Level IV, NUIG and Wednesday sessions

Settled into college life I can now hardly find time to update my blog. Autumn has arrived. All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey. I went for a walk… enough of that now. First of all I am stoked to announce my recent passage into Level IV Instructorship, after a most excellent day out with Benny and Kipper. My partners in crime Darragh, Paul and Alex Stanley from riverstyle.com all passed their assessment as well so congratulations lads!

 

NUIG kayak club are a close knit team

Another great day was spent with the paddlers from NUIG that have the very useful tradition of having an instuctor training weekend for the people that help out with the beginners. They organised a day with several teach the teacher modules about warming ups, safety on the river, rescues, strokes and a lot of other stuff. I was really inspired with the turnout and enthusiasm and especially the expertise of the group there, and hope that other clubs might adopt a similar tradition.

Meanwhile, at UL, I’ve been doing beginner sessions behind the boat house and the Castleconnell. There is some great potential in ULKC and there has been a great turnout so far. The Lahinch weekend and the pool sessions have been successful as well, and I’m hoping for another big generation of fresh new paddlers coming out of this year.

Slovenia with Gene17

Slovenia, week 2

Slovenia is one of the most beautiful countries in Europe and an ideal waterpark for river people, rafters, kayakers and even the shark biscuits that call themselves hydrospeeders. It also very good for paragliders, climbers and mountain bikers and of course hikers and August is one of the busiest times of the year. Gene 17 hosts white water kayaking courses here, in spring and late summer, and this year was my third year out here.

The first week Matt Tidy and Dave Carroll were part of the instructing team and during the second week Dave left for home and Deb Pinniger came out in his stead. We were lucky to have a really fun group of nine people during the first week, and even luckier to have another really fun group of nine people the second week: I think both weeks there were rumours of the local drinking house Bar Baraka being drunk dry.

Upper Soca

Somehow in Slovenia you tend to get a mixed bag of weather in August; it can be scorching hot one day, and it seems the weather almost gets tired with itself and decides to throw a big wobbler, thunder and lightning and wind storms included. This meant a nice top up of water every now and then, and the river varied between higher and lower levels. We never had any bad or cold days however, although the darker days would provide us with some amazing mist banks and dramatic cloud formations.

The late nights cooking and the full days of driving and paddling caught up with me on the second week, where I lost both voice and car key on the same day. The car had to be opened by a mechanic and the voice didn’t show itself for a few days, but my team mates were amazing for keeping the spirit and really helped reducing my worries about it, so thanks for that Matt and Deb!

Group in week 2

On returning the car to the airport at the end of the two weeks I literally gained a few gray hairs (ask me to show them next time you see me), as I got stuck in traffic on an Italian motor way with only a very small margin to catching my flights. I eventually got in right on time and was a lot luckier than Jody from the course: she missed her flight in Stansted and had to fly to Belfast instead…

So back home it all felt a bit strange. A long summer, 3 months, 10 countries, loads of new friends: time flies when you’re having fun! And the tiredness set in… I spent most of the week horizontally, getting ready for another year playing Sport Scientist in the lovely University of Limerick. But it could be worse ;-), Curragower and Glens, here I come!

European Championships

Trains, planes and automobiles from now on! I left Arctic Fox within Dave’s good care in Norway and flew with a detour via Ireland to Santiago de Compostela in Spain, from where we would rent a car and drive to Ourense. The brand new C3 we were allowed to break in ended up being the slowest car any of us had ever driven, and we contemplated cutting out holes for our feet for some extra power. The appartment I was sharing with Siobhan was very comfortable except from an ant invasion. Poor Tim Harris. He really doesn’t like ants!

The wave was supposedly not working on the weekend of our arrival, but we went down for a sneaky peak and were lucky enough to get our first training session on Sunday. The wave in itself was a bit small but perfect to practise some smaller moves on. I reckon if we had it in Ireland, there would be people on it the whole time.

The team after the training session-photo by Jackie Ferguson

The first team training with the French made our eyes roll out of our heads. Especially the French Junior Men were astonishing, and the new type composite boats they were paddling attracted a lot of attention. I reckon other companies will come out with similar concepts, but Gui Gui Prod definitely made an impression during the European Championships.

Team Ireland at opening ceremony

In the Preliminaries the men unfortunately missed out on the bigger scores; unfortunately Louis just managed to miss the cut. In the ladies Jackie pulled a similar act with a very respectable 11th place, and where I managed to get through to the semi finals, Siobhan even placed herself fourth! The juniors and junior ladies did really well during their first competition outside of Ireland. It is not easy to stay calm and show what you can do when everybody’s watching and I think they all coped with the pressure really well.

Siobhan was battling a stomach illness in her semi final runs and managed a nice seventh, and I was very excited to find myself in a fifth place and make the finals with two solid runs, even though only one counted. The finals eventually brought me a fourth place, which I was very happy with. I caught an edge and nearly managed to turn it into a macnasty, but not having very much practise at this move I landed just behind the hole and missed out on a medal. The junior and senior men’s finals were very exiting to watch as well, with the French cleaning up, as expected…

A ladies blunt...

There has been a lot of discussion on the fact that the runs weren’t very spectacular to look at, and agreeing with that, I still think that it was a very interesting competition, just for the fact that it was very flushy and there was no room for mistakes. I think Louis from Roc Roi (who was called in to save the day after a lot of controversy as regards the organisation) did a great job and deserves a big hug, especially after coming out during the busiest time of the year and having a young family. Fair play!

So we closed off our trip to Spain with some sight seeing, shopping (great rebajas!) and tapas. We even managed to finish our sun tan. I flew back home to touch base for a few days, and to prepare for the last leg of the summer trip: working for Gene 17 in Slovenia.

Norge!

Picking up where we left off: after a lovely time in France we swung by Slovenia to see Beppe and Sabina, some paddling friends from Slovenia and Italy, tie the knot and get married. Congrats guys, it was a lovely day and the party and dinner at Franco’s was very enjoyable.

After a detour through Nussdorf, where another couple of paddling friends live (thanks Ingrid for the most excellent work on my helmet; and Holland, where I visited my grandparents and aunt and uncle, we made the long trip all the way up to Norway.

It is great to have a van, because even though it might not be the safest position, lying down in the back is definitely the most comfortable way of travelling. We swapped over plenty of times, but by the time we got to Sjoa, we were still absolutely wrecked.

We met up with some old time partners in crime, Tim and Nick, who are always ready to help out save the world with their expert hypermiling:

We had absolutely perfect waterlevels and got a few excellent playruns in, a session or two at the bubble machine and

 some riverrunning on an ole time classic: the Ula slides.

When we met some of the other Irish paddlers out there, I was invited along on one of my favourites: the Upper Jori. It was a real wonderland run with beautiful scenery and sunny weather and a great day out, buttered mariettas and tins of minerals included.

Photo by Ross Redmond

Most of my time was spent sleeping the drive off in the back of the van and surfing the wave behind the Kayak Centre in Heidal. It is not generally running and after the floods from last year it was feared that the wave had been washed away. We were lucky: it had come back and better than ever. A perfect fast bowl wave with shoulders on both sides. Expert coach Matt Tidy from tidytrix.com helped me out with some core tips and even now, back on Curragower, I can still feel the difference!

Photo by Anna

At the end of July Strie Strommer kayak shop organisise a wicked even: Sjoa River Festival. This is one of the best periods to be out in that area,as there are loads of nice paddlers around and there is generally good water. They have a boater cross and sometimes when the levels allow it a rodeo as well. This time I had to miss out on the race and the parties and fires as I was on my way to the next destination: Spain and the European Championships.

May: UL and high water in France

 

We all knew there was a big snowpack, and expected a lot of water in France for the spring season. A resilient micro system over the southern French Alps would make the season turn out even a bit more extreme this year; UL kayak club was in for an interesting time. As I was going out to France in ‘Arctic Fox’ (our little Sprinter) anyway, I joined them on their 2 week Alps Trip.

 

They were pretty hard to miss at Rosslare harbour: a flash new big Sprinter dragging a rather narrow looking trailer with uneven rungs and boats slapped onto the side and top, filled with happy shining faces full of expectation. Galway canoe club had booked onto the same ferry, and there would be beer, I suspected. And I was right…

There was beer on the deck, an amazing sunset and about 50 dolphins following us for a little while, jumping the wake of the boat. Hoping for a floor space in one of the lads’ rooms, I had brought a sleeping bag but when it actually came to sleeping, I was bodily lifted into one of the beds and Kev took the floor. Thank you for that, I owe you one brother!

The drive from Roscoff to our first stop in the slalom site of Sault Brenaz was pretty uneventful and gave us time to come up with cunning plans for future trips and looking for Decathlons. We now know never to trust GPS systems; following Tony through the city of Le Mans provided some expected frustration and I am pretty sure I will be one of those freaks that will still use a map, even when they are not made anymore, somewhere in the 2050’s.

 

Sault Brenaz, or Isle de la Serre Slalom Site, is an amazing spot. It’s safe, has very defined eddy lines and easy to walk up along, as it is shaped with lots of s-bends with bridges crossing the flow to give the walker the shortest route to the top. This is where we met the rest of the club. Many cars, many 2 second tents and gear everywhere: it’s amazing that I didn’t lose track of more kit during the 2 weeks.

It’s pretty hard to move such a big amount of people around and I think Lorraine and Kev did an amazing job, right from the start. An Alpine warm up with some rope throwing and getting to know one and other (this is when we still had the sun) got everyone excited for the rivers in the southern French Alps, and the plan to leave early in the morning was met by my surprise as it actually happened: clean away at the estimated time!

 

So that’s when the weather turned on us… As our journey proceeded, so did the rain and by the time we came over the Col de Lautaret, we could see there was definitely enough water. I think I said: “I don’t think I have ever seen so much water here”, but I was also very excited to be back in the Alps, so in my mind I didn’t take my estimation very seriously.

The rest of the group was quite a while behind, and we ended up never getting on the water that day, but a careful start the next day on the easiest section proved to be a challenge. Someone’s famous words “I generally don’t get on the water when the branches on the trees coming down are still green” and the local farmer’s worried advice to be “very, very cautious” started off a small knot in my stomach. But the branches are still brown and we got on.

Three bends and a few swims further, the decision was made. The branches had turned green and it was too difficult to deal with more than one swimmer at the one time: we got off the water. We were also not sure how easy the last bend before the famous Rabioux wave was going to be, and we were worried about the last eddy to catch (people had looked but the water was still rising). Unfortunately it made for a nasty walk out for most of the group.

 

The next day the water had risen again and there were now not so many options left. We decided to paddle the lower Guil with some of the more experienced paddlers, but as the main group arrived at the take out we found notices that forbade access to all rivers in the department. Very sadly, a local kayaker had died on the river that previous day, leaving his eight month pregnant girlfriend behind.

Police was out fining people but our group got off a bit above the take out, avoiding the police that was patrolling the bridges, and plans were made to make a Move.

 

The first Move of the trip led us to the Verdon area. This should give us a few days of nice rivers: some good stuff for the more advanced people and nice mellow stuff for people that wanted to do some shape up work. 4 hours of driving (and another swift and well organised exit from the campsite which would have left the military impressed) brought us to a dry and sunny spot: blue water and a beautiful little playwave right in the middle of the picturesque town of Castellane.

Of course, we were jinxed! That same morning, a notice had gone up in the town, closing the rivers in that department as well.

Move number two happened that same day: we tried the Var area, an hour’s drive further south. The local fire men thought there wouldn’t be a problem getting on the river there, and as we were getting changed, the police decided differently, and we were chased off again. So we drove back to Castellane and of course it started to rain.

 

 

This is what we did on our day off…

 

So France was clearly not going to happen for us. We gave up on croissants and camembert, and decided to give Italy a shot. Move Three brought us down south to Nice, across the border to leave the Shit behind us. Driving up a lovely road beside a beautiful blue looking river called the Roya, we dropped down into the Valle di Demonte, where there should be a class III river we might paddle. The sun came out, there was no police looking for us and the river was… a brown raging torrent.

The Roya we looked at the day before was really our last hope and we spent 2 nice days on the water. Some decided to go ahead with the planned level IV assessments and finally, FINALLY we got to do some paddling.

Unfortunately, some of the group were going home then having only a few days of paddling in. It is very sad how that sometimes happens, but on the other side, no gear had been lost and no-one had got hurt by a rash decision. The Stura di Demonte had now dropped a good two foot, and the whole group took a goodbye paddle in the area before making our last and final Move: to Valsesia.

Did we have any interesting learning points on the Demonte River? Yes: a phone is a very handy thing to bring with you on the river. At all times… And did we have learning points on the drive to Valsesia? Indeed: Yoghurt doesn’t travel very far laterally when throwing it out of a car at 70 miles an hour. It will therefore very likely NOT land on the target car right next to you, but rather spray all the traffic behind you, especially the black BMW convertible sports car with the Big Italian driving it.

 

The river Sesia and its tributaries are generally running much earlier in the year but the weather had brought the rivers up to a much higher level. It was hard to find rivers with an easier grade though, and especially after the broken up trip we had, most really hadn’t had enough ‘flow’ to take on the more difficult rivers. There were another few learning moments, especially in regards with organisation and trip leading, and what to do when there is a whole bunch of Italian (yes, the are different) fire fighters on the bank that give you the wrong advice about the line. Highlights were definitely the Sorba Slides and the Race Course above the campsite, and the Mountain Style bar with its big mugs of beer. And then of course some people had birthdays…

 

That was it for ULKC, unfortunately… I was staying and the group would go back to Sault Brenaz for a day, on its way to the airport in Paris. At this stage it was clear we really had made the best of the trip. France had had much more bad weather and still hadn’t opened up the rivers. In fact, they had suffered from a lot of flood damage and crazy situations (see some of the photo’s at SND Kayak Shop), so nobody had to feel bad about all the driving. It was just one of those trips. However, the crowd had been so positive and fun that the trip will stay in people’s mind for a long time, like all things that have cost a little effort do.

Goodbyes were exchanged, and hopefully I will see everyone back soon! My next part of the trip was about to start: some Italian paddling with Dave, and then driving back to France for a few weeks of Alpine rivers. Bring it ON!

The Amazing Knot!

Welcome to my blog. Over the next week or so I hope to update my travels from this summer in this space. It’s a bit complicated, involving lots of driving, flying and going around in circles. Have no fear, it was never boring!

Kx