What a cow? not a cow!

"You guys can't paddle that, you're idiots! don't you read the newspapers?" This is how our latest creeking foray into the Kaimais started.
For the last wee while rumours have been rife around here about a new creek that was sounding like it could be our answer to the Styx on the west coast. Almost natural flowing, nice and steep and super easy access.

But the story doesn't start with that. Last Friday, after I did a late night mission to Te Awamutu to catch the Mangawhio (and then missed it again), I got back to the falls only to hear that Brad, Ryan Lucas and Petey had gone to the Kaimais to run this new creek - the Whatakau. At about seven o'clock rumours started trickling in that something had gone wrong...
Slowly all the pieces came together and we heard the pretty sobering news that young fulla was in Tauranga hospital with a broken back after running a big slide. This news, while pretty bad, only served to get the gossip really flowing, "It's a first D", "It got ran the other day", "It's even steeper downstream"....

Naturally we had to check it out. With the weather coming to the party and filling it up a little, Big dog Bayly and I decided to go and see what the fuss was about and what the bottom section held. After the usual logistical organisational hiccups (get lost in Tauranga trying to find a topo map, stop at bakery, etc etc),we finally got to the top of the creek where we met a little resistance in the form of a farmer who was convinced he would be the last person we ever saw, "Look if it was able to be done we all would have done it", "I've done some kayaking myself ya know".


Anywho, we decided we might just back ourselves on this occasion and off we went. The put in is just below a massive, savage, unrunnable beast of a slide and we kicked off straight into some cool little slides and drops. A little way down we decided that the "Almost natural flows bro!" call may have been a bit optimistic.

B about to get on

Contemplating a terrible slippery portage. The other option looked like fall off - to piton. More water and she'd be sweet.

Everything would have been mean with another couple of cumecs to pad it out. Anyway eventually we came to Ryan's slide (don't think there'll be any challenges to that name) and both decided we were quite fond of our backs so we got our portage on with the help of a pipe which runs down the side of the rocks.

Ryan's slide. The top two thirds look inviting but the bottom has a few rocks. More water? who knows.

After that it was the inevitable, kayak eating, elbow pad needing, Kaimai boulder gardens which Definitely needed more water. Just as we were starting to hate on said boulder gardens, we came to another horizon line into a gorge which precipitated another scout. The entrance rapid loooked a little rowdy with rocks inc, and then we got a look at the exit drop. Money. A perfect twenty footer with the roll in - to boof - to stomp type deal that most kayakers slobber over. My boat decided to run it without me as I was portaging the first one so B got to send 'er first to retrieve it and get it back up to me.

Sending it.

Mean

This drop definitely made the day - more boulder gardens another portage around another unrunnable beast and she was all over.

Another Kaimai creek ticked off, not quite in the same league as the Tuakopai etc but definitely worth a go with some more water, and, funnily enough we didn't die. Go figure.

Burton open

So things have been pretty slack on the paddling front lately,just general laps on the Tuna and the occasional smokey run to keep things interesting, however, we did have a sick week in Wanaka a while back for the circus that is the Burton open.
Basically it was an all expenses paid trip to wanaka to help out at the open and then party in the town at night.
In cases like this pictures are usually way better at doing the talking but I forgot to pack my camera because I was super hungover from my birthday party the night before. Hence the blatant stealing of a video off youtube for your entertainment.
All the big kids were there and gave a whole new meaning to hucking - Mr S White is a freak and set the bar with not only previously unheard of double corks in the pipe but he had to do them back to back. And switch. Enjoy.

Maraetotara Stream

Given that I'm from the Hawke's Bay, it's only natural that I would love it if there was a sweet creek run preferably within an hours drive of my house, with big drops, clean rapids and an easy shuttle. Sounds a bit far fetched I know, but I haven't given up just yet.
With a masssive storm thrashing the east coast I was watching the weather charts somewhat whimsically from up in Rotorua umming and aahing about whether to head back home to find some water. With awkward work hours and no one else to rally with I had basically given up hope. That is until Mr S. Davidson turned up at the Tuna on holiday from uni and jokingly I said to him "Bro shall we head to the bay tonight?"
No hesitation,
"Yeah bro lets do it"
So the foundations were laid for a long distance overnight mission to the bay to try and catch the water.
We cruised down home on Wednesday night and checked the flow guages praying it was still holding up. With about 12 cu she was looking good to go. So at the ludicrous hour of 5am (I'd forgotten that time of day existed) we were out of bed and on our way out to Waimarama beach.
Credit at this point must collectively go to Matt Danes and Joshy Neilson for finding and publicising this creek respectively. By some freakish coincidence it's one of the only watersheds in Hawkes Bay that has a flow guage which makes it easy to check etc.
With the flow peaking at 30 cu two days earlier and then bouncing up and down a bit (we put on with about 5cu at the top) we turned up at the farmers door (waking him up in the process) and got the low down on where to put on (below the floodgates/man made death sieves).

We knew there were some drops in there somewhere and for the first few hundred metres this was all that kept me going as we were constantly getting out to portage willow choked messes of rapids. We finally got to a mini gorge with more native style trees and the entrance drop was a sweet 1o footer. The next hour was basically more of the same - mini gorges with cool entrance drops and then some form of strainer/manky/sieve - some of which were runnable and some not so much.
I was getting slightly despondent at the amount of portaging we were doing and then we came around the corner to find the money section. A ten footer into a fifteen footer then a cool little double drop then a slide. The flow was a little low for them to be super clean but they still made it all worthwhile. After this was all little cascade/ledge things which again would be sweet with double the flow. Then in the true spirit of unplanned, spur of the moment missions we slogged through an hour of flatwater only to get forced off the river by more devil tree strainer pile ups. "Sounds average" I hear you think, and you would be correct except that we paddled past about three ideal takeouts kidding ourselves there were more drops 'just around the corner'
Anywho here's some pictures and a little vid of our adventure.




Now for the inevitable question.... Would I go do it again?? The top section is a catch 22 - the bigger drops would all profit from more water. But, then there would be heaps of savage strainers which may or may not come into play. The good section and everything down from there would be super sick with more water. All in all, if it comes up and I'm in the bay I'll definitely be back in there.

Vegas

Well, I've finally bitten the bullet and moved to Rotorua to save the hassle of driving here every weekend. We've got a sweet pad with a lake view and an excellent potential trampoline site which I intend to fill as soon as I have enough money to live on.
It was pretty much an ideal start to residing here, I arrived on the Thursday, then on Friday a dirty big front came through and landed on the Kaimais. So naturally Saturday saw about ten of us putting on the Tuakopai/pae. It was pretty low so we were trying to beat the water which resulted in no one getting any photos but it was an amazing run which I cant wait to get with more water. Then it was a quick run down the Mangakarengorengo/Wairoa, by this stage the crew had swelled to about 15 and my lasting mental image of the day is of a riot of colours all bombing down different lines on the last rapid of the Manga's at once. It was pretty choice.

So that was two weekends ago and since then we've pretty much had bluebird days which basically = the Kaituna at threes - not super exciting when you're too cold to roll/play anywhere. This lead to a cunning plan to get a cheeky smokey gorge run in. Brendan (as always) was one of the instigators of said plan so it was basically a given that we'd be paddling out in the dark. Same old. Anyway it was good fun with the log rapid claiming another victim. Our current scheme is that hopefully gnarly is good to go at 4/5's so we don't have to do the portage. We'll see...

Anyway, I digress. Seeing as we are well into the throes of winter, I thought I'd try and go for the optimistic approach and cheer people up with a movie of happy fun summer times.
Although in saying that it could also have the opposite effect and make you even more depressed. If you're in NZ that is. If you're overseas then you will have forgotten what winter is like anyway, so it doesn't really apply.
Therefore, watch at your peril (or leisure - you choose).

Queen's birthday weekend

Lake Waikaremoana lies in the heart of the Urewera national park. It is one of the most remote areas in the north island and is a long gravel winding road from whatever direction you drive from. For this reason it seems to have escaped the attention of kayakers and so there isn't a whole lot of info on creeks/drops etc in there.
The lake is a mean spot, being super remote and surrounded by bush it has a cool atmosphere and amazing scenery.
So with my family deciding to go there for queens birthday weekend, I thought it would be rude not to take a kayak to scout and hopefully run some new stuff. Brendan came over on Saturday night (having taken seven hours to arrive due to scouting every drop he saw on the way) and after an epic game of 500 on Saturday night (I know, exciting stuff huh!) we made a plan to scout as much as we could on Sunday.

I had seen a big slide on the way in and so we went to scout this first in the hope that it had come up overnight with the rain, but unluckily it was still too low. However after looking at the map we saw there was a drop on the Waikaretaheke which we decided to have a look at. It turned out to be a sweet little grade four rapid and was a fun start to the day.

B at the bottom of the drop on the Waikaretaheke

Me eyeing up the next move

Getting the boof on.

After this we boosted back to the visitors centre at Aniwaniwa where there were some big drops on the map close to the road. One of them was too big/shallow/manky to run but the others (Aniwaniwa and Bridal veil falls) looked like they had marginal lines.
So with these drops in tje back of our minds we carried on around the lake to the creek we hoped would bring us the goods. On his way in, B had noticed a steep section on the Hopruhine river which definitely looked promising. We hoped there was some more sweet drops below the section we could see from the road.

The view from the road of the Hopruhine.

Alas it was not to be. Just around the corner from where you can see in the picture, there was one more sweet drop and then the river fell out of the sky through a boulder garden with boulders the size of houses. It was a sievey, cavey, loggy, manky section with insane gradient which does not, and will most likely never go.
Super gutted we tried to mission up to the bottom of the gorge to try and run the exit drops but they were a mess and not worth the effort.

So it was a bit disappointing not to be able to run the choice section but now we started having the thoughts which go through your mind when you really want to go kayaking. They went something like this..
Me: "Bro do you reckon those drops at the visitors centre go?"
B: "Mmmm, yeah I reckon we'd probably make it down them"
Me: "Shall we have a think about them tonight and decide tomorrow?"
B: "Yeah lets go do that in the morning"
So pretty much we talked ourselves into running the first drop the next day and away we went.
Monday morning dawned with about 8cm of snow on the ground and a vicious southerly cranking but for some reason we still thought it was a good idea?
Anyway this is how it went. The drop was called Bridal veil falls. Check out the video below.

Not exactly ideal - flat land a 45 footer into green sideways and upside down - it was probably a first D just because no one else has been silly enough to try it but it was still funny. We were both sweet and we'd fed the addiction for another weekend. The other drops might go with more water but they're still marginal.
There's still some more stuff in there to be looked at with more time and water, no doubt we'll be back at some stage to check it out.

Hawkes Bay Represent!

co·er·cion (noun)
co·er·cion[ kō úr'n ]
1. forcing of somebody to do something.
2. force used to compel somebody.

I like this word.

It covers all sorts of scenarios; It is a classic technique of students used to persuade others to drink on weeknights, to spend money on toys instead of essential items (like food) and to guilt trip people into thinking they are carrying kayaks up a terrible razorback ridge with no water in sight because you have to do it "to pass my course bro".
However on this occasion, my intentions had no ulterior motive other than to run some shit.

On Saturday night while having a peaceful night in with the family (due to funds being absolutely non-existent), while watching the weather, I heard the words which make the ears of any self respecting kayaker prick up. "Heavy rain warnings for the Hawkes Bay ranges, expect 150mm inland and up to 80mm down lower". In the Hawkes Bay, this is pretty much unheard of so all of a sudden, said kayaker was paying intense interest to weather websites, flow websites, rainfall websites and every other website vaguely related to these topics.

Sounds a bit fanatical I know, but there was a good reason for it. For three years I had been slowly gathering info on the creek which I basically grew up next to. Usually a trickle, I had heard it took about 150mm to flood. Hence the intense scrutiny of rain guages etc.
On the map the creek looked like it had good gradient and was quite a tight gorge. In the words of Ping Lawrence - the local farmer "No, you dont want to kayak that, its full of big boulders" The ears pricked up even more.

So with frantic recruitment (facebook is marvellous), I convinced Ryan Hunt to make the drive from Rotorua to Hastings - not a drive usually associated with kayaking (unless its going the other way), hence the coercion part. I had to sell it to him but full credit to the man - he was committed, leaving Taupo at six in the morning and arriving at mine with another recruit Matt, who he picked up on the way down, to come and hopefully get on the first descent of the Omahaki stream.

We got to the put in after doing the standard shuttle drama and she was looking good to go. We got on and ran some fun, (if quite shallow) grade three stuff which was ticking along nicely. About twenty minutes in Ryan realised he had left the key to his car on the front seat of my car - everything had been going far too smoothly.

The put in to the unknown and unrun - mean!

The gradient started to pick up a bit as we entered what I knew was the steeper section. Just how steep I was unsure because, despite all my intentions to do so I hadn't quite got around to scouting the gorge in the summer....

Ryan on one of the first little drops

However it all worked out sweet and we discovered a fun run with some technical grade four rapids and grade three boogie in between. The rapids themselves were reminiscent of the Rangitikei at low flow but not as long. The cool thing about it was that although it was probably a little low and boney in places, it looked like it would be a mean, non stop freight train at high flows with nothing bad to cap the runnable levels.

Me crankin' on it


The end of a tricky little off-edge-S turn-boofy kinda thing

After the gradient sat down again, it was a run down to the main Ngaruroro river which was charging, and a fun big water muck aorund to the take out. Massive thanks to the Beamishes for lending us a car to go and run our shuttle with - it would've been a long walk otherwise....

Matt coming through one of the last rapids.

It wasn't huge, it wasn't super steep, it didnt have any mean waterfalls, but its the creek that runs through my place and it goes. And in the Hawkes Bay, that is definitely saying something!

Now I just have to sit and wait for 250mm of rain in the ranges......

California dreaming

I'm not jealous of everyone who's going to California this/next week to go creeking at all.

Why would I be when I've got cold wet Rotorua to stay home for.

Lies.

Of course I'm jealous, I've even had sadistic thoughts of hoping people get savage beatdowns to remind them that back to back summers and clean granite 20 footers aren't all they're cracked up to be.

More lies.

I'd happily take beatdown every day to be getting on a plane for LA tomorrow bound for 30 degree days and endless slides.

But anyway, enough of the ranting, last weekend there was a massive crew in Vegas and after the mandatory party on Friday night, we succumbed to the peer pressure from B and rallied to do a run of the entire Kaituna. As always, there was a token hungover person (Berno), and it just so happened that he was also the only one who hadn't paddled trout pool, awesome gorge, gnarly gorge or smokey gorge - ideal.
So we put on and did the normal run, and then awesome, and then all of a sudden people had stopped talking and joking (and breathing fo some of us) because now we were in the last eddy before you drop into Gnarly gorge. For those out there who aren't kayakers (and for those who are), the best way to describe this gorge is like the biggest set of stairs in a house with the highest walls you've ever seen in your life - it literally just drops away in a non stop twisting, turning white rollercoaster. At one point I was back paddling flat out to stop from crashing into Jamie and Berno who were checking out the bottom of the river side by side.
The lines all turned out to be super cool and easier than I thought they would be but its still definitely the most committing place I've ever been into. After gnarly we busted down through smokey and were met with hot chips by Soph and Hess, Chur!!! It was a mean day and a cool feeling to paddle all the sections of the tuna in one go.

On Sunday we drove down to the central plateau to hit up the upper Waihohonu which is a walk in trip that is spring fed and flows off the side of Mt Ngaruhoe. This means it flows all year and you get some sweet, super tight, super low volume creeking for the easiest 1 hour walk in ever.
The river keeps dropping into these crazy little mini canyons which mostly have a big(ish) entrance drop and then tight little rollercoaster sections to exit. It's all pretty easy to scout but hard to portage and the gorges all look real scary because you cant see around the corner, (then it turns out to be flat) so there were a few nervous faces at some of the entrances to the gorges.
About halfway is the crux of the run, it has several names, none of which are super inspiring - touching dicks with the devil, the drain plug and the death sieve being the worst of these. As these names imply there is a terrible sieve on one side, and a slot on the other side and the catch is that you want to run as close to the sieve as possible. But not too close. Then its a slide over a rock into a 20 footer. It's one of those situations where the portage is worse than the rapid though so we all ran it.
The rest of the run was sweet except for butters and soph logging some out of boat time and Butters folding his brand new Mystic. Guts.
Then it was back to Taupo for a roast and a spa courtesy of Anna - she's amazing, and a general shit talking session about the last two days.
I didn't manage to get any photos of these days so you'll just have to take my word for it but on Monday we went to a little park and huck out of Turangi to cap it all off.

Soph styling Poutu falls

Jamie lining her up


Berno off the lip.