More Photos

Rodrigo in a tricky spot in the depths of the Rio Tintilco.


Hiking back out through some thick rainforest.


Rodrigo below the final falls on the Desahue.


Rodrigo dropping in.


The view from my hotel room in Bogota. Looking towards downtown and the university near the hotel.


Another shot of us on the Maichin.


Again on the first drop of the Desahue.


Dusk at Cabañas Misimali.



More to come, but probably not soon!

All paddling photos from Emanuela.

Photos

I have found a computer that is fast enough to load photos, but it is still slow, so I will only put a few up.
All of this stuff is very close to pucon and some photos correspond to the missing photos of previous posts. At some point I might take the time to put them in the right spots, but it is not likely.
enjoy


me on the first rapid of Pucons local run, the Desahue. This run is really great and we will do it a lot. I'll have more pictures from it sometime soon, hopefully.


The final falls on the Desahue!


Dropping into another falls close to Pucon.

Rodrigo and I on the Rio Maichin. This run was a lot like the Cal-Salmon. It even has a bunch of creeks flowing into it that we need to explore! There is one especially intruiging one that we hiked up a little bit that day. Later we looked at a map and found that it flows from a loke high in the mountains and we will have to hike to the lake, then kayak down to the Maichin, where we would finish the run. I can't wait to do this one.


This is the view from where I am staying just outside of Pucon.

Exploring the Rio Tintilco

Yesterday Rodrigo and I set out to explore one of the deepest cnayons in the area around Pucon. It had never been explored before and we were inspired by local rumors of huge waterfalls and impassible canyons. We entered the gorge with surprising ease, partly because a local showed us the way down out of his backyard. With full kayaking gear to keep us warm and safe, we set off in hopes of finding an exciting first descent to come back to. The river started off bouldery and steep, and stayed bouldery, steep, and infested with wood until we got to a place where it would have been impossible to go back upstream if we had passed. It looked as if there was something interesting around the corner, but we could not risk getting trapped in a deep gorge with no escape route. Also, there would have been no way to kayak to the point we made it to, so in our eyes, to continue would have been foolish, though it would haven been very exciting to see what was around that corner.

We went back up the river the way we went down, then up the canyon wall, out to the road, and walked about 10 kilometers to where our ride was waiting. Needless, to say I slept very well last night.

First Day Off The Bus

First day off the bus, first experience in Pucon, first river, first rapid, first broken boat. If there was anything that could possibly sour my first experience in Chile and bring my spirits down, it would have to be breaking someone else's boat the first day we met and first time we paddled. I still can't believe that it happened or the feeling of knowing that there was a huge crack in the bottom of the boat. The second I felt water gushing onto my leg and saw that my sprayskirt and drytop were swelling from the pressure all the water was putting into my boat I knew.
Now, the first rapid was no smooth slide into a deep pool. No, it was a steep, rocky mess that sloped down for 10 feet then fell about 10 more into a shallow pool. Both Rodrigo and I took a big hit but only the boat I was paddling broke and only I flew headfirst into the pool after hitting an especially sharp rock. Maybe a testament to paddling skill? The boat, of course, was a LiquidLogic. Not to say that LL produces a low quality product, but if you look at my paddling history, it is riddled with broken Hucks and Gus'.
There ended my first day paddling with Rodrigo in Pucon. I can not even begin to explain how horrible and embarassed I felt about the situation. I had known Rodrigo for about 2 hours and already had broken one of his most prized boats. There is only so much apologizing one can do though, so I told him I would do all I could to make things right and pay him whatever he wanted for the boat or try to repair it and paddle it for the summer.
However, repairing this huge crack was no easy task and neither of us are confident in the plastic. We have figured something else out and are now happy with that in the past and much great paddling in the coming months. Hopefully the other boat can hold up!
This was the real first drop of the Desahue, not the one the boat broke on. The boat broke on the first bigger drop,of which I have no pictures.

Okay, that wasn't really the end of paddling on the first day. This falls was at the take-out of the run we were doing so after hiking all of sixty yards to the road then down to the car, we ran this a couple times.

The next day I went to class then headed to Kayak Pucon to meet Rodrigo and Ema to go paddle. We drove a little over 10 minutes, only a little closer than the previous days run, to this wonderful falls.

No paddling yesterday as Rodrigo couldn't find me walking around town after class. It was miserable weather though, raining, cold, and windy mixed with brief spells of sun and warmth. Today we paddled and it was amazing. I´ll let the pictures do the talking.

Todaywe went to the Desahue again and had a successful run. I didn't take any pictures, as the river kept me quite busy, but it is only about 15 minutes away so over time I will put some up.
We will be off to Maichin tomorrow. Rodrigo has hopes of bringing customers down this run as an advanced rafting river, so we'll see how th at goes. I think we will soon R-2 it as well. He has a new Aire Puma and the two of us should be able to run some good stuff in it.


I am doing my best to try to put these pictures up.

Travels

I am Pucon, Chile at the moment. Getting here was an adventure but being here promises to be even more of an adventure. My trip started simple enough with a long drive from Gold Hill, OR to San Fransisco, CA. My flight left at 1:35 on the morning of the 19th of October and was scheduled to arrive in Santiago de Chile at 2:30 in the morning on the 20th. Well, flying cheap has its advantages and disadvantages, and upon arriving in Bogota after stopping in San Salvador, El Salvador and San Jose, Costa Rica I ran into one of the disadvantages. My flight to Lima, Peru was cancelled and all the instructions for what the now stranded passengers should do were in spanish. Lucky for me, a large group formed around one unfortunate airline employee and soon everyone dashed off in the same direction. I was last in the race to the immigration office, as I was just following everybody, but I made it there and after some confused hand signals I was no longer in transit through, but officially in Bogota, Colombia. Great! Now what?
Again, I followed the group to the airline counter where they seiged some poor employees again. I also made my way to the counter, and with the assistance of a very helpful Brit, I got myself a reservation at an upscale hotel in downtown Bogota.
After a hot shower and a little rest after the strenuous day, it was time to cruise the streets of Bogota. The hotel was across the street from a university, and one block away from a main street that held many bars, clubs, and people. The university was gated so I was limited to the street, but I was not to be dissapointed and had a fun time walking around the city.
The next morning I made my way to the Airport with a San Salvadorian who had helped me the night before at the hotel desk, and boarded a plane to Santiago. Once in Santiago, I found that the buses didn't run at 3:00 in the morning, so I was forced to wait in a coffee shop in the airport until 6:00 AM when I could get a ride to the bus station.
I had not slept well since leaving Oregon, so was very thankful that I got to sit in the back of the bus and get a surprsing amount of rest on the 10 hour bus ride to Pucon. When I arrived in Pucon, a woman offered me a room to sleep in, at a hostal of course, and as we walked the three blocks to the hostal she carried my paddle and told me about the town and area. I walked around Pucon for the next hour then went back to my hostal and soon fell asleep with hopes of running great whitewater the next day.

Gracias

Thanks to all those who made it to our little gathering on such short notice. I was very happy to see you all and hope you enjoyed the event as much as I did. It was a pleasure to have you as the first, and likely only, audience for my film. I appreciate the stories told and advice I received. All the things said only make me more excited for this adventure of flexibility and new experience. Thanks again and keep an eye on this space.
Chris

Trippin'

I may have forgotten to mention in previous posts that I am soon leaving the country in search of adventure, education, and whitewater. I assume that the first two will come easy and go hand in hand with eachother. It is the third that concerns and has me the most excited. I plan to arrive in Pucon, Chile on the 22nd of October and possibly start paddling the same or next day. This may sound like a romanticized beginning to my trip, but I have been led to believe by all those I have talked to that this is not only possible but very probable. My concern, as stated before, is that with this kind of opportunity I might forget about my plans to attend a language school for a few weeks. No big deal though, right? That's what I was thinking. I'll just go to school wwhen the paddling isn't great.
Though I assume anybody who is reading this already knew about my trip, I will let you know about some more details. I depart SFO at 1:30 AM on the 19th then stop at nearly every major city on the way to my destination of Santiago, Chile. I should arrive there at 2:30 AM. Short trip, eh? I have some short layovers in San Salvador, El Salvador; San Jose, Costa Rica; Bogota, Colombia; Lima, Peru. I switch flights in San Jose and Bogota, which promises to be more exciting and stressful than I am anticipating. After the long flight I will be staying in a hostel in Santiago for a couple nights then heading by bus to Pucon where I hope to be met by a kayak and friendly waterfalls.





Unfortunately one of the above waterfalls was claimed by a tragic but undeniably awesome act of nature. Truly a phenomenon that three waterfalls dropping 15', 35', then 50' could turn into this. The event must have been amazing.
http://kayakpucon.blogspot.com/2006/04/medium-palguin-is-gone.html




Chile photos from www.kayakpucon.net

You can see the scouting ledge in the top two photos where people are standing in the third when the falls was still there. I am not sure if what remains is runnable, but it is truly a shame that three incredibly beautiful waterfalls are lost. This is especially true because they are on Pucon's local run, being only about 20 minutes outside of town. I am sure there is still plenty of good whitewater to be explored in the area though, so I will not miss out.

Beyond my plans for language school and meeting people in Pucon I have no set agenda. Being flexible and willing to leave at a moments notice or wait around and run the same things will be key to finding paddling partners. I hope to meet more people doing what I am doing and willing to hit the road or trail to get the goods.

I also may have forgotten to mention in previous posts the reason I am not bringing a boat with me. Aside from the fact that I don't think there is anything more troublesome to travel with than a kayak, I do not have a functional, willing to travel boat. I guess this note should be in the heart of a previous post about the trip to BC, but it will do fine here.
Small talk aside, I lost my boat as result of a scary, albeit short swim on the Ashlu. I do not have a picture of the place I swam and an accurate description is more than I want to attempt right now. The main components of the feature that I swam out of were fast moving water and an undercut rock outcropping nearly perpendicular to the swift current. I hung out for a while then after I had been underwater for an uncomfortable amount of time I pulled and swam for the surface. I reached it once, then after a little wrestling with my boat I went deep against the wall and resurfaced near the only eddy between the outcropping and two more ugly drops. I'll spare a description of the next two rapids, but believe me when I say that I am VERY, VERY glad to have gotten into that eddy.
My boat however, was not so lucky. It continued through(?) the next two rapids and into commitment canyon, which offers no escape except downstream. Humbled, we did a recon mission into the gorge but found only a piece of foam from my boat and my paddle, for which I was very thankful. I believe that my boat has yet to surface and may never be seen again.