A Small Etive Trip: 18/03/2012

With seven years of coaching experience with Glasgow Uni Canoe Club, it's been a while since anyone has really surprised me with their successes on a river, so I suppose I'm going to start out this post by saying well done to George and to Ross for catching me off guard.

Both of them had been looking at rivers they wanted to do, so when I invited them to come paddling they asked about doing the Middle Etive. Having paddled it a lot, I was willing to head there, but was expecting to have to portage a couple of the rapids due to limitations on safety coverage. However, Stephan was up for a jaunt to the Etive as well, so accompanied us, and was invaluable in providing safety cover while I demonstrated the line and set up cover at the bottom before switching.

Triple Falls proved to be Ross' best rapid of the day, styling all three drops, and managing a perfect boof on the third drop...though the amount of time he spent not capsizing while being pushed against the walls after the second drop was pretty funny.

We all ran Letterbox too, though I was the only one not to plug it, and George was shoved into the river right alcove by the water and had to make a technical exit onto the bank.

Ski-Jump was its usual, friendly, self - though I think it was one of the ones that had scared Ross most up to this point.

Crack of Doom was my screw-up of the day: my line in was great, unfortunately between choosing whether to run the drop at the end left or right, I went centre and then backwards down the right. On the plus side, my reverse boof/brace works fairly well. Ross and George both ran this easily. Stephan gave it a miss as his back started giving him some bother.

Crack of Dawn was it's usual portage and seal launch.

Great Waterslide was fun as always. Ross and I got the line right, Stephan just missed the wall and capsized (his flat-water beat-down did not result in a swim though), and George was our dedicated person for crashing into the wall.

Right Angle was paddled my me, George and Ross. Only Ross capsized, and his roll saved him. He then capsized against the wall, and after a little nudge from my paddles to move him away from the rockface, he rolled up again. Despite having a sore back, Stephan decided that sliding down the drop was a good idea...

Many moments were spent later sniggering as Stephan hobbled around at the Real Food Cafe and trying to climb sideways into his car. Silly Stephan.

It's been a very long time since I've been to the Etive and no-one has swum, particularly when with people who've never run it before. So well done again to Ross and George on what was, overall, an excellent trip.

The new paddles no longer look like this though....

Low Low Lugar

A few weeks ago, I decided that I'd quite like to explore some new rivers, in the hopes of finding one that the canoe club doesn't do normally, but is in fact, a classic.

To that end, I compiled a list, and some of those rivers were looked at as possibilities for this trip: the Lugar; the Ayr, and the Middle Doon.

The guidebook says that if the get-on for the Lugar looks paddleable, the rest of the run will be too: this is a lie. If the get on looks runnable, the rest will be a scrape. I imagine that if there was more water around (if "Where's the Water" shows the Ayr as on high) then this might make a good trip. As it was, we often had more fun on the flat bits than on the rapids, as we had freedom to move.

The entry to the river was quite fun, with a sliding wier that everyone ran and enjoyed (and I think Stephan went back for seconds), unfortunately, this was the best we were going to get for quite a while.

Whilst I found the other rapids combersome, I had nowhere near the same issues as Peter, Stephan or Ross (though as their kayaks are either heavier, or more prone to pinning than my Mamba, even that doesn't say much). The river did provide two positives: Elspeth is now less afraid of river (I'm not going to call this white-water) paddling, and Peter has now had a swim-free river trip!

The last rapid on the river, even at this level, I'd say is worthy of a grade 3- rating, and would probably be 3+ if more water went through it.

At roughtly 8km long, that this river needs more water was a lesson learned the hard way, but in the end we had an enjoyable day, paddled a new river, and learned the merits of having a little more water in the area.

The Awesome Awe (yes, I know it's an overused joke)

It's been a while since I've been asked to lead a club trip, so it made for a nice change of pace, what I wasn't expecting was for my back-up to be someone I'd never paddled with before (in fact who had never paddled with the club) and Ross!

So first thing in the morning, we three (well, more Stephan and I), discussed where we should go: the Upper & Lower Orchy; the Nith; the Middle Etive (which I veto'd); the Lower Tummel... The list was a lot longer than I'd expected, but in the end, the Awe was the decision, and based on our day, it was the right one.

After loading up the boats, we set for the Awe, with the sun shining and the skies blue as far as the eye could see...until we arrived at the river when it began to rain and hail. Running the shuttle, Breffni and I got help from Alex and Haydn of Strathclyde Uni Canoe Club fame, which dramatically improved our return time.

Once we were on the river, the weather settled, and we headed down. With Ross doing safety for the first time, and with neither Stephan or I having paddled the Awe in nearly three years, we took it slow. There were times where we got out and inspected a rapid to make sure it did what we were expecting: sometimes we stayed there to indicate a line; sometimes we noted the line and went back; and at least once it was a false alarm entirely!

The first real rapid (I think it's called Magnetic Rock) was where most of the interesting stuff happened. Breffni and George both got tangled in some rocks, but wrestled their way out (George doing probably the strangest roll in history!), Peter found himself upsidedown on top of a rock, and flipped himself back up, only to capsize and start the swim count for the trip. Shona got a very good line through the rapid, much to our delight, and from this point onwards it was mostly plain sailing.

Everyone on the trip did well, and even tolerated the two races that I set up (which were actually disguised ferry glide training). George deserves a mention for his....interesting?....roll on one of the first rapids of the river. Breffni deserves one for trying to pick her own lines, Shona for going from two swims on her last trip to zero, and Peter gets one for putting a cone on SUCC's minibus. Oh, and thank you to Stephan and Ross for helping with safety.

All in all, a good trip.