Lea

So Jimmy (the Probe) has a new headcam, which we tried out on the Lea on the weekend. I've put the footage together and banged it on Youtube. If you're coming for the race and don't know the lines, here's an opportunity to get studying!

Had a pretty perfect level as well, just a pity about the water drops on the lens.

enjoy!



Harry

Top Ten Rivers in Tasmania - Upper Wilmot River

The Upper Wilmot is possibly the most brutal, difficult and most committing river in Tasmania (in my opinion). The only river that would match it might be the Dove Canyon, which I haven’t personally paddled.

This is an easily accessible river that has only ever been paddled twice, for very good reason.

Where the Lea and the Iris rivers meet at Lake Gairdner, the water is diverted by pipeline through the mountain into the dams of the Forth River. From the Wilmot dam the usually dewatered Wilmot River travels roughly 30km downstream to Spellman’s Bridge.

These 30 km feature numerous long, committing and extremely difficult rapids, most with serious consequences. The rock is very sharp and scratchy and the river is pushy and difficult. The vast majority of these rapids are walled in with extremely high cliffs and are impossible to portage and extremely difficult to scout.

That being said, the huge cliffs and the committing nature give this river a really awesome feel, if you can get onto it you should, it’s amazing.

You need approximately a foot of water going over the dam to paddle this river. From the start the river quickly hits the first gorge. Get through this and keep on pushing to the second gorge, because that’s where you’re going to spend most of the day. The very last rapid in the gorge has a massive boulder in the centre that you need to get to via a dodgy eddy to scout. Below this the river mellows somewhat, although there are still some very good grade 4 rapids and there starts to be a lot of trees starting to grow in the river (it rarely flows after all). The good thing is that there is almost no wood in the main gorge and everything is paddleable.

If you get to do this river, allocate AT LEAST 8 hours on the water, if you get in trouble out there it would be almost impossible to get out and often when you can it’s on the side of the river that is much further away from everything. Take a strong crew and have fun!

(If I’ve talked this river up a bit, it’s because you can’t afford to take it lightly, don’t get on the river at 3 in the afternoon and think you’ll get through, it’s never going to happen, we pushed REALLY hard and still took nearly 7 hours.)

http://www.loungefilms.com.au/kayaker/explore/displayimage.php?album=search&cat=0&pos=13

The Loungekayaker website seems to have been replaced by some prick´s personal business website, but this used to be a link to some photos on there.

http://www.webspawner.com/users/billshep/wilmotriverwalk.html guide to walking into sections of the gorge

Cheers

Harry

Top ten rivers in Tasmania

Number 6 - Alum Cliffs

The Alum Cliffs section of the Mersey River features long, continuous rapids, big water and majestic, amazing scenery. Due to dams on the upper Mersey this section only flows after very heavy continuous rain forces the dams to spill.

Generally speaking this river is probably easy grade 4. The rapids are generally not that hard, except for one small section in the middle. That being said, a stuff up could see you in lots of trouble, I once paddled for probably half a kilometre or more with another paddler on the back of my boat, so don’t swim!

The crux section of this river is a grade 5 boof into a hole that feeds into an undercut cliff. Shortly after this is an S-bend rapid that feeds into one of the worst stoppers you’ve ever seen. At certain levels it’s a killer, there’s no doubt about that at all.

Most of the other rapids on this river are long, river wide sections, confronting you with hundreds of metres of nothing but white caps, and few discernable lines. Just go with it, the only rapid you can’t boat scout is the crux section and it should be obvious when you get to that, as the gradient makes it impossible to boat scout, the cliffs come right to the water on the right and the eddy on the left is very obvious.

And the scenery on this river is amazing. Enormous sandstone cliffs line the river, sometimes hundreds of metres high. There is one particular spot when the cliffs narrow to only a couple of metres, with the cliffs towering high above you. It’s like the Irenabyss on the Franklin, only far more spectacular.

The ideal level for this river is probably around 1.8 metres on the gauge at Kimberley. 1.6 is still good, below 1.5 it gets crap, due to the lack of gradient on this river. Above 2m is still alright, but it washes out a little. You could do this river as high as you want, it’s a big river bed and minimal gradient, so go for it.

cheers

Harry

epic awesomeness

How ridiculous is this photo? This guy did this deliberately as well!

Check out the original post here.

cheers

Harry

Number 7

Gordon Gorge

This is a river that’s very hard to get to, but the flow isn’t a problem. Generally it gets run once a year, in the springtime, when a big crew can be organised. The reason it doesn’t get run often is basically remoteness. There is a ridiculously long shuffle (you definitely need a driver), there is an occasionally locked gate, there’s an hour long (or more) walk in with your boat and there’s a long stretch of flatwater at the beginning before you hit the gorge and at the end when you hit the lake.

This river is special because of the remoteness, the fun nature of the rapids and most importantly, the scenery. The river bed is made up of big boulders that have fallen out of the cliffs above, in several sections you can see the house sized and bigger boulders still resting by the water and the place where they came from evident in the cliffs above. The cliffs are a constant feature all the way through the gorge, with massive trees and boulders.

Overall this is a solid grade 4 river. At low flow sections of this river can be somewhat sketchy, with a few undercuts and sieves. At high flow sections of this river can be tricky, with big stoppers and linked moves. Both are still fun, and in between is very fun. The crux section of this drop features a sliding boof with a very serious stopper if you stuff it up, then immediately below that the river goes completely underground. It’s advised to walk that bit!

Once the river hits the lake you have about 5 km of water to paddle, which isn’t exactly fun, but on the positive side it is the most amazing scenery all around you. The drive out is also pretty stunning, with lots of cool things to see.

No photos sorry.

cheers

Harry

Raindrops keep falling on my head...

The top ten rivers in Tasmania

Tassie is blessed with lots of rivers, big and small, all contained within a reasonably small geographic area. We don't have the aweseome bedrock creeks that you find in many classic whitewater destinations, similarly a lack of big water rivers means we don’t get the massive waves and amazing play spots that other places enjoy.

A lack of snow pack means we’re usually heavily dependent on rainfall, apart from those golden times when there’s been so much rain that the run off keeps the classic creeks running, or the rare occasions when a late dump of snow melts into the rivers, keeping them up for two or three weeks at a time.

But what Tassie does have is a huge variety of classic rivers, from easy grade 2 through to solid grade 4, with even some legitimate grade 5 rapids and rivers to be found. We have big volume rivers through to super steep, low volume creeks, great surf and even some good play runs when the rain really pours down!

Any list must necessarily take into account personal preferences. For me, I like wild places, steep creeks and beautiful scenery. I like running rivers rather than just stopping on a wave and the more gradient the better (within reason).

So with all that taken into account, over the next few days I'll be posting my top ten list of the best rivers in Tasmania.

cheers

Harry