Road Trip 2011
So you may have noticed over the last 6 months there has been a distinct lack of blogs on my creek and big water paddling. This was because I was focusing purely on my racing at this years Junior European Championships, which took place in Bosnia, however within 3 days after the Europeans Joe Morley and I had started the drive out to mainland Europe with 4 plastic boats on the roof. Our plan was to drive straight to Prague for a few days of freestyle paddling on the 2008 freestyle world cup site, also home to many international slalom competitions.
All packed up and ready to go
Creeking In Czech
On arrival to Prague a BBQ was quickly assembled and by 11:30 the steaks were cooked and readily consumed after the 14+ hour drive out. In the morning I woke early, as per usual after a late night, so took a look at the river. My heat sunk seeing that the level of the main river was far too high for the slalom course, leaving the channel backed up and washed out, no use for paddling at all. I quickly made the plan that we were not staying in Prague, I was already having serious withdrawal symptoms from not paddling for 5 days. Seeing the high water level, I knew there must be something good running somewhere, but not knowing any non Czech slalomists i was stuck for ideas, After a quick look on the Pyranha Team Page, and a facebook message to Katerina Migdauova we had a plan. We head up to North Czech with Katerina and many of her friends to a small town names Jizerske Hory. Here the scenery was becoming ever more mountainous with passing many swollen rivers which were getting my heart pumping and ready to run some real water. We parked in a small carpark filled with many paddlers cars and brightly coloured boats. We followed the group up the valley, after a reasonably long steep drive, we went over the brow of a hill to see a huge bowl like valley, filled with small wooden houses, it reminded me of a western film as the camera shows the cowboys looking upon the Indian settlement.
We paddled a small tributary which joined the main river for about a mile. The river was very steep, very rocky and incredibly good fun. The top was tight narrow and gnarly, which certainly put me on my toes after not paddling a creek boat for many months. The river then opened out following the confluence of two other rivers to give some bigger, and deeper technical rapids.
Nice technical rapid on our first river
We then decided to paddle the Kamenica, a river which I would describe as a steeper, wider and bigger Washburn. This river was exceedingly good fun, continuous rapids all the way down. It ended with a 15-20 foot weir, one that local paddlers were wary of due to a shallow landing and strong tow back. After careful inspection and giving Joe first the camera, then the throwline I was psyched to run the drop. I got some run on the boat, and looked for my line, a strong boof off the lip landed me flat at the bottom, with lots of speed to clear the tow back.
Final drop on the Kamenice
My experience in Czech was very positive, and I would definitely encourage people to go paddle there more often and get it on the map!
Wild Water Racing Junior World Championships
The next place on our trip was Opava, Home to the 2011 Wild Water Junior Worlds. A week was spent there, learnin the lines and racing. The river was exceedingly flat, favoring bigger stronger paddlers, however GB fought hard and came out with some reasonable results.
It was a great week and it was especially to meet up with friends which I had met on previous trips. It was especially good to see the amount of paddlers who did not just do Wild Water. Haley Popp, a fellow NRS team paddler raced well, along with her younger brother Bryson who raced in C2 Class. There was also a very large number of slalom paddlers who competed in wild water alongside their slalom racing.
Team race in Czech
Time for the main event
On arrival in Austria life was once again balanced. My slalom and wild water paddling had been the priority, but now it was just me and the rivers, able to choose what to paddle, what lines to take and ultimately how far I wanted to push my self. Many rivers were paddled during the ten days Joe and I were in Austria but I will only speak about the highlights. We started the trip with a medium level run of the Inn Shoot and Landeck Gorge.
Inn Shoot and Landeck Gorge
The Inn Shoot is one of the best sections of water I have paddled to date. It is a continous 3km run with large steep waves and huge holes. Joe had told me about this run, saying it was a lot of fun so it was high up on the hit list for both of us. We ran it 3 times during the week, the latter two times on high water.
We paddled it first with me, Joe and Oz Rowdon, a slalom paddler from the UK. We got in, and started the decent towards the gorge. My heart was now pumping, eagerly awaiting to see what the river looked like at water level, not 100 feet up! The whole run was non-stop paddling, powering threw the edges of holes and fighting over waves to see what the next section would bring. the river flattened off until Landeck gorge approached giving a nice short ending rapid. When paddled later in the week at high water it just got bigger!
Lower Venter Ache - My favourite run to date!
The Lower Venter Ache was quite simply amazing. Large(very large)continuous rapids for 6km.Joe and I had paddled the top half earlier in the week,and were determined to paddle the rest.We headed up to the get in and met with a group of Czech guys.The river was still high due to glacial melt,way over the guide books high water recommendation,however the Czech guys had already run it once that morning, so despite the higher level, Jo and I decided to give it a go.
The first rapid on the Ventre Ache starts as you break out of the put in eddy and doesn't stop till the get out!
The river is fast and narrow, a little wider than the Tryweryn.It had continuous high, peaky waves and large holes, some of which went across the whole river.The gorges were seriously steep with no exit. Very intimidating when some of the biggest water I had ever seen was in there!
The river was still rising sharply when we got off the water but we couldn't resist one more run. It was bigger still and so fast that we only did 3 breakouts during the entire 6km stretch!
Lower Oetz
The Lower Oetz is a classic run.In low water it is a run much like the Tay, in high water it just keeps getting bigger with large standing waves and munchy holes to punch.The highlights of the Oetz for me have to be the standing play wave below the 'extreme danger weir' which saw me doing clean spins and surfing all day, and the rapid on the following corner, where there is literally a wall of water standing in front of me and which I had no choice but to punch through.
Super Glassy Wave
Brandenburger Ache
I had been pretty excited about this run all week. Joe had been bigging it up for the past 6 months, so I was anxious to see it for myself. Getting onto the river,after briefly looking at the first gorge from a foot wide path literally cut into the face of the cliff and from quite high up left a lot of unknowns, especially quite how big the water really was down below!The first gorge was steep ans fast with small drops all the way down, ending with a curl off a wall into a deep recirculating hole which had me quickly flipped and rolling.The best thing about this river was the length. I think the section we paddled was about 16km. Even better is that the river doesn't really slow down for any great distance before you are in the next over hanging gorge and working your way down the another rapid.It was quite an exhilarating experience to paddle through a gorge not much more than 3m wide with cliffs towering above,and indeed over your head. About half way down there was one short portage, due to a drop with a tree in the hole, however the portage was so steep and tricky at the time it almost seemed safer to run the rapid. The last section was again in a gorge and had a small drop with a nasty hole at the bottom,which saw a few of the team having to bounce off a wall or fight their way out of the hole.
A flat section of the Brandenburger-A relatively rare site
Upper Pitzbach
The Upper Pitzbach was also a good run, a technical rocky 8km made us on our toes. It also had a nice little boof half way down...
Nice little boof on the Pitzbach
Augsburg
On the way back, Augsburg seemed like a good place to have a rest break from driving, and of course a short "loops" session...
Looping the Burn - Video to come!
And thus ends the post.I had the time of my life paddling out in the Alps, something I plan to do again as soon as possible. the experience I have gained from my time out there has made me much more confident and I am now really looking forward to Sickline in a month or twos time!
Thanks
I would first like to thank Joe for joining me on the trip, he was great to have along and made things run smoothly. I would also like to thank NRS, Lightning Paddles and Pyranha as my gear really did serve me well throughout the trip. In addition to this I would like to thank White Water Centre, Nelo Kayaks and GoPro for their continued support. I will also thank desperate Measures on behalf of Joe for supporting him.
David Bain
