River Whiteadder - 11/3/2007

Fifteen Edinburgh Kayak Club boaters enjoyed a tight, technical, low water run on the River Whiteadder, a grade 2/3(4) run in the south of Scotland. Most everybody paddled kayak. I dusted off my C1 after months of neglect. Robin organised the trip and Charlie posted an early objection to another Stanley run on SSPPP, setting plans for "something different" in motion more overtly. Ali, Chris and I caught a ride with Callum. Latecomers reorganising boats and Robin making a wee detour meant we were first at the get-in. According to the guidebook, anything under 0.8 on the gauge was "low". We were right at 0.8.

"Low" on the Whiteadder meant the run was very technical and not at all pushy. The river wasn't very wide at all, about the width of a road in most places. We divided up into pairs, one experienced boater with each inexperienced boater. My buddy for the day was Magnus. Neither of us really fit as experienced or inexperienced. Initially, we were last in the group, which meant for my short, stubby C1 lack of speed, I was last. Soon, Andrea wised up to how useless it was for me to be in the sweep position and she had some pairs wait for us/me to amble past.

The first few rapids were grade 1+/2- rock dodging, a good mental warm up for paying attention to the rocks and river features. Low water runs are brains over brawn, as the majority of times, the consequence of misreading the water is being beached on a rock. We had plenty of that going on.

The first feature of note was a small, river-wide ledge. I think our trip leaders were expecting something bigger than it was. It was maybe 18 inches with a couple of fairly straightforward lines. After I caught the eddy at the bottom, I took a few photos of people running it. Sometimes the reeds got in my way. Magnus asked me if I managed to get a photo of him without his tongue sticking out, apparently a skill of his.

The odd circular house on river left marked the beginning of a semi-continuous grade 2/2+/3- stretch of water. I caught an eddy near the top and watched Charlie and Dirk enter the rapids. Andrea prodded me to get going. At higher water, probably it is continuous grade 2/3-. At low water, it was eddy hopping fun. I bounced through the first wee wave train and caught an eddy with Charlie and Dirk. The eddy gave a good view of the next drop, a technical 2+/3- cauldron pourover thing. I watched Charlie and Dirk run it, as well as a few others, while I waited for enough of a gap to run it myself. My ferryglide into the current felt perfect, giving me plenty of time to turn downstream and made a few more corrections to my line. I ran the drop roughly left and relied more on balance than speed to let me land splat upright in the washout. It looked far more planned than I expected. I caught the river right eddy below and watched a few more runs before continuing downstream.

Soon enough, we were at the first of the scouting-required drops of the day. Seeing a pileup of boats in a river right eddy above a horizon line, I caught an eddy above them and waited to see who was doing what. Graeme and his daughter got out to scout, as did Russell and a few others. Robin and still others were waiting in the eddies below to catch. This rapid was a series of two drops, the first easier than the second, and the second promising to be intermediate/advanced only at this water level. Swimmers were advised to be out of the flow before the second drop. Robin had us run it one at a time. I watched a few people run it and based on their lines, decided there were probably several options to run it so I could get away with flexibility yet again.

Once enough people had run it and been cleaned up if necessary, I decided it was time to go. I broke into the current and caught the last eddy above the drop on river left for a last scout. All looked fine and my plan refined to be running centre of the chute with the slightest angle to the right. It looked very much like a shorter Jacks Rock falls, which is fitting because the whole run reminded me of Clear Creek Gorge. With a splat, I landed in the washout of my second 3-/3 rapids of the day and caught the friendly river right eddy to watch those behind me run it.

A variety of interesting lines followed. Most people didn't have any difficulty. Magnus got kicked a little too far to the right, flipped and got his boat pinned against some rocks. Rolling wasn't really possible so he swam. Russell was right there to do some fishing if necessary, but Magnus was fine and his boat stayed conveniently in the eddy. Andrea was last to go and she made it look easy.

Most people walked around the second drop. When I paddled over to the river right bank, I watched Graham boat scout and run it. About 3/4 of the way through the portage, Jiemen and Dirk helped me with my boat. I'm not sure if Jiemen realised it, but he nearly knocked me into the river trying to take my boat off my shoulder. Dirk realised it and I could see him nearly laugh. He took my boat from Jiemen and put it down among the rocks at the bottom. I set up to photograph those who chose to run the second drop. Chris was out scouting and quickly decided to give it a go. Robin and Russell weren't far behind. Andrea ran the line that had already made me decide walking was the better plan. The drop looked straightforward enough. The washout involved all sorts of pinning options both left and right of what little main current there was. She hit the drop fine, hit a few rocks before getting stuck for a second on one and then washed back into the current to finish upright and smiling sheepishly.

More grade 2 rapids followed and we stayed roughly in our pairs wandering down the river. I wasn't the only one with a camera out there. I caught one eddy interrupting Rik taking photos with a camera that looked very much like mine. He asked me if I paddled C1 so I could style down everything! I laughed and said I like challenges.

We came to another bend in the river that seemed to drop into a wee gorge with a footbridge visible overhead. Everybody got out to scout. Chris and Russell eddyhopped down and got out to scout and set up safety at river level. The majority of us scouted from the footbridge and highish river right. I didn't like the looks of it, especially after watching the hole hang on to Graham for an extra second. My boat was shorter and stubbier, and I would have less momentum going over the drop. I thought I might be due for a stuffing, so I took the high and dry line with a few others. About a third of the group walked it. The scrambling through trees, down precarious slopes and across large slippery rocks made me rethink my decision.

I got to the "best" get-in surprisingly in time to see most everybody run it. Two women, one of which had a baby and a pram with her, decided to stick around to watch the entertainment, too. Most everybody had good lines. I got photos of Magnus not sticking his tongue out, Callum not swimming (and running a great line!), Andrea demonstrating an air brace with confidence, Rik running a good line and Charlie providing the stuntboater run of the day. Everybody managed it upright. I still think that stopper might have had eyes for my boat.

The last to run it were Russell and Chris. The women who were watching from above heckled them to run something more difficult than the same line everybody else run. The women wanted to see both of them run the river left chute. The one holding the baby said if they ran it, they would impress her baby. Chris obliged. I think Russell did, too. At that point, I was trying to get down to the river level to get a more interesting shot and I missed his run.

After the gorgy bit, the river calmed down for a while, but the wind kicked up. C1ing got very, very slow and after a few wee rapids, I got left behind by all of my double-bladed companions. The wind treated me like a sail at times, blowing me fully backward. I tried to hug the banks to see if being there made any difference. It didn't. Negotiating the wee rocky rapids became all the more challenging as I had to choose my line not only by the water but also by guessing where the wind might send me. I did ok by both, but definitely added some new scratches to the bottom of my boat. During the first few of those, I had found my way to the back of the group and then left behind officially. Eventually Graham and then Callum realised they were short a boat and hung back for me to catch up. My net progress was downriver, but occasionally that meant fighting an obvious upstream current.

We caught up with the group at the last big rapids of the day, back to back grade 2s. The first of these, we arrived just after an interesting swim by Ali. After running the first, whose line is best described as pinball, we chatted with Ali for a minute above the second drop. Graham ran ahead. I noticed he ran left and got pushed right. Ali described her pin in the pinball rapid where Charlie attempted to pull her off with a rope and ended up flipping her and forcing her swim. Charlie looked a little sheepish.

I took advantage of the big friendly eddy and my tall C1ness to scout the second drop a little better. The river right side looked too shallow so the best option was to run river left. The washout looked unobstructed. The left chute looked like it had two options, either running with a slight left angle straight into a pillow or run it with a centre-to-right angle avoiding the pillow. Either way, whichever line would have some degree of push to the right. I ferried out to the chute and chose to run straight into the pillow. I knew I wouldn't hit the rock behind it. Sure enough it gave me a rebound push to the right and I bounced through the waves that followed, finally officially catching the group in the eddy below.

Graeme offered the club splits so I could paddle with two blades. Robin thought the get-out was just in view in the distance. I opted against the splits, too much faff for too little distance to go, and instead went for a head start toward the get-out. Robin turned out to be wrong, but this time, they didn't leave me behind so noticeably. About 20mins later, the get-out came in view. The river just sort of ends in a series of pipes running under a low-water bridge. I arrived last, just in time to have missed Russell attempting to run his boat through one pipe and Robin swimming through another.

As we headed for home, the rain picked up and stayed with us. The tease! It should have been doing that on Saturday!

My complete set of photos is here, temporarily.

Rik's photos are here.

Graham's helmet cam videos are here and here