Wye, Wye, Wye, Delilah

So on the Yukon there is a decent size rapid - called five finger rapids its a set of rocky outcrops that make 5 channels (the 5 fingers).  Four of these offer imminent death, the fifth is runnable and a piccy from the Skagway News shows a voyager going through, like this

We decided that we needed a bit of rough water paddling and persuaded others at the club that they fancied a trip to the Wye which creates the border of England and Wales.

Day one we paddled from Ross on Wye solo to our campsite at Symonds Yat East.  15 miles solo, arriving home about 6.5 hours after we set off, at a leisurely pace, against a strong wind all the way.

There were thoughts of camp cooking in the evening but to be frank the weather was not co-operating and the food in the Saracens Head pub is good.  You could tell that its been a good days club canoeing when the conversation just gets bizarre.  We played pictionary and solved pandas' infertility problems on only 2 pints each.

 For a change we had more ladies than gents but the club seems to be moving that way

Sunday morning Esther and I left the group playing on the rapid for the first 2 hours and practised some windy paddling - wind over current was kicking up the kind of waves that every so often filled Ester's lap with water - it was great.  We paddled up stream fighting until we could go no further (1.6 miles upstream) before turning around, hitting the really bumpy wavy bit and then doing it all again - we covered about 6 miles in under 2 hours which we are happy with as we were paddling against current half of the time.

We then donned helmets before heading towards the rapid.  Usually I like to stop and play in eddies on the way down but we were on a mission and were aiming to go down keeping the stroke rate up and it seemed to work with us pulling into an eddy at the bottom to have a chat with friends.








We then practised breaking out and in and ferry gliding as a tandem (I'm a solo whitewater paddler preferring to tip myself in the water).  As we worked up the higher parts we slightly lost our ferry angle and straightening out into an s turn caught the edge on the eddy line and were off swimming down river.

2 lessons from this:

1.  Esther is to keep hold of the boat as on the Yukon you can't hijack Phil and his boat to to and catch up.
2.  Always make sure your long line (and not the short one) is on the boat that way you only have to swim yourself and the end of the rope into shore and not keep the whole boat on one arm, the paddle on the other and oops there is no arm to swim with.

A few more crosses and it was time for lunch and soaked to the skin I called it a day.  However we had forgotten about getting the boats back to the centre so in  jeans and dry clothes we got all of the unused boats back up the river.  After that I wandered along the path and took photos of the others playing on the rapid.

It was great to combine training with a fun weekend away with friends and there are a few more like it planned.




S

Sore bottoms, moodiness and excellent snacks!

So another week of evening training and what to do for the weekend?  On Saturday I went Easter Egg Hunting with friends at Disreli's joint. But Sunday was paddling day.  

We had a target of a 30 mile paddle from Windsor to Kew, along the Thames, so caught the train, with the boat in the bag, and after a very short walk were at the riverside assembling the boat.  

Then we got the boat down these stairs - that was fun, with a bit of paddling at the bottom.

And we were off heading away from Windsor - it's a shame we didn't get a piccy of the castle - Neither of us checked to see if her madge was at home.

This stretch is under Heathrow's flight path and we got a good view of the underbelly of many aircraft as they went over.

It got closer than it looked

Canoe Rollers at Richmond

I had my first experience of a floating dock made of many sections of air filled plastic  - quite amusing to feel the dock fall away from you as you step onto it.  We stopped  for a quick consult of the map.  As you can see we finally got a sunny day - I spent it in a t-shirt and then paid the price with lobster red arms.

Instead of portaging we mainly went through the locks and we took the opportunity to have our snacks as we waited for the water to drain out.  It was a meatball all round day, although I remain of the view that Esther is adding pasta.




Now this being a bit of a longer paddle we saw the first instances of moodiness.  Esther just stopped talking and was real head down.   Now when I'm a bit pooped I start singing - any nonsense but Esther goes really quiet so I decided to take advantage of the quiet!






Richmond lock is only open for the 2 hours either side of high tide and unfortunately we were a bit too late.  It's a long lock and I thought that we would have a long portage, then the man from the PLA pointed us to the canoe rollers so that you just pull the boat down the ramp.  A lot easier than the long carry.  What I didn't realise is that I would be sitting at the bottom for hours waiting for Esther to go to the loo.

Sarah waiting restlessly

I was a bit restless as all of this sitting in the boat with minimal movement was, to be brief, giving me a slightly numb bum.



Now I am told that I have ample in built cushioning but I think something may have to be done before the race in terms of padding and obtaining more in built padding is not the answer.

We arrived at Kew around 7.5 hours after we started, which owing for the loo stop and waiting to go through locks is, we think, quite a respectable time for a 30 mile paddle.

We then took the boat home, firstly on a double decker bus, then the train (from the station by Kew Gardens) and then Sarah walked in 20 minutes up hill to her house dragging the 24kg boat and with a HUGE  bag of kit.  That has to be the worst part of the day.

We'll be posting soon about our exploits on the river Wye.

Sarah

Of broken boats and meeting fellow crazy people

So Easter has been and gone.  Dan and I went to Holland to De Kluft recreation centre.  It's in the middle of no where and has nots of water.

We hired a Trekkershut and Sarah argued with AirFrance about the fact that paddles are similar dimensions to skis and if you can take skis for free you should be allowed paddles.  We had a plan for hiring a canoe, paddling to the shops, stocking up and a good weekends paddling from our hut.

The weather didn't climb above freezing all weekend - not a problem as the hut was toasty.  The canals were frozen every day.  Frozen to the point that the ice only broke if you threw a really big stick at them really hard.  Powered boats were capable of passing if they had 2 people with large poles breaking the ice in front of the boat.  Clearly no canoeing.  The friends I had lunch with yesterday said that only I could plan a paddling trip on frozen rivers (thanks ladies) but then I'm not sure that they know anyone else who plans paddling trips.

The frosty view from our trekkershut

I satisfied myself with cold weather training by going cycling and walking in the snow.  It was fun but no canoe

We did get some boating - this is Dan operating the self service chain ferry across one of the waterways.








Tuesday we went to paddle as normal.  As I got in the boat I noticed water - thought nothing of it as the splashy woman in front had already got in.  As we paddled round and round the water was growing and not coming from the splashy woman (that usually hits me before pooling on the bottom of the boat).  The more water, the more unstable our tippy IC1 gets so we decided to change boats before the inevitable happened.   Turns out we have about a 5 inch gash on the bottom of the boat - not sure how it occurred whilst in storage but its time to learn fibreglass repair.

Out again in a more solid royalex beast to finish off the evening - we can really get those things moving these days.

To add to our excitement this week we met one of the guys going for a place in Interserve's non veterans boat.  He was on our beginners course which unfortunately for him focuses on kayak (we may have offered a little canoeing help).   They have whole PT plans to follow and organised trips to Scotland.  Feel quite jealous of the amount that they get organised but at least we won't have 7 smelly boys in a boat with us.  Added to that they seem to be skirting the toilet issue which as you have seen here needs dealing with early.  8 people all needing the loo at different times, thats a lot of shore leave.  They do, however, have a support team which I am most jealous of.

Oh well more soon as we are racking up some miles on our training paddles now.