Flat spins on Stanley

Today was a good day. After about a year of trying to flat spin on a wave and falling in a lot I finally managed it!
A flat spin, for the uninitiated in the world of playboating, is where you spin around while surfing on a wave. So a flat spin on flat water is just turning your boat around 360 degrees. On a wave, this becomes rather tricky!

This morning was very cold and snowy:

The roads were pretty sketchy! But I finally got there and we headed up to the Linn to have a look at the scary.

That orange dot on the far side is Jon.

We ran away downstream and went for a surf at the corner wave.

It doesn't photograph well, but it is an awesome wave with the weirdest eddy service ever. I tried for a spin, managed to get backwards and couldn't quite believe I was still upright so went for the rest of the turn and got all the way around! I had a screamy celebration and then, just to make sure it wasn't a fluke I went back on the wave and did another two spins in one ride. Woop!
We paddled down to the Thistlebrig wave, but it wasn't running very well.

So we went downstream to Wee Eric:

Photos of me by Paul Crossan:

Much flatspinning!!! It was awesome.

The Water of Ruchill

I got a text this morning from Craig.

"Are you still going to the Tilt?"

Sleepily I replied, "Still going out, but maybe not the Tilt" as I checked the water levels online.

"Definitely not the Tilt."

We all met up in Comrie and drove up the glen to the put in for the Water of Ruchill, a surprisingly large river that only goes in spate conditions. It was relatively low today, but still good grade 2/3 fun with a big scary grade 4+ gorge section in the middle that was easier to portage than I thought it was going to be!

At the put in.

Snow!

Grade 3 ledge drop.

Grade 3 ledge drop. Picture by Kirstie Macmillan

The gorge is a sequence of three large drops that would probably be grade four on their own. All together with very little breathing space in between they are a scary proposition. Apparently at high levels the whole thing is a monstrous grade 5+ which is very believable.

Jon commented afterward that "It's been a long time since I scared myself like that." I'm very ok with not having run the gnar!

Drop 1 in the gorge sequence of 3, pretty scary.

Drop 2 in the gorge.

Drop 3 in the gorge.

Jon in drop 1, photo by Kirstie Macmillan.

The guide book says to portage on the right, but the left bank looked much nicer, and it certainly was. A pull up a steep bank led to the top of the gorge cliffs and it was a straightforward walk across a field and slide down a muddy ravine back to the river.

Pulling up the first steep bank of the portage.

Portage selfie!

The picture makes it look much less steep than it was.

Back at the river, waiting for the others.

I got a bit bored, they took a long time to come down.

The final small drop out of the gorge. The third large drop
is in the background.

Happy Calum!

Continuing on down the river there was lots of grade 2 bouncy bits then a surprise grade 3 with a rather sticky hole that I side surfed for a couple of worried seconds before sneaking out the end and doing the rest of the rapid backwards! There were loads of red kites in this section wheeling around above us in the snow and we saw a couple of small deer running away from us.

Me and Jon floating down in the snow. Photo by Kirstie Macmillan.

Then we hit the flat near Comrie and discovered a sort of tree graveyard. The sun came out just as we got to Comrie!

Log jam!

Comrie, the confluence of the Ruchill and the Earn.

How not to paddle the Tilt

Mid November and water levels have been a bit mental. On Friday 14th the Tilt was running at a record level for about a decade, so when Jon H said he wanted to do the Tilt at the weekend, I was a little unsure. However, like the Braan, the Tilt does not hold its water, and it was running low on Sunday, so it didn't actually seem too ridiculous.
We met at the take out and had a right faff looking at the take out rapid and chatting about the rugby the day before. Note: when you have limited daylight, don't faff about inspecting the last rapid of the river when you could easily do this when/if you get there.
The Tilt Estate understandably do not like people driving up their track and leaving cars around the place on the narrow road, so we quickly drove the boats up to the top in the van, launched them out and drove back to the take out. Then came the fun bit - lets walk 6km. This took a while and we probably faffed a bit trying to see down into the gorge in places. Note: when you have limited daylight, you should probably do things with a bit more urgency.

Are we there yet?

Finally we reached the boats, got kitted and walked the little bit more to the put in.

Some paddling around, practice rolls and we were off. The first rapid, Genesis, is a nice grade 4- that I mostly didn't notice as Gina capsized on the lead in and I was too busy trying not to crash into her head.

I got her paddles and Jon H got her boat and we reunited all three, although since she wasn't feeling on top form, Gina walked out at the first bridge to meet us at the next bridge and paddle down the lower gorge. A bit disheartened, the rest of us continued down the next long grade 3 that leads into the tricky grade 4 "Tory back bencher" which you have to guess where the line is.

On the long grade 3 section.

The line looked ok, but the bottom hole seemed a bit grabby, so with Jon W portaged round and sitting at the bottom, Tim and Jonty on safety and me on camera duty, Jon H paddled down, missed the boof, subbed and popped out no bother. Not as grabby as we thought then. Oh well. Off I went next and learning from Jon's run, went for a flare off the roostertail which worked fantastically. Kept my face dry and everything.

Inspecting Tory Back Bencher.

Safety?

Jon coming down.

Looking back up at the rapid.

Jonty and Tim followed on while Patrick did safety, then had a right faff portaging and getting in on the slidey rocks. Eventually Jon H did a super sketchy scramble back up and helped him in, then did an even more sketchy scramble back to his boat.

The next big grade 4 rapid, Rollercoaster, was just round the corner. We eddied out above and Jon H dropped over the first big slide. He had initially told us to punch the curler on the right, but clearly disliked this plan now. A bit of sign language and shouting and I headed for the left side of the curling wave on the lip and wheeeeeeeee, down the drop. It was bigger than I expected! I had hoped to find an eddy in the middle of the rapid, but no such luck, so I shimmied down the s bend drop and eddied out right at the bottom. Jonty, Tim and Jon W all came down fine and eddied out below me in various places.

Jonty emerges from the bottom of Rollercoaster.

Patrick did not have such a good run. According to Jon H he did a sort of kick flip down the fall and face planted a rock. Somehow, he was unhurt, but he did have to swim the second half of the rapid which looked uncomfortable. He managed to climb out on the bank and I got his paddles into a semi-stable position while Jon H chased down the boat which had disappeared off down the next grade 4, named "Sam's Hole" after a friend of ours who once spent rather a long time going round and round in the pothole. I had a bit of a butterfingers moment trying to get Patrick's paddle to a stable eddy and it disappeared too. Oops.
We then had a bit of a faff, because we weren't sure what Jon H would do with the boat and if he knew the paddles were coming down too. We sent a scout off downstream while we considered whether to get Patrick across the river. A failed throwline attempt later and the scout returned. Jon H was just round the corner where the river went really flat with the boat and paddle. Patrick climbed out of the gorge on a fairly worrying steep slab and set off downriver. Jonty and Tim ran Sam's Hole quickly while Jon W and I portaged as we weren't keen on the lack of safety cover. It was starting to look a bit darker than ideal...

Tim runs Sam's hole.

Jonty runs Sam's hole.

We came round the corner and eddied out in a large eddy opposite where Patrick and Jon H were sitting on the bank. Something wasn't quite right. Jon waved me over and explained the situation. While coming down the sloping rocks of the gorge wall, Patrick had slipped and slid all the way to the bottom, smashing his foot and leg off a protruding rock. The rock had gone through his wetsuit and thermals and made a bit of a hole in his leg which was bleeding rather a lot. More worrying though was that it seemed fairly possible that he'd broken his foot.
The Tilt gorge is not a very accessible place. At our location it was possible to get out on the right bank only, since the left bank, with the road, was a nearly sheer cliff 30-40 feet high. Downstream, the cliff continued for several kms before it became marginally less steep and possibly escapable. Light was also a major issue - we were definitely losing it. The rapids between us and the possible escape above the middle gorge were grade 3 ish.
It didn't leave much choice, so we got Patrick in his boat and slowly made our way downstream, taking every chicken shoot. We passed the huge 50-60 foot sheer cliffs at Exit Falls, then it wasn't far until Jon H stopped us at a section of forested slope. Jon W and Patrick got out and abandoned their boats to try and get Patrick up the slope.
Our final group of four headed off down the river to get to the bridge where we were supposed to find Gina as fast as possible. We portaged one rapid with a weir-like hole that looked nasty. The next rapid had Tim doing some mystery playboating and getting shoved in an undercut, but he rolled up no worries. The light was getting pretty convincingly dark by the time we made it to the top of the bridge. Gina was mildly fretful.
Jon W and Patrick were hobbling down the road, so I set about retrieving the keys I had squirreled away in my drysuit. Jon W ran off down the road with them while we got Patrick in a vaguely comfortable position lying down. Jon H and I were having a discussion about what to do now when a Landrover came down the road. I flagged them down and they kindly allowed me to hitch a lift in the back. En route to the bottom we picked up Jon W who was inordinately relieved that he didn't have to run any more. Thankyou was probably every second word that we said for a while.
Back we drove with the van and my car. We got Patrick in the front seat and nearly left Tim behind, but not quite! Cranking the heaters up we headed to Perth hospital and managed to find it surprisingly easily even with the phone sat nav not cooperating for a while.
Patrick was taken into an evaluation room so I went and changed out of my dry suit and into normal people clothes. Soon he was back out and we sat around for a while in the waiting room watching nature programs on the hospital tv.

Eventually a doctor came through looking for him and we wheeled him into a little room where his foot and leg were prodded and poked and his leg started bleeding on the floor, although the puddle made by his soggy wetsuit was much bigger. They were short staffed, so the nurse gave us directions and I wheeled him to x ray. I think we left a trail of drips all the way through the corridors.
When we arrived back the van had caught up with us and Jon W tagged in as Patrick's company so that I could get some food. We were making fun of Country File when Jon W posted on facebook that Patrick's foot was in fact not broken! Although he was getting his leg stitched up as it was still bleeding. Finally he limped slowly out and we could all go home.

Les Alpes Part 6 - Day 14, 15 and 16

Day 14 (Friday 11th July)

It’s the last day of the holiday, so everyone is a bit down. Thankfully, the weather seems determined to cheer us all up, so we leave for the Gyronde in brilliant sunshine. The Gyronde is an interesting river, as it starts at grade 6, drops to 5, 4+, 4 then 3 at the footbridge, then 2, then it’s a 1/2 float to L’Argentierre slalom course on the Durance. If you don’t like what you see, you can just walk further downstream.

All through the time we’ve been here, the river has been running quite high due to some sort of confusion of hydro schemes that also meant the Durance gorge had no water in it. Today, however, it is at a perfect level and the whole group is getting on.

The Gyronde put in.

After running a shuttle to the slalom site and finding a convenient tree to hide my car under, we head down to the river. The first path down looks a lot more like a cliff than it does a path, so I opt to follow Rory and Raffa a little further down to a slightly less vertical slide to the river. Walking with creekboats is wildly overrated, so we decline to walk up the river any further. Also, there is a nice eddy right where we are. Those who had gone down the cliff put in join us and off we go straight into the maelstrom.

Rory in the put in eddy.

Amy and Raffa. You can see the river getting steeper upstream!

The water is as blue as the sky and full of frothing white. I shoot down the first drop and blast through a big hole. Somehow I end up in a micro eddy in the middle of the river and remember to breathe. Chris is leading my group, so when I see him peel out of an eddy above I follow on behind and we eddy hop the rest of the grade 4 to the bridge. The rest of the group is waiting there for us. We relax, bouncing down nice grade 3, changing up the lead in each large eddy we find.

The difficulty drops again and soon we come to the weir, at this level an easy boof on the left. The river from here is grade 1/2 and we float along in the sunshine.

A quick party surf on a small wave in the middle of town and we’re here, back where we started. We catch some eddies on the way down the slalom course, surf some diagonals.

The final eddy comes too quickly and we’re done, out on the bank, watching the others bounce down.

In an echo of our first day, we eat lunch on the grass by the cars, man-wiches all round.

Photo by Jon Wyles.

This bug fell out of the tree onto Andre!

Some people are keen for more paddling and head to the Guisane for a second run. Others paddle back to camp down the Durance. I drive my car back while the masters of the BBQ visit the supermarché to buy large quantities of meat.

Back at the campsite, the deep blue Lac is inviting, so some of us go swimming. It’s colder than it looks, but actually nice and refreshing. We swim across and back and some of the more adventurous do some rope swinging. Eventually we wander back to camp and potter about tidying and packing. I empty my car and find most of the world’s plastic bottles. The BBQ is roaring – too hot to get near!

Photo by Jon Wyles

I cook all my leftover stuff for dinner while the others have burgers and sausages and chicken bits if you’re not Rory. At the supermarché I had bought a giant melon, so I slice it into lots of bits and pass them round.

Then it’s packing time and tidying time and making sure everything is in the right car time. I don’t think the Austria-bound guys would appreciate it if we took their tents away!

Day 15

We wake up to rain. It matches our mood fairly well, especially as it’s way too early. Sad to see us all go, the Austria guys have woken up too, and help me stuff my very wet tent into its teeny wee carry bag. Off we go in the rain. Rain rain rain. The supermarket in Briançon is shut. Dave and I, desperate for morning coffee, are distinctly unimpressed.

The pass over the Alps towards Grenoble would probably be really spectacular if we weren’t in the clouds. A loooooong drive down and we find a supermarket. Coffee!

We change drivers at Grenoble and as Dave starts us off on the long motorway north I have a nice sleep. Not quite awake, we manage to fail spectacularly at one of the toll gates and get a bit lost around Lyon. Our next driver change occurs at the busiest service station ever.

At Calais we find a fuel station and top up before returning to the land of expensive diesel. Then we get really lost in Calais in a saga that shall be termed the case of the Missing McDonalds That Wasn’t Worth it When We Actually Found It. We arrive at the ferry terminal five minutes too late to catch the early ferry.

Point worth noting: Calais ferry terminal is really boring.

I make it driving from Dover to Ascot at stupid o’clock through sheer force of will and the promise of sleep on a comfy sofa.

Day 16

Jon brings me coffee. I kind of want to hug him. The drive back to St Andrews is a blur of service stations and pointedly remembering to drive on the left. I only slip up once, and that’s in the back roads of Ascot with no other cars in sight. The passengers are very quick to let me know about it!

Back in St Andrews we dump boats in the shed and passengers at their various houses. I drive home and collapse on the sofa, so glad I booked an extra holiday tomorrow!

<- Part 5