Kayak

Date: 20/3/11

Location: Crooked River

Activity: Kayaking

Grade: 4/5

The plan was to walk in and do the grade 3 section on the crooked river. After walking for 30 mins we decided we had passed the get in and a new plan was formed. Rata would go back to the grade 3 get in and wait for me, Phil and James who would walk up 10mins and run a couple of grade 4 drops before paddling out with rata. 40mins later we were getting further and further away from the river and hadn't found any good spots to get down. We were fairly certain that the gorge was grade 4 and not too intense so we carried on up. When the track started to drop back down to the river we were stoked and getting excited. Half way down we decided that we would scramble down through the bush to the river in an attempt to save time and get back to Rata. We were wrong. It took nearly 40mins to reach the river and we soon realised that it was going to be a long day when we saw that the first drop was a big chute with a tree in the top. We portaged that and carried on down some amazing class 3/4 drops scouting for each other. James scouted the next drop which turned out to be quite intense. I was first up and ran it reasonably cleanly. Next up phill came down, ran the top fine but then got pushed under a big undercut at the bottom. it was all happening now, we could see him trying to roll and then disappearing again. After what seemed like minutes but was about 25-30sec he popped out the bottom and swam to the other bank. Now we had the task of getting the boat, it was still pinned up against the rock and the paddle was stuck somewhere under there too. I tryed to set up a paddle hook to get a line on it but by the time i had it set the boat flushed out and floated off downstream. things were getting a little dodge and not looking good for Phil and his gear. James jumped in his boat and took off around the corner after it, Phil climbed up the bank and headed downstream too. I was left to pack up the rescue kit and then took off in search of James. on my way i made contact with Phil who was up in the bush. A couple of class 3+ drops, some serous boat scouting and about 200m I found James with Phil's boat. When Phil arrived we put the split together and paddled out through some awesome class 3+ with out any trouble, picked up Rata and headed out to the farm then all the way down to the bridge. off the water at 6pm. what a day! Stand by for some more Crooked pics next week.

The lower grade 3 section The last 3+

The final decent to the river Tired and hungry