Went to the X-fest and came back with “balls” on my shirt

I suppose a general lack of kayakers in explorers meant that only Dave, Justin and myself headed down to Underberg for the Thrombi X-fest. We left a little later than planned mostly due to the powers of the room, which upset me mostly because I had been at work and not in the room. We arrived at the X-Fest late into the night thanks to some interesting navigating in the mist and rain, with the most featured road in the world providing some extra entertainment. We put up the tent had a beer and went to bed.

Our breakfast plan of pronutro went to pot thanks to some awesome bacon and eggs rolls for sale, I’m sure everyone at the festival has egg on the pants. After a fair amount of fannying about Dave and I decided to enter the kayak sprint race, a little worried that we had never seen the river before. Luckily we paddled the section over which the sprint race was being held Philip Classens and Adrian Vroom. This included two of the bigger rapids on the section: “Slot machine” and “Super tube”. With no major chaos we our minds were put at ease.

Previously this race had a Le Mans start format, this year an interesting start ramp had been built barely wide enough to fit three boats never mind four. Dave was put up against a three other paddlers in creek boats and never really had a chance. He managed to cock-up the run somewhat needing to roll at least half a dozen times. My race was more competitive as there were only two other paddlers both in play boats. I cocked it up right from the start getting off the ramp late and hence playing catch up. I cocked it up more by getting flipped at the bottom of slot machine. At the end I was getting creamed. There was one more twist in the tail however for Dave and I, the race was longer than the section we paddled in the morning and included one more drop. Both of us took horrible lines and needed to roll at the bottom but all was good.

Justin and I entered the croc race expecting to kick as….well we never. There were some pro canoeists in our group, this wasn’t all bad as we go to drink beer sooner. I went to bed early and Justin kept on drinking beer so I’ll have to let him account for what happened.

Then next day Dave and I ran the river down to the falls with Adrian T, Luke and Vroom. What an awesome section of river lots of big drops and long rapids with short pools. We got to the falls without incident, Adrian T and Luke ran the falls while the rest started the long walk out the gorge.

Thrombi X-Fest

ok - so Neil beat me to the post... oh well, was such an awesome event it deserves two posts. Wrote this a few days ago, was going to add pictures but won't bother now seeing as Neil has put some in. By the way - if you're wondering about the "balls on chests" thing - just have a look at the t-shirt sometime...

We went to Thrombi, and came back with "balls" on our chests...

So Justin, Neil and I headed down the dreaded N3 on Friday afternoon, towards the Umzimkulu River and the Thrombi X-Fest ("Thrombi" is a section of the Umzimkulu known as Thrombosis Gorge, near Underberg). Luckily Neil's car held up on the long drive (thanks Neil's Car) and we arrived at the campsite after getting lost (well, we weren't really lost but we didn't really know where we were going...) via Underberg. It was drizzling and miserable, so after a quick erection (of the tent) and a beer we retired to the dryness for some kip. Justin didn't have faith in my old school Vango tent, and claimed that he got a little wet in the night - I told him to stop peeing in his sleeping bag.

We woke up to a fantastic breakfast of bacon, egg, bread, all mushed together and dehydrated to make the wonder food we all know and love as Pronutro. After staring at the box for a while we went down to the tent and got real bacon and egg rolls - no brainer really, especially when you have no bowls or spoons, and the long life milk looks like Crogan punched it in the face.

We entered the kayak race, after fannying about a bit, and tried to join up with a trip to the waterfall. We ended up missing this trip, but ran the race section with Phillip and Vroom. Only three rapids really: Tonsils, Slot Machine and Supertube. Tonsils was just a drop into a hole really, slot machine was a little more tricky with a lead in and then a nice twisty hole to sort you out at the bottom. Supertube is probably the biggest rapid on the stretch, with a tricky lead in rapid (stay right or middle right), ending in a blind drop into a "supertube" to the left. At this level we went just left of the indicator wave at the top of the drop - great rapid. From here it's a relatively easy walk back to the field at the start.

We then did the race, after being informed that there was no more "lemans start", instead all 3/4 kayakers in each heat would have to slide down a dodgy looking contraption on river left, into a pool about a foot deep... hmmmm. Anyway, no-one broke an arm or anything (not on the slide anyway). I was a spectacular last in my heat (although I was the only playboat in a field of much faster creekers - but I would have been last anyway). There was a bit of a suprise at he end, when it wasn't - the end that is. After finishing supertubes we were beckoned from downriver towards the "new" finish, which included a small drop and a massive one. Running the last rapid (and finding out it was a 3 metre drop) before the finish completely tired and completely blind was pretty interesting.

Pictures, and more article to follow later...

Buffalo: Fugitives Drift - Buffelshoek

After the planned trip to the Malibamatso River (in Lesotho) didn't happen due to lack of water, a few of us decided to go paddle anyway. After frantically arranging a lift at the last minute with Adrian and Vroom, we all set off towards a pub in Vryheid (where Robin and Ronnie had been since luchtime...). I was in the back of Vroom's bakkie - and with no window to the cab, was kept company by a six-pack of BL and Adrians photo album. There were murmurings of paddling Buffalo, I thought we were paddling Bivane (which would have been similar to Mali - read: easier than Buffalo). Turns out that all the paddlers that had not pulled out were pretty keen on Buffalo, and where all much better kayakers than me... hmmm. So, a little apprehensive about the paddling a big river the next day, I was keen for an early night. Of course, this meant that we stayed at the pub till midnight (with many rubber arms being twisted) and eventually ended up sleeping in the garden of the waitress that had been serving us...

The next morning we were woken with a tray of coffee (look out for "Natalie's Backpackers", opening soon in Vryheid) and promises of breakfast. We gracefully declined (didn't want to take advantage after all)
and headed off towards the river, with a stop in Dundee for breakfast and pink Gorillas.

The river was steepish, and high volume (100-150 cumecs) - very pushy water. I started to regret overpacking my boat, and was enviously eyeing out Robin's Expedition Solo. The first few rapids provided a nice warm up - were very long but the lines were pretty obvious and there weren't really any retentive holes around. Soon though, we came upon this rapid:

Philip had ended up on the right, and opted to walk around the massive pourover ("because there was no-one there to throwbag him"). Vroom and Adrian ran a less intimidating (but still tricky) line down the left. Another steep, fast drop finished off this rapid (see more photos on my gallery - unfortunately this was the only place I got my camera out). Robin decided early on to walk around this rapid, and rather than fanny about deciding whether to run it or not, I joined him. I put in in a side stream and bumbled down to the bottom of the rapid.



Somwhere along the line (near the beginning) we all dropped into a massive hole while running a seemingly "innoccent" looking (but still massive) wavetrain-type rapid. The wave-hole was about 2-3 metres high and spanned the river, so there was no way around it. It backlooped all of us I think, but luckily wasn't very retentive. Good times.

It's been a while since I paddled with a nose-plug, but the amount of rolling I was doing in this very dirty river made it a neccessity for my dodgy sinuses. As the day wore on I started bonking a little, and the rolls started getting a little sluggish. I hadn't done any real paddling in about 3 months due to a rotator cuff injury, and was feeling the effects of my not-fitness. The river was also testing my read-and-run abilities, with some quick ferries around massive holes and dodgy creases a requirement every now and then.

A serious learning experience, made better by being in the company of some good paddlers.

The next day a few of us pulled soft and paddled the commercial section, declining the offer to paddle the slightly more difficult Rorke's Drift - Fugitive's Drift section. I'm sorry to have missed it - but it's not going anywhere...

Lots more info and photos on Adrian Tregoning's Site.

Upper Blyde

Daav and I headed up to the Blyde river in Limpopo last weekend. The original plan was to paddle with Hugh, which didn't happen. Instead we crashed at Chris Huddle's place and bumed along on a Blyde river adventures commercial trip.

The drive into the canyon is a long one but well worth it. The scenery and river is awesome, a cool clear river flow though the third largest canyon in the world. But the rapids make it even better. The run starts of fairly easy with a few smallish drops and bony rapids. I made a meal of Island rapid by getting broached half way down, but I sorted it out with a little shoulder contact on the many rocks below.
After the lunch stop about 6km down the river starts to get really good, with lots of low volume drops and steep rapids.
Just as it starts to get late you meet up with the dam and catch a ferry across what would be a long hall into a head wind.

Good times, awesome river and looking forward to the Blyde fest.