Australia Day Paddle 2011

Australia Day Paddle 2011

In a time honoured tradition, the crew set sail for another paddling adventure on the high rivers. Last year was a flooded Mulgrave, with this year, rains come and gone for a while, the plans had been set about for an adventure on the mighty Russell River. Unfortunately, due to Adro's unfortunate back injury, and Gunny's domestic Straya Day duty, we had no guide who had paddled the river regularly. Laggy did offer but was not confident due to river levels, thus the location was then changed to the Freshwater Creek, a lovely little play river which, at the right level, provides a lot of fun and frivolity.

The crew this time were : Flounder, Tangles, Tarzan, Lucky, Freckles, Tooey, Snowwy, Sandy, and Laggy. Four of the crew had been through this part of the creek before, and for the other five.....an anticipated fun adventure was about to begin.




The crew met in Crystals Carpark, and compared boats and dynamics of boats. Most of all interest was Snowwy's sit-on-top....for which a many raised eyebrow looked on due to the size and length of the boat.

But to his credit, Snowwy manouvered the aircraft carrier with ease through the Grade 2 Boulder Garden Rapid of which surprise came to us all.

First Stop was the portage and insertion at the bottom pool at Crystal Cascades. Above this point, there lies many a Grade 3+ rapid. A few of the crew decided to have a go at the two drops above.....for which much interest was observed.

Flounder set up safety of which he recognised the first rapid was slightly a bit dangerous for the way the water flows over the slide, it tends to hold the unsuspecting kayaker within it's realm at the bottom.

First down was Lucky with the Mamba which seemed to have enough bouyancy to take him through the reticulating slide.



Next through was the ever-present Laggy. His Axiom , which sometimes resembles the USS Enterprise for it's size and volume, had no trouble negotiating the waters of the middle pool.

Once two were through, only one remained. Young Sandy started his journey for something he had never done before. But all was in place....

Oops....the Perception did not quite have the volume and gave Sandy a good back-somersault. To his credit, Sandy did not panic and did try to roll twice without success due to the churn of the boil.

Flounder deployed the throw bag but was not needed as the two other boys successfully rescued the waterlogged Sandy

The crew then added Tooey and Tarzan to the list at the middle pool, and then Laggy Luke and Tarzan then led the crew through the last drop into the Bottom Pool. All succeeded. Well done to all.

The crew then made preparations to journey down Freshwater Creek....their target being "The Rocks Causeway".



The Boulder Garden was the first rapid. Unfortunately , this rapid was not easily disposed of due to carnage with Freckles Deisel. The boat travelled down the river with Tooey in pursuit and Freckles made plans to hitch a ride with Snowwy and Tarzan. Welcome to the water Freckles.....

Many Grade 2 rapids were then dealt with with no real carnage and the crew settled down to a good team process in that leaders would help out the virgins of this creek.

At the end of this technical part of the river, we all faced the culmination. This was a small drop rapid that verges on Grade 3. With water in the river from previous rain, it makes it easier to negotiate. See the Drop Rapid Video below. Tooey and Snowwy came to grief to add interest to the rapid.

Once the Crystals Bridge was reached, things settled down once again with normal Grade 2 rapids. Rock Drop, hang vine and 1st weir were all negotiated well.

The Wall Rapid provided some interest. Sandy, with much credit to his persistence, went through a successful roll....encompassing some seven tries in a row. We all stopped for a swim....and I am sure Sandy was thankful for the rest.

The main Weir was then disposed of and minor Grade 2 rapids were then disposed of after that.

See the video showing the Redlynch Valley Bridge of an example of a "nice little flow".

Finishing at the Rocks Causeway, the crew felt relief of a longer than normal paddle. The crew dispersed happy with some following other Straya Day plans....and some adjourning to the Red Beret....a local watering hole with beautiful food....and cold, cold ales for all.


In all, another successfull Australia Day Paddle had been completed.

Remember, when paddling the fabulous waterways of this great country, please do not leave anything except for footprints in the sand and a ripple behind the boat, and please do not take anything away apart from photos and great memories of the event.

Blue Skies ....Flounder

End of January Paddle Plans

End of January Paddle Plans
(you can expand pictures by clicking on them)



Plan for Sunday 23rd January:

The main plan is for the usual top trip from Kearneys to Sharks Tooth Campground. Water is good at the moment with only 30cm below Fisheries.

Option A (if the gate is still closed) : will be Arnolds through to Roos - Tangles will be contacting the ranger on Friday.

Option B (if water is over Fisheries) : either Fisheries to Peetes or the Little Mulgrave River depending on water.

Meet at the Servo at 9am on Sunday. Bring usual paddling gear of clothes you can get wet; shoes you can get wet, bottle of drinking water; dry clothes; towel; and a small watertight container for your car keys.



Plan for Australia Day Paddle ( Wednesday 26th) :

The Main Plan is the Russell River. This will be only open to the usual crew. Adrian will be the lead on this one as he knows the river. We do face a 45 min portage in with the boats, thus we need an early start. The river level for us needs to be 3-3.5 metres at Bucklands on the BOM Site. Any higher we may have to revert to another watercourse. This will be decided on the day before.

So details are as follows:

• Meet at Gordonvale Servo at 8am and travel to Golden Hole together by carpool.
• Get to Golden Hole by 9am, unload.
• Portage up, and have a swim and a decent rest at top.
• For paddling, do major rapids two by two with others as safety cover with throw bags.
• Once finished, Miriwinni Pub for a debrief.
  

Option A : Barron River just under the dam. Dano will check the water level on Monday/Tuesday. It is going over the dam at the moment. We just need water in the river. There are a number of great little Grade 2-3 rapids on the way....with the culmination with Tinaroo Falls being a Grade 4. Maybe we can paddle it this time. We did this Aug 2 years ago when they released. Pics below :

Proud Supporter of Adventure Equipment Cairns


Remember : when paddling these fabulous waterways of this great country, do not leave anything behind except for a ripple in the water and footprints in the sand; and take nothing away except for photographs and Memories.


Blue Skies.....Flounder

First Paddle of 2011

The First Paddle of the Mulgrave River 2011
(The story of Lawrie)

Christmas 2010 in the North brought presents to children and among other things....with heavy downpours in the Mulgrave catchment, a huge level of water. Just as a guide intrepid paddlers utilise the Bureau of Meteorology's website of recording river levels. The level and recording gauge used for the Mulgrave River, among others, is at The Fisheries .... a low bridge of just 1.85 metres from the river bottom. Most of our paddle trips are based between 1 metre to 1.85 metres or in our terms from 80 cm underneath the bridge to bridge level.

The news events of early 2011 of Central Queensland and South-East Queensland brought sobering information in regards to driving over flooded causeways with many vehicles lost and some tragic lives lost.

So when the intrepid paddlers learnt that the river level for the Mulgrave was at 9 metres, there was no way paddles were going to happen in the Mulgrave Valley. Paddlers went to other funspots at Freshwater Creek and Crystal Cascades (see earlier posts).

The first paddle of the Mulgrave started with a group of 11 venturing forth on usual plans....to do a trip from Kearneys to the Sharks Tooth. However, a locked gate at Arnolds Bridge soon had us changing our paddle plans to paddle from Arnolds to Roos Road bridge.

This meant that the virgin paddlers, Lawrie and Cameron, were to be thrown in at the deep end to venture through the Sharks Tooth rapid first up.




Lawrie and Cameron went through initial refresher kayak training


and increased their confidence to at least face the first rapid.

Some of the crew as a warm up ventured up to the swing rapid to play in holes and the standing waves to then meet us at Arnold's Bridge. Once they came down , our adventure began in earnest.

Once through the Shark's Tooth rapid being separated from his boat, Lawrie was told that he was through once of the hardest rapids that the river had to offer. From this photo to the left, Lawrie found that if he was to venture into troubled waters.....he had crew and friends ready to help.

Once all was reset and people emptied their boats of water creeping in, we followed the river to find an unusual small hole and wave just below of our normal pull out at the campground. Here Timme and Adro went through a usual play of surfing their boats.

Unfortunately with this part of the river, a long serene flatwater section of the river has to be traversed to get to the next set of rapids.

Due to the ageing nature of our paddlers, and the more interest in paddling the flowing waters, we rarely travel these sections anymore.

However, this section of river does provide interesting vistas of quiet paddling and Lawrie took full advantage of a serene paddle.


Once the first set of lang flatwater was behind us, the intrepid paddlers now faced the rushing waters of Melaleuca Corner and the ever present Rock Garden rapids.

On his first try, Lawrie surpassed the expectations of the crew, and managed to paddle through the Garden. However unfortunately, the same could not be said for Cameron and Gus who had not done the Rock Garden previously. Chaos reigned and carnage followed.

They were not the only ones.....

Tarzan had previously not paddled for a while and found that he had problems with rocks. He also found that his pretty Perception kayak had close encounters with submerged rocks and ended up for a while sticking end upon end out of those same rocks much like the Lady of the Lake held Excalibur.

Tarzan had then submitted to following the river on his backside....much to the bemusement of the other crew.

The river then flatens out for most of the way with trivial rapids on the way. Portages over the Fisheries Bridge gave a chance for Seal Launches. Overhanging branches then claimed the ego of Spray, Gus and Cameron.

The day ended quite satisfactory with Laggy cooking a magnificent meal of sausages and onions for a sizzle to fill the hungry torsos.

Please Remember : If you paddle the amazing and natural watercourses of this fabulous country of ours, do not leave anything other than footprints, and take nothing away other than photographs and memories.

My best wishes to the unfortunate people of South East Queensland for the tragic events that have unfolded in the past week.