Kokatat.

There is more from Tibet -- see previous posts.

Yarlung Tsangpo

2006-11-29T17:37:00.000-08:00

The Yarlung Tsangpo is the largest and probably best known river in Tibet at least it is well known in the kayaking world.
In recent times the great bend of this river [ which is now regarded as the deepest canyon on earth ] had seen a few attempts from teams of kayakers and it has become one of the most well know white water adventure story's.

One of the teams had a tragic accident during a high water attempt, when kayaker Doug Gordon was flushed into the middle of the river never to be seen again, then Scott Lingren and his team successfully descended the upper gorge of the Yarlungs great bend section,they portaged the middle gorge and its 100 foot water falls over a 12 000 foot pass only to discover the river downstream of the bend had been obliterated by a glof [ glacier lake out flow ] that burst high on a huge tributary on the bend the Po tsangpo, this massive and sudden burst of water ripped up giant boulders and redesigned the river, making the lower gorge unrunnable. It was the largest kayaking expedition ever put together and was deemed a great success, for having run all that was runnable.

This section of the Yarlung was far to high for us to even think about during are time in Tibet we had never planned on doing it anyway but we did paddle a section of the Yarlung far upstream of the great bend even here it felt more like paddling on the ocean and the gorge we scouted downstream of this section was the largest white water I have ever seen and has never been paddled at this flow.

The Photos show a truly massive tubing wave some of the strangest hydrology I have ever seen.

This wave was at least 25 feet high and the hollow tube could easily contain a normal sized house and then some!

The hole to the left of the wave had to have been 15 feet high.

The photo of the two bridges shows how high this river can get because the downstream bridge was covered by the river the same year the first expedition attempted the great bend but 2 month before they put on, the second slightly higher bridge was built after the flood.

The Gates of Hell !

2006-11-28T14:59:00.000-08:00

So having completed all our paddling excursions in Tibet we were gradually running out of time therefore it was time to travel back to Nepal to get are flights home.

We planned to do this over land by traveling down the Upper Upper Bhote Kosi to the border with Nepal at friendship bridge.

Having successfully run the upper reaches of this river [ see previous post] we looked for more rivers to run before leaving we found a few that were fun and one that was to high for it's gradient and out of control.

And so we entered the Town of Nyalam a Tibetan word meaning ' The gates of Hell' between here and the Nepal border the river drops into a deep and extremely steep gorge a dirt road is cut into the side of this at times 1000 foot deep crack in the earth.

It was one of the most if not the most spectacular places I have ever seen, and is impossible at least for me to describe, but I will say that I was scared and humbled just looking at the raw power of this place.

The river falls of the Tibetan plateau at 4000m and only starts to lose gradient just after the Nepal border where I have kayaked from, 10 years before being here in Tibet.

The altitude at the border is not much over 1000 m its hard to know what the distance was due to the road switch backing a lot but I would guess the steepest part of this gorge to be around 1000 feet per mile a perhaps doable gradient in a small creek but this was the monsoon season with at least 3500 CFS [ Cubic feet per second ] and probably closer to 5000 CFS, and in an inescapable and at times unscoutable and unportageable canyon.

It was unbelievable, I have seen some steep unrunnable white water in my time and some giant rapids and waterfalls but nothing quite as dramatic, long and continuous as this.
There were waterfalls on top of waterfalls some of them more than 100 feet high, huge boulders sometimes blocking most of the river, the sides of the gorge were streaming with water falls hundreds of them one after the other all the way through the gorge, some of them well over 1000 feet tall.
The vegetation changed from the arid dry Tibetan desert to thick jungle teaming with life.

I can't do this place justice and neither do the photo's as it is hard to get a sense of scale, to a kayaker and perhaps anyone it is the stuff dreams and nightmares are made of.

Completing this Journey closed a circle in my life.
I was here at the border of Nepal and Tibet 10 years earlier kayaking the bhote Kosi river in Nepal from as high as it had ever been attempted at that time, then I had stood on Friendship bridge looking at the Tibetan Plateau and wondering what lay up stream let alone what adventures there must be in Tibet, now I know and I hope to return.

The top photo's here show the gorge looking upstream towards the Tibetan plateau if you look closely at the first photo in the top right corner you can see a line line cut in the hillside that is the road.
To help with scale the boulder in the center of the river as around 80 to 100 feet high !

The last photo is looking down from a bridge over looking a tributary creek a top a massive waterfall !

The Upper Upper Bhote Kosi. In Tibet.

2006-11-20T18:43:00.000-08:00

In my first post about kayaking in Tibet, [titled 'Tibet'] I told the story of the first know descent of the Upper Bhote kosi, which in Tibet is call the Shishipagma chu.

It was one of the highlights of our trip and arguably a world class white water run.
Here are some photo's of that river to go with the story in that first post about kayaking in Tibet.

The first photo's below show the area around Shisipagma mountain the only 8000 m mountain that is entirely in Tibet [ all other Tibetan eight thousanders are on the border with Tibet and Nepal ] it was also the last 8000 m peak to be climbed.
The following shots are the team at the put in for Shisipagma chu or Upper Bhote Kosi river here two rivers join and make the main river, after are ran this we went back and ran both tributary's completing the drainage.
All other shots are the Shisipagma chu upstream of the town of Nyalam which was our take out and a Tibetan word meaning -- ' The gates of hell '.

What lies downstream of 'The gates of hell' will be in the next post, but I will say that it was one of the most dramatic,scary,humbling and inspiring places I have seen.

Where it all started !

2006-11-19T22:15:00.000-08:00

I Just wanted to mention a new link I have put on my Blog, titled-- 'Where it all started, Kayaks and Paddles UK '
Check it out, it will take you to the best Canoe and kayak retail stores in the UK.

Kayaks and Paddles was the first of these stores and is where I started life as a professional kayaker [ This is not to say I make a living from just kayaking but that I make a living with in the sport one way or another, retail, instruction, safety kayaking, guiding , consulting, etc ]

Kayaks and paddles was started by Bob dyer who remarkably gave me a job when I knew nothing about selling kayaks or business or even talking with people, but I did know a fair bit about kayaks.
This was right at the start of his first store and now 10 years or more down the line this store and others have become a giant success.
Because I no longer live in the UK, I no longer work at Kayaks and paddles but I put my experience there as the main reason that I turned a sport into a life style.
Bob and the store gave me the confidence to go after what I wanted, he also gave me the time off I needed to pursue those goals including months at a time to travel to places like Nepal, Costa Rica and Ecuador where I completed many of the 30 or so first descents I have done.

It was always fun to work there, with constant humor and piss taking, it taught me that any thing can be achieved when you have the will to try, but at the same time to not take it to seriously, because what's the point unless it's fun.

I think I have stood by the philosophy of Kayaks and paddles [although we would never have said we had a philosophy, which is far to big a word for Bob anyway] in the way I chose to continue the kayaking lifestyle when others have slid away for more traditional life styles, personally I can't imagine a better way to live, at least for me, and I owe a lot of that to my time at Kayaks and Paddles.

We even invented new words that had great meaning to the people mad enough to understand them, words like Kermufittypuff and Numpty both of which are being used to some degree in the rafting and kayaking community I live in now in the USA.

Kayaks and paddles was the best start to the most enjoyable career I can imagine.

The photo's on this post were taken by Steve Brooks my good friend and often my kayaking partner when I lived in the UK.

From the top they show me about 10 years ago running rope swing falls on the river Plym, a class 5 run that gives the city of Plymouth its name and where I learnt a lot about white water.

Then we have one of the trips Bob gave me the time to do, this time in Corsica the birth place of extreme kayaking, a very young looking me runs a drop on the restonica river, I even had hair back in those days !

To this day even though I have not lived in the UK for almost 8 years I still have a good friendship with Bob and his Canoe shops team, and we still have fun dreaming up new and wacky ideas which are primarily just to make us laugh while maybe selling a few kayaks or something, watch this space for more news and also a new spot on the www.canoe-shops.co.uk website titled ' what's in the box Andy '

Thanks Bob.

Tibet's Dawa Chu

2006-11-09T18:06:00.000-08:00

The Dawa chu [ chu is Tibetan for creek ] is a tributary of the druksome river in eastern Tibet.
While we were there the Druksome and drucla river valleys were either very high or flooded and all the tibutary's were cranking few of them having been run before.

This one had seen a descent but we managed to put in further upstream than the last team, due to the willingness of are driver to take his truck up a difficult part of the dirt road that accesses the river.
The creek doesn't actually have a name so we named it Dawa chu after the name of our driver Dawa.
The creek proved to be much harder than it appeared from the road with extremely continuous class 5 white water.
At one point 2 of the team were getting worked at the same time in the same rapid but in different holes both managed to fight there way out, fortunate because swimming this creek was not really an option especially so because of the Altitude at 4000 m making everything harder physically.
This was one of the best creeks we did in Tibet. Set in a stunning valley.

The creek was also inside a national park where the Chinese officials did not allow kayaking, only hiking and sight seeing were allowed. I think this was mostly because they did not wish to have deaths with in the park and viewed kayaking as to dangerous.
So we had to run the river as somewhat of a secret mission, our driver saving us again when he was confronted by the Chinese at the take out, he managed to explain to them that we were just sight seeing, fortunately we were still high on the river at the time and the official's did not investigate further.

Rain and then some !!

2006-11-07T17:13:00.000-08:00

To follow up from the event's of yesterday [ see previous post ] after the epic surfing in rattlesnake rapid the rain kept coming all night and most of the next day the White Salmon along with most of the river in the Northwest flooding, the White Salmon being bigger than I have ever seen it and The Hood river blowing out hwy 35 off of mount Hood.
The shots here show BZ falls, maytag rapid, Husum falls [normally an 8 foot drop] and Dave Hammond running through rattlesnake rapid [ compare this to the pictures of rattlesnake in the previous post ]
It was a fun day on the river, but really to high for either the good playboating or the harder creeks to be in.

Rain at last.

2006-11-06T17:16:00.000-08:00

I don't mention much from my home base [ Washington state ] on this blog so here is a quick break from the posts on Tibet. [ I hope to post a bit more on Tibet soon ]

It has been raining here almost non stop for the last 5 days.
To an addicted kayaker such as myself rain is something we pray for and when it comes the excitement and anticipation of finally having water in the rivers is like looking forward to ....... well, ya know there's nothing I look forward to as much as this.
All the rain brought the White salmon river to a bank full flow [ 6 feet on the Husum gauge ]
I took advantage today by freestyle kayaking on Rattlesnake rapids wave, which goes off at this flow. Big air was possible, the only problem being large logs floating downstream which were hard to see from wave level.
A great day and it's still raining !

You got to pray.

2006-10-31T19:03:00.000-08:00

As I am sure y'all know Tibet is an extremely devout country comprised almost entirely of Buddhists.

I also knew this before arriving in Tibet and had witnessed it to some degree in Nepal 10 years earlier, but I was not quite prepared for the incredible commitment the Tibetans have towards there faith.

In Lhasa the Buddhists faith is perhaps the most remarkable and indescribable part of Tibetan culture.
Temple's adorned with huge golden statues of Buddha and other important figures in the Buddhist faith were mind blowing enough, but the people themselves stole the show-- every morning big crowds would be circumnavigating the most sacred temple in town most with prayer wheels in hand and many stop at the main entrance to prostrate, a system of movements where they go from standing with hands above head to there knees and then slide there hands along the ground to a fully laid out position face down on the ground with arms above head, then reverse the procedure to the standing position and repeat again and again sometimes for hours, indeed it gets even more remarkable when I learn that some Buddhist make pilgrimages from an area along way from Lhasa [ I don't remember the distance ] a process that would take them up to 6 months to complete because they prostate along the road the whole way!
Some would pull carts of bedding and food up the road leave it there,walk back to there starting point and then prostate back to the cart then repeat, therefore covering the distance 3 times.
When I first saw this I thought they were nuts but then I thought about what they would think of what I was doing-- throwing myself down rivers in a small plastic boat -- and I am sure I was the crazy one in there eyes, really I was also on a pilgrimage of my own, it just seemed to me to be a lot more fun than there's.

Other than temples and prayer wheels there are also prayer flags this doesn't sound all that amazing until you see where they are hanging and the amount that are hanging there.
This includes being stung across rivers and high across deep gorges, up on the cliffs of mountains often in such a way it was hard to see how it was done.
There was also huge amounts of prayer flags at every mountain pass along are journey.

Despite the pain this country has been through and still has to deal with due to the cultural revolution it is unbelievably stead fast in it's faith. There was in my mind often an strange sense of peace throughout the country and even in the city.

The Photos top to bottom -- Me following a Buddhist monk in the spinning of the prayer wheels, when in Rome ....

Tibetans prostrating in front of the Jokang temple in Lhasa

Dave surrounded by prayer flags on top of a 5018 m pass.

Day 2 on the rong buk chu [ River from Everest ]

2006-10-31T17:29:00.000-08:00

The second day on the Rong buk river from the village of Rong buk to a random spot where the road crosses the river and the river flattens and braids in class 1 and 2 rapids.

This section of the river proved to be considerably easier than day 1 from base camp [ Previous posts ] but incredibly fun it was generally very fast continuous class 3-4 and 4 + and had 2 small slot canyons, both of which contained the hardest rapids.

We had high water and I believe the run would be easier in low water but not as fun.
The whole team paddled well and we had no incidents. We lost a lot of altitude so getting enough oxygen in our lungs seemed much easier than at base camp the day before.

There were no big drops on the run but some of the most consistent gradient I have seen on any river.
Shortly after the second short canyon the river started to flatten out after this we paddled about 9 miles of class 2 to 3 in about 45 minutes due to the intense speed of the water.
We met are drivers at a convenient bridge right where the river braids into class 1 and 2 rapids.

We took out here and drove to our next adventure but the river does pick up again in a 5 km class 3 canyon before it drops into the upper upper Arun river gorges in a mad and unrunnable dive off the Tibetan plateau and into Nepal [ The Rong buk actually circumnavigates the northern half of mount Everest flowing north to east to south where is drops into the Arun ]

River from Everest --- 2

2006-10-31T16:31:00.000-08:00

Here's some pic's of the Rong buk river flowing through the glacial moraine mentioned in the previous post.
This is the lead out rapid and Dave sneaking around a monster class 5 + rapid about half way through.

Color in a bleak landscape. The kayaks wait while we scout.

River from Everest

2006-10-30T09:05:00.000-08:00

After are ride to Rong buk village the gate way to the north face of Everest [ describe in previous posts -Road to Everest ] we rested trying to acclimatize to the altitude at 5000 m doing anything slightly strenuous at this altitude left me breathless and after our first day on the upper part of the river I had a severe and worrying headache that fortunately was gone by the next morning.

After a day of rest we rode the horse driven carts [ pictured in previous post ] about 10 miles up a dirt road to Everest base camp which is basically a bunch of seasonal tents where you can still buy Coca cola.
The road is actually drivable but motor vehicles are not allowed due to the Conservation effort taking place here, it is also a way for the locals to make money from tourists wishing to visit Everest base camp without having to walk of which there are many. [ As well as mountianeers shipping there equipment to base camp ]
We arrived at base camp to crowds of Tibetans wondering what the hell we were planning to do with are old shaped plastic jelly beans.
Tibetans never go in the water of a fast moving river regarding it as far to dangerous and were obviously shocked and scared about are intention to paddle down the river.

The Rong buk river here was flat, shallow and cold it flowed from under Everest's north glacier only a few miles upstream.
We put on and floated down stream the river gradually picking up speed, soon we reached a massive glaciel moraine that the rong buk cut through at around 350 to 400 feet per mile.

We scouted the whole moraine, parts of it looked good but all the good parts flowed directly into class 6 rapids with only a few sketchy eddy's to stop, most of the group decided to portage the whole moraine but myself and Dave started discussing the possibility's which involved running the good stuff, catching the must make eddys portageing the bad stuff and possibly sneaking around some of it.
It was a problem solving activity made much harder in the thin air, paddling class 5 up here left me completely breathless but still having to paddle hard for the next eddy.

The moraine was exciting and went smoothly for both of us we paddled more of it than expected the portages were short and with the exception of one fairly easy, the one was on a lose scree slope sliding directly into the class 6 rapids we were walking around.
The water was exceptional hard to read due to everything being the same color, water,rocks mountains all looked like I would imagine that moon to look like --totally grey.
The last rapid exiting the moraine was a long class 5 pin ball machine, just a Total mess of water and rocks with no choice but to bounce of off rocks and pin spots sometime unseen under the silty flow, it was hectic stuff, I was relieved to join the rest of the gang after there successful portage of the moraine.
From here the river eased off a little but was still extremely fast class 4 perhaps at times class 4+ really fun stuff, we cruised down the river until we reached are camp back at the Rong buk village and monastery, our plan being to rest and put back on the river the next day down to where it braids out into class 2.

The road to Everest --2

2006-10-30T08:43:00.000-08:00

Here's a couple more shots of our ride to Everest base camp that go with the previous post.

The road to Everest

2006-10-29T08:23:00.000-08:00

Here are a few shots to follow up on the post below. [ Tibet ]

Our Journey to Mount Everest was a long brutal dirt road over a 5000m pass, finally arriving at the village of Rong buk. [ seen here in the shot of a small monastery with prayer flags, Mount Everest is in the clouds in the background, see previous post for a photo of the mountain ]

From here we hired small horse driven carts to Everest base camp out put in at 5200m.
The Roug buk river here was flat,small and very cold having just flowed from the glacier only a few KM upstream.
In about 1/2 a mile it dived into a steep glacial moraine the rapids were a mess of silt laden class 5 + and class 6 portages, having scouted most of the group decided to portage this mile long section but 2 of us decided to give it a go.
The next post will have the story of our descent, as well as some shots of the river.

TIBET

2006-10-27T20:25:00.000-07:00

Well it's been a long time, but fortunately I am no longer stuck in Tena as my last post about 8 months ago suggests.

I have been fairly busy this year working but mostly playing all over the place including Washington my home base, B.C. where I tried to run the Stikine river but chickened out as it was so friggin' big !! At least to me it was.

There was also Idaho and Montana but the Highlight of the year and a very big Highlight of my life so far was a 6 week kayaking trip to Tibet, where I paddled with 5 British friends [ Actually 3 of them I didn't know but now they are some of the best friends I could ever hope to have ] together we kayaked all over Tibet and knocked off numerous first descents including one that had been thought about and looked at for many years by adventurous kayakers, in fact I had been wondering what lay upstream on the Bhote Kosi river in Nepal ever since I paddled the river from the border with Tibet 10 years ago.
I remember standing On friendship bridge looking up, way up at the Tibetan plateau and saying to myself one day I would return and explore the Tibetan part of this river and other rivers in Tibet.

Unexpectedly the dream came true when my friends invited me to join them on there Tibetan adventure made possible both logistically and financially by Chris Jones of the adventures company Wind horse Tibet based in Lhasa .
[ Thanks Chris ]

The Upper Bhote didn't actually come together until the last week of our trip but we found a perfect gem of a river about 25 KM of class 4 and 5 pushy water but with no portages, our takeout was at the town of Nyalam which is Tibetan for 'The Gates of Hell' and indeed this did seem like a gateway to hell -- the river here dropped of the Tibetan plateau in the most dramatic and unrunnable gorge I have ever seen, about 3500 cfs falls at over 1000 feet a mile in a 500 foot deep gorge with a very scary dirt road cut into the side of the vertical walls !
Fortunately we all caught the last eddy at Nyalam before entering Hell some of us were so emotional at the take out here that there were tears not just for having survived the river but for surviving the whole trip, being in such an amazing place and realizing dreams.

I whole trip was incredible but another Highlight and a highlight of my personal kayaking career had to be kayaking from Everest base camp on the Tibet side where a river call the Rong bok drains the Tallest mountain in the world.
Here we rode small horse drawn carts with our kayaks up to 5200 M and Everest base camp, although we had all acclimatized to the altitude having spent weeks in Tibet often over 4000M the thin air up here made every movement more difficult and we were facing solid class 5 to class 5 + with class 6 portages for the first mile or so of the run where the river dives through a massive glacial moraine, after this was incredible class 4 and 4 + continuous and very fast white water made that much harder in the thin air, all in the shadow of the most spectacular mountain I have laid eyes on.
I hope to post a few times showing Photos of Tibet and it's rivers. I also Hope to go back one day.
For now though the shot above is Mount Everest's north face looking up the Ronk buk valley, we put on the river upstream of here and not far downstream of the bottom of the glacier.

Stuck in Tena

2006-02-22T08:45:00.000-08:00

The other day we ran the rio Pano which joins the rio Tena right here in town. It is a fun run that requires a lot of water, which is why we may have been only the second group to descend this fast class 4 run.
Getting to the river proved to be much more difficult than actually running the river. This is because the province of Napo, of which Tena is the capitol, is in the middle of a road strike so there are no Buses or local Taxis opperating; in fact, I heard of one taxi driver who tried to work, only to get rocks thrown at his truck by the locals, nearly breaking his windshield. Eventually we found a private truck owner that was willing to take us, mainly because his windshield was already toast and a few more cracks would not have made any difference.

By the time we got to our put in it was about 5 pm with only 1 1/2 hours of daylight left. We would have to go fast! I was up front and managed to run everything blind without the need for catching eddys; we had mostly open boulder gardens so it was pretty easy to see the line. We made it to the class 2 sections just as the lights went out and were able to float the rest of the way to town in the dark.
It was a good day but the strike is still on and while out this morning shopping for breakfast I found nearly all the local shops closed and boarded up with their roll down metal doors. One bakery was open and while I was buying fresh bread, at least 3 large and loud protests came parading up the main street.
My Spanish is not so great, but as far as I can make out they are basically pissed at the road strike although I am not sure if they're annoyed at the bus drivers striking because they can't go anywhere or at the government for not doing anything about the strike, which is basically about the bad quality of the roads in the Napo province.

There seemed to be a lot of activity, especially for Ecuadorians who usaully just can't be assed to do anything if it involves work or getting out of bed !
Personally I think they are pretty stupid, not for having the strike but for the timing of their strike. This weekend is carnival weekend where the entire country goes into party mode for no apparent reason other than just another excuse to not do any work, or anything for that matter.
Carnival weekend is perhaps a time when there is more travelling by locals on buses then any other time of year apart from maybe New Year's !
This to me, and others, suggests that having a road strike right before carnival is not the best of ideas when you consider how badly the Napo province wants money [ just like every province ] and surely the Ecuadorain government realises this as well, and are just biding their time until those Napo idiots realise they are only shooting themselves in there own feet ! Why oh why did they not wait until after the carnival ?
Perhaps I am missing the point and all they want to do is really piss off everybody and have no one on their side ? But either way I am not surprised that they didn't think it through in a little more detail because that would involve 2 things that not too many Ecuadorains can comprehend: work and organisation.
Mean while Val and I are stuck in Tena, unable to get to the river to go kayaking although apparently one of the roads going south is now open. The trouble is it goes directly to the largest tourist center in Ecuador, the town of Banos. Now, if Tena does not open up from the north all the folks that would have come here [mostly from Quito ] for carnival are going to go somewhere else becuase they won't miss a good excuse to party. That somewhere else is just about graranteed to be Banos, so with this situation in mind, those of you reading this who know me well, even know me badly, will know that a party of this size and nature would repesent Hell on Earth to me. Fortunately for me Val feels the same.
Soooo we are indeed stuck in Tena, which really isn't so bad. It's warm and there are lots of stupid people to laugh at. I just hope the roads open before we are due to fly out of Quito a week from today.
Another thing I noticed while viewing the protests on the main street is that a number of the protesters had made signs saying ' Soy Primitivo '. Now, as I have mentioned, I have a very basic grasp of the culture and language here, but 'Soy Primitivo ' directly translates to: ' I am primative ' ! Now call me stupid but I don't quite get this statement and feel that it would be the equivalent to going on a protest march in Portland for what ever reason with a big well printed sign on my shirt or in the window of my car saying ' I'm a slapper', or as Val so eloquently put it, " I'm a fucking monkey in the jungle ". Perhaps this is just the way it is done here, but I am at a loss and feel the need to rant and rave, after all there is not much else to do while stuck in Tena.

[ above is a shot of the Rio Jondachi one of the finest runs in Ecuador, just wish I could get to it but I 've managed to run it a lot in the last few months so I am not to bothered I guess it is time to relax for a while ]