Update coming soon.

Uganda.

From Zambia we headed north to the equator line, and the white nile. The source of the worlds longest river. We were coming here for a few weeks of freestyle kayaking, some relax, and the nile river festival.
Kayak the nile, and NRE put on a fun event after funding for the main event was cut. But it was an awesome time, with 60 or 70 boaters turning out for an unofficial event.


We’ve moved from the silver back section of the river, down to the Nile Special wave which is on the 2nd day of the river. We came down here with Casper and Sven from Netherlands and Brussels, and 2 south africians Stefan and Uno to try and learn some freestyle tricks. Plus attempt a decent of the dead Dutchman rapid… Our dutch mate Casper managed to prove the name wrong and survive. Although the scouting park of the rapid was the scariest for me. Wild animals and insects everywhere…. Arghh.



Nile Special is one of the sickest waves in the world. Right behind the Hair of the dog wave which we caught in perfect flow yesterday. Really steep and perfect for practicing any move! Also hair of the Dog has been running sweetly everymorning so we’ve been working our magic there!



The backpackers we’re staying at is an island on the middle of the Nile, so we are pretty isolated from anything, and can just paddle and relax. There’s no power or anything. But we’re heading back up top soon before leaving for NZ.



Our taxi broke down one day when we went on a mission to Super Dooper hole. But found another sick wave. The taxi ran out of gas, 1 hour from anywhere so we built a massive fire and partied with the local kids cooking corn in the fire and chilling watching the sun set.



It's also pretty cheap here. I've been eating 4 or 5 chapatis per day. They're 500 bucks (shilling bucks) each. But that's 25UScents. So it's not busting the bank. And they're good!!!

Last days in ZAM

The last few days in Zambia have been pretty epic.

The zam has been rocking big time. This past week I have paddled over 200km in my Rad. It’s awesome. Most of which was pretty sweet white water.



Tim Copplestone came out from England and got into the river big time, as we did back to back days following a multiday trip down to 25, and then heading back to Livingstone, jumping up early the next morning to run back down, and try and catch a day up on the multiday. Wicked trip. And pretty cool to check out the bottom of the river.




On our last day we chilled out, taking in the falls. Leaving at 5am and jumping the fence into the national falls park on the Zambian side, we got an amazing view of the fall as the sun rose behind us. Unfortunately since the Kafue trip I didn’t have time to get back on the watee on the Zam before flying out to Uganda.

Kafue mish..

Kafueeeeeeee River.






Nico, Jono, and I headed out of Livingston in a cloud of dust and broken glass as we knocked out recycling over towards Lusaka to go into the lower Zambezi national park which is one of the worlds best parks for wild life. We stopped off quickly to buy some illegal gas smuggled in from Botswana, by an ex-pat aussie hanging in Livingston because President Bana hasn’t been paying Zambia’s diesel bill…




From here we began the 7hr journey to the banks of the river where we camped out over night and met the rest of the crew. Some South Africans. Sean, Ross and Graham.
These guys kindly shared croc, snake and hippo stories all night, and pointed out the 5m croc swimming next to the camp sight in the morning..



We headed up the river parking one car at a religious commune, and heading on the back of the other one loaded up to the dam flowing out of lake…. We arrived, showed paper work saying we have “authority for mission granted” and the boys soughted it out sweet as amoungst a bunch of Ak’s and dam staff we finally got to the river with out to much hassle, surprisingly. A fisherman had died, so everyone was preoccupied.



The river flows into the dry river bed from the base of a hill. So it’s a crazy sight to see a river just starting from nowhere. The water was up a lot higher than the boys did it last. Around 300cumecs approx. so was pretty stonking.



We headed down running, scouting and portaging some gnarl rapids, all of which seemed a lot bigger when you were in the middle of them. The river was so wide, and fast, that it was life saving eddy catching after each rapid as the gradient of this river meant the rapids were stacked together. At one point Ross and I ran first, and I caught the eddy to turn around and see him disappearing off the next drop after an unlucky surge. But it’s almost like you are on your own. If you swam you’d die….


A few broken paddle, some sick sick rapids, and a couple of small beatings we ended up at the bottom waterfall, a cruxy rapid, which one day some might man up and run it… but not that day. And set up camp for the night.


The next morning, the river was pretty chill. And it was the wild life we had to watch out for. Lions, Elephants, Crocs, Hippo’s Snakes. You name it and it was proberly there. Lucky for us. We only met a few crocs. The first one gave chase, but we were proper amping, and managed to get a way. The 2nd one, was more aggressive. It chased us 100m across the river. Nico was yelling “ Paddle man, Paddling go go” to us in the front sort of chilling, and then “it’s not stopping” “go to the bank the bank” and we arrived at the bank, a flury of camera’s, peli-cases, dry bags got tossed up into the bushes as everyone tried to get out of their boat. I sprinted up with my paddle, but had to leave my boat at the water. Holding on to my paddle to wack that croc in the mouth if it chased up. It stalked around at the bottom, waiting for us to go back to the water. And A couple of us had to sneak back to waters edge to get our boats.. Man that was a fast snatch and grab. We portaged a couple of hundred meters down stream, and seal launched into the water. Simulatiously, although a few of us jumped the 3,2,1 count and started hammering it down stream.. But we made it through. Ending up at a banana farm, and Laura who picked us up with drinks and food! What an epic 2 days on the river. Sweeet big water creeking is all I can say.



The excitement didn’t stop at the take out. 1hr of fill-tilt four wheel driving back to the road we headed en-route to Livingston, before flying to Zambia straight into a truck accident.

Seeing the number of trucks that can only drive straight in Zambia is pretty impressive. The main road is littered with the remains of crashed, rolled and smashed trucks. So we came round a corner to a jackknifed truck in the middle of the road, and another truck slipping down the bank while it tried to pass….. So the entire road was blocked. A few minutes of interesting towing of trucks with nilon rope, and no deaths to the 30people standing in front and we were back on our way. A couple more check points and 7hrs before we got to jollyboys in time for a burger, beer and dinner.

Slammed on the ZAM

Lat few days paddling up and down the Zambezi. Sick times. Off to the Kafuui National park to run the 3 day trip down the kafuui.

Day 2 - Minus.

the view from the put in
Today I experienced the full power of this massive giant of a river. Blair, Jono, Lou and I headed upstream from the normal raft put in to check out and decided to bomb the minus rapids at a sweet flow.
The word on the street was they were high, but they seemed sweet once we got up there.
The rescue crew. Jono and Blair.

It’s a amazing walk into the gorge, with a porter carrying your kayak into the gorge, some taking 2 at a time. It put’s it into perspective. We pay 10,000Katchwa for the walk in and out. This is 2USD (just under) for a days work. Then afterwards you get a juice 2L from the shop, and this is 13,000. So the wage here is pretty little. I’m guessing these guys earn around 7USD/day. Which is good for this area.
my porter bro'ther from another mother. This guy does the track faster than us with 2 boats...

feeling small as..




To get to the minus rapids you have to paddle and portage your way upstream about 1km. But the view is amazing. These rapids are right below the victoria falls.
Always coca cola
So are the best viewing of the falls. Esp when you pull out to enter -2, but it's a bit hard to get a pic then... view above -2
trying to find the window... Hoping the doors don't close...

We walked up as far as -3, but it was to high to get up there, close enough to the falls to put in for -3. Just to check it out. Absolutely beautiful!

First run through was sweet. I had perfect line, just rolled a bit.

"sweet" got my helmet back...
So I ran back up with Dieago a local rafter/paddler and banged out another run through. Was slightly off line, boofed the big pour-over, and got a little thrashing in the hole. Nothing serious. But I was having problems keeping my helmet on… It came off both runs, so I need to go back until I can get down with my helmet on!! The water pressure is pretty intense! That it feel's a bit like you're getting beaten-up under the water