Kids River Dee Trip

During October half term we ran a day trip up to the River Dee for some of the young people that have been coming on courses for a few years and needed a new challenge!
We arrived to a slightly-higher-than-i-would-have-liked Dee, and got on at Glyndyfrdwy with lots of very excited faces all round. 

 

After just a few minutes, we came to the first rapid, a lovely bit of grade 2 with some big bouncy waves at the bottom to enjoy. One at a time, everyone ran it, and everyone stayed upright, with a particularly impressive brace from Eve when we all thought she was about to trip up on the eddyline at the bottom.

The rest of the top section was a lovely combination of fast flowing flat sections and sections of grade 1 to 2 white water, which everyone really enjoyed, with only one or two occasional mishaps. The more experienced paddlers were being challenged to hit as many eddies as possible, while the rest were practicing moving the boat around on the rapids and spotting the rocks early enough to avoid them - with varied success!

At horseshoe falls we decided that the canal would be a good option, as a lot of people were getting tired by that stage, and the river was quite high.

Then it was back onto the river for a quick run down the first two drops at Mile End Mill, and a ferry across to the finish... well that was the plan anyway, perhaps Charlotte and James P has different ideas and didn't want to miss out on the last drop?! :-) James ran it beautifully, and Charlotte won the prize for swim of the day on the middle stopper, and did the last drop sitting on Dave's deck... nice rescue Dave - good job he was paddling that giant Karnarli!

We all got out just as it started to get dark and headed to Mc D's for some much needed grub!

Congratulations to James S and Calum for passing their 3 star assessment...

Thanks to everyone for making it such a great trip, I couldn't have hoped for a nicer bunch of young people to spend the day with. And of course, thanks very much to my beautiful assistants Dave, John, and Will.

Jenna