SUCC Alps 2006 - 23 June to 2 July 2006
Chris V writes...
As the last of the British water drains away for the summer, thoughts naturally turn to what to do to entertain ourselves over the dry, barren summer months. The answer as ever is to head the length of France to take advantage of the sun, cheap beer and awesome paddling of the French Alps. Therefore with a not inconsiderable amount of last minute faffage, on the last weekend of June a select group of SUCCers
past and present headed south.
The teams assembled were:
- The black (not very) stealthmobile: Mikey B, Chris, Tim and Beth
- Goose's car: The Goose, Ketchup (non-paddling, non-driving shuttle
bunny), Martin and Eric
- Saga tours: Mr Webb, Mr Bolt, Mr Willoughby and Sick Boy (the others
deserve respect, Jon doesn't!)
- The Baby Mobile: Pinky, Julie (non-paddling, photo-taking, cherry
picking, baby-feeding, super shuttle bunny) and Suzie (non-paddling,
non-walking, non-speaking but much gurgling sleeping baby)
- The Hire car: Facey and Facey's boat
We (the not so stealthymobile) eventually left Southampton at about 9
on the Friday evening having had to repack the car twice to fit all of
Mike and Chris' rubbish in. Happily speeding up the M3 it was
discovered that Mike had neglected to return the keys to Richmond
Gardens before leaving, whoops. With near perfect timing we arrived at
Dover with just enough time to fill up on Red Bull, Coke and Haribo
(essential overnight driving fuel) before driving pretty much straight
onto the ferry where we were joined by Team Saga. As everyone thought
about getting something to eat or looking at the over-priced Duty Free,
John W and Mike did what they do best and headed to the bar. It being a
midnight ferry and therefore past Mikey's bedtime the inevitable
happened; Mikey drifted off to sleep, we all walked away from him and the
rest of the people in the bar pointed and laughed.
Saturday
The ferry docked, we found our car (good job Mr Webb knew where we had
parked) and the fun started. Get onto the wrong side of the road set
cruise control and onwards Lyon-wards until morning. One of the
disadvantages of Mike's lovely new stealthmobile
is that once you have
programmed the cruise control to 85 mph there isn't that much else to
do, so while everyone else slept a "high as a kite on red bull" Chris
set about playing with every button he could find and trying to work out
how to set the date, resulting in the occasional unpleasant blast of
French radio. After a few hours it was Mike's turn to drive and then it
was Chris' again (it would appear pushing paper around is significantly
more tiring than being a Phd student). Originally the plan had been to
stop at Lyon to have a play on Hawaii-sur-Rhone but after not much
discussion it was thought that pressing on to get a nice warm up river
in would be better. Consequently after a brief breakfast stop in
Grenoble on we headed to Briancon for lunch on the hill by the castle
with Team Saga. During our meal we were treated to the sight of a
wedding party meeting up in the car park below. This seemed to involve
tying bits of flowers to your car and then leaning on the horn
permanently! After a quick look over the back of the castle at the
gorge it was time to head off for River Number 1.
Briancon Gorge (III)
When we had run this last year it was painfully low, thankfully this
year someone
had decided to let some water through the barrage making
it a decidedly more pleasant run. For Tim and Beth this was their first
ever Alpine river and both seemed to like the whole idea. The water
shoot down the side of the barrage was once again devoid of water - nevertheless Mike and Chris not being particularly keen to get out their
boats scraped their way down the shoot and flopped into the pool below.
Given that neither is particularly small it is a wonder how Jon
managed to vertically pin himself doing the exact same thing! The rest
of the run was all good fun made slightly more exciting by a chronic
lack of sleep.
At this juncture a point should be made on the style of the kit being
sported by the 2 cars: Team Stealth was in play boats, paddling with 45-degree paddles and wearing boardshorts. On the other hand Team saga were
paddling RPMs, Diesels and shall we say larger craft whilst wearing 10-year-old BAs, neoprene shorts and if you're John a full face
fluorescent yellow Romer helmet. This truly was a sight to see though
in no way a reflection on paddling ability (unless it is those in big
boats paddle more sensibly).
After making our first of many visits to the layby at the get out and
being treated to some not very good rock bands sound-checking across the
river, we headed back to Giant to get food and Goose. Then it was on to
the Rab and the competition to find a space to camp that was level, ant-free and in the shade. With the weather not as warm as would be hoped
and rain threatening it was a short discussion about what to do tomorrow
before people headed for sleep.
Sunday
After a quick trip to the boulangerie for the first of many breakfasts
of pain au raisin and pain au chocolat it was time to head off to go
boating. The original plan was to go for a relatively easy day of Onde
followed by Gyronde that lasted only slightly longer than it took us to
relay it to Facey! The Onde was agreed so off we went meeting up with
the babymobile at the get in. Whilst the shuttle was taking place Beth
used the best of her Army training and found what she considered to be
an ideal candidate for tea: a massive snail. Not entirely keen on the
idea we thought that les escargots could wait. Anyhow on to the river.
Onde (IV-)
Once again the level was far better than the year before which made the
river excellent. After about 10m warm up it was straight into good
technical alpine grade IV white water. Not entirely surprisingly Beth
found it mildly intimidating especially after taking a roll and adding a
couple of choice scratches to her new helmet and a lovely bruise to her shoulder, but by the time Chris identified the wrong bridge as the get
out everything was good and big smiles all round.
After a quick lunch it was off to the get in for the Upper Guisane. Not
for the last time there was a minor communication breakdown between Goose's car and everyone else with us wondering where they were and
eventually discovering they had gone to the get out instead, so one car
down we set off on the Upper Guisane.
Upper Guisane (III/IV)
In
retrospect the Upper Guis might have been a better river to start the
day with as supposed the Onde. A nice bit of grade III water eventually
lead to the one rapid of note: S Bend. After going for the traditional
mass bimble down it was all a bit tame into Villeneuve where Beth stopped
for the day and Martin and Eric jumped on. Goose decided against
joining us deciding instead he would rather go and watch England
play football with Michelle and Beth (not Beth's
favourite pastime).
Lower Guisane (IV)
The Lower Guisane is simply one of the best, most fun rivers in the Alps, it is never dull and with the amount of water we had just good
fun. Due to the extension of a bridge Shelob's weir is now a compulsory
portage (not many complaints here) and there is another weir to portage,
apart from that it is pretty much non-stop eddy hopping (or hoping?)
paddling! There had been a slight change from previous years with a big
gravel bank on river right appearing. This was where it got harder and
even Pinky decided it was time to think about being serious but within
seconds the grin and the giggle were back!
A return to the layby get out of the previous day saw everyone playing
with Suzie and wondering about the football. As if to make her point
about her dislike of having to watch football Beth callously threw the rugby ball into the river forcing John to rescue it. It was during
this time that we discovered that even at only 3 months Suzie has a well
educated sense of smell:
- Paddlers around wearing cags = happy smiley baby
- Paddlers around having taken off cags and revealing smeggy thermals =
not happy baby
- Paddlers changed into (slightly) less smelly kit = happy baby again!
Monday
With Ia(i)n2 in full control it was time to try the silly; the Guil grandslam.
Putting in at Chateau Q and then running Chateau Q, l'Ange and
finally the Middle Guil in one continuous section. Unfortunately due to
a lack of water the Middle was not really an option but the other two were
there for the taking.
Chateau Queyras Gorge (IV?)
Chateau Q is unique and has to be seen to be believed. The Guil enters
the gorge about 6m wide and is soon down to a matter of less than 2m
in width! The first section is just 300m of non-stop Duracell Bunny paddling with several drops and stoppers to keep you interested.
Whilst both Jo(h)ns and Beth joined the photo crew above everyone ran the
first section on their own. It is totally solo paddling and over in
less than a minute, you've either mad it down upright (probably via a
couple of rock braces) or else it's not been nice to you. It is a
strange feeling sat at the last eddy just below the bridge counting thirty
seconds from when the person in front of you has gone so that you know
it will be clear. After the main section the gorge flattens out before
the final drop. This is can be nasty and is different every year. In
theory the line was right heading left to avoid an undercut but not many
people paid much attention or had any choice. Chris flipped and did a good
job on matching Beth on the colourful shoulder stakes. Eric on the other hand decided
to run the undercut upside down to no ill-effect. After
posing for photos at the bottom it was on to l'Ange.
Guardian Angel Gorge (IV)
L'Ange Gardien is a very beautiful gorge and very different to Chateau Q. It is
suitably intimidating that Chris had previously walked away from it
twice before and Mike decided that he wanted to paddle it for the first
time with Pinky and Facey and headed off in the first group. The rapids
were all quite sweet and after the 2 portages you were able to seal
launch back into the river (much to Pinky's delight). Just before the
get out we all stopped so that Pinky and Facey could get pictures of
where Facey proposed to Dawn (Dawn currently being a little too big to
come play). At the get-out we were greeted by Julie with fresh cherries
from their campsite and the inevitable stone spitting ensued.
After lunch in the sun the general conclusion was reached that the
middle was too low to make it worth while paddling so after much faff
the group split with some people running the Sunshine Run on the Durance
from the Rab down to Embrun (II-III) and Pinky and Tim going for a high
water blast down the Lower Guisane again having not fulfilled their
adrenaline quotient for the day.
Mr Webb and Chris went down to Embrun to pick up the sunshine runners,
eat ice cream and watch lots of people playing on the wave. Facey and
Beth both seemed to be having a whale of a time ripping it up once they
got used to the wave. John W was commenting that maybe his boat wasn't
quite the correct choice for the task!
The evening ended up with everyone except the Penketh family having a BBQ at the Rab and throwing stones across the river. This is a good
game except if your shoulder is a little bit painful from Chateau Q.
Tuesday
Having said good bye to Pinky, Julie, Suzie (whilst collecting another shipping order
of cherries from the campsite) and Facey (wishing him well on impending
fatherhood) we set off around Lac de Serre-Poncon to go visit the Ubaye
valley. John W had been going on all week about how he wanted to do Fresquieres, one of the harder sections on the river and legendary piece
of water. So we all trooped up and had a look at it and thought that
maybe another day and today we would go for the racecourse.
Ubaye Racecourse (IV-)
The Ubaye Racecourse is where they hold the French national down river
races and is an awesome, relatively large volume, play run at the levels
we had. With nothing too serious on the run (well nothing harder than a
low IV) everyone piled down; catching waves on the fly, rock splatting,
wave wheeling and generally "playing the river". Sick Boy even managed
to bob through the largest hole on the run. It was though the site of
our first swimming action, perfectly voluntary I hasten to add as Chris,
Tim, Beth, Andy amongst others jumped in off a rock set up for the
purpose by the rafters who use the run extensively. Tim even went one
better and careered off the rock whilst still sat in his boat. As we
approached the end of the run their was a mild moment of concern for
Beth, who (having been told we don't want to go into the Gorge) found us
merrily paddling into one, thankfully for all concerned we hadn't lost
the plot but were going into the Lauzete Gorge rather than the Ubaye
one. Still it is an amazing 200m of water with a bridge hundreds of
years old arching 50 m above.
After such a fantastic day mucking around it was only appropriate to
finish it off with more mucking around on the play wave at Embrun. Much
borrowing and swapping of boats took place, though we still couldn't
convince John W to show us how it should be done. It still being nice
and sunny the obvious choice was to head back to the Rab for more beer
and another BBQ. This time we (team stealthy car) went all out with a
gourmet delight of trout fillets with lemon and pepper accompanied by
jacket potatoes and tomatoes. Then to complete the gastronomic delights
we had baked bananas with chocolate, mmmm nice!
Veneon III-IV (V) - report from Iain
On Tuesday bright and early the Baby mobile and Facey made our merry way over the hill towards Val d'Isere, the aim being to get Facey closer to the airport (via much riverage) and for the rest of us to get a bit more baby time. We pootled over the pass to look at the Romanche, which was honking (just prior to midday, so big this year), and sadly had at least three trees in it. The ballistic nature of this river means that tree avoidance might have been a bit perilous for two boaters, so we skipped and headed down valley to the Veneon.
The Veneon is rightly described as an Alpine gem. It flows turquoise and white in a very steep sided valley, with continuous great-looking rapids and no dull bits whatsover. It is also quite hard, with most of the river in the class V to VI category; check your paddle magazines and there will be pics of psychos doing these bits because they are sooo photogenic. The bit we inspected was the easier lower section between Uhhurhurzutalors and fublufuhpommesdeterre (can't remember). This section is steep and fairly chunky and should be looked at - espcially as the (V) bit is actually 800m long! We got on in scorchio sunshine and paddled through with two portages (rough looking weir thing at the top and the 800m cataract). I (Pinky) found it quite intimidating, but Facey was more cool, though it should be noted that with the gradient and rock types - i.e. the river feel, we inspected even the class III stuff. Still it was a top run and deserves a more involved attempt next time.
Wednesday
After a very successful evening the night before, Mike was even more
problematic to get moving in the morning but eventually we headed off
Briancon way to see if there was water in the Claree. On the way we
stopped at the get in for the Durance Gorge to have a look at the level.
We were in luck, it appeared to be at a level worth giving it a go.
Just as we thought we might give it a go Goose's car drove on past and
didn't return so we abandoned the D Gorge for the time being and tried
to find Goose in the supermarket before finally heading up past Briancon
to run the Middle Claree.
Middle Claree (III+)
The Claree starts with a bit of a bang: after almost 100m of warm up it
is straight into a couple of drops that represent the crux of the run.
After quite a lot of wandering around the undergrowth trying to inspect
the drops and work out if the intended lines would go everyone bumbled
through them with out incident. Unfortunately, even though the
temperature had increased substantially, there really wasn't enough
water in the river to get it at its best with the main issue being the
repeated impact with rocks. At the get out Beth removed her cag to
discover that she had transported a stowaway down the river in the form
of a very hairy caterpillar!
After a lunch of mostly melted cheese we headed off to have a go at the
Durance Gorge. With the guide book description of hard water inside a
committing gorge with a monster portage to add to the mix, those of us
who hadn't run it before were to say the least intimidated.
Durance Gorge (III)
Having psyched ourselves up over the period of about an hour we finally
decided to go for it. We were going to run the D gorge. For the record
it was the biggest disappointment of the week with there not being
enough water (the gauge was on 2.8 for reference). Even the portage
didn't live up expectations, though involving scrambling across a scree
slope it wasn't that exposed. Tim did do the honourable thing and offer
to take Beth's boat for her. To put it bluntly the river was dog low and
when we stopped for the second portage (slot and drop was so narrow as
to be impassable in these levels) it was noticed that Mike and Jon
had cracked their boats. After hitting far too many rocks to count by
the end both splits were worse and Ben had added one to the legendary
RPM. By the get out Mike was sinking fast and Chris had had to take
about several dry rolls as the channel he followed disappeared and he
had to roll overland to get back to the point where he could float.
After talk of a cocktail night everyone headed off to the supermarket
where the majority (well all the blokes) were distracted by the sight of
a very attractive French young lady wandering around the freezer section
in just a small bikini! As Mike put it: "You don't see that in
Morrisons". An evening of eating pizzas and watch Ben repair his boat
and a distinct lack of cocktails.
Doron (IV) - report from Iain
After Driving up to Val d'Isere, we stopped at the campsite in Landry on Tuesday night, drank beer and got pished on by a mighty thunderstorm. Baby slept through. Wednesday morn and Facey had not very long at all to bag a river so we headed to Brides Les Bains to scope the Doron.
The Doron is a short and sweet river fed by the snow and ice that supports the Three Valleys ski area. It is like a cross between the lower Guisane and the Gyr, not too tricky but full-on. This day it was 90 on the gauge and was certainly in the full-on category (as high as we have done it), slightly grey and with that bizarre river mist that thunderstorms seem to bring. It was as usual very quick and very sweet, but the mist made river scouting quite a challenage and meant that we skipped some byoutiful waves. No trees thankfully, but this time due to the size of the river we chose to inspect the weir down by the dechetterie. 40 minutes of top fun in the sun and we were done.
After that: in short, Facey legged it to Geneva and we lounged by the pool in the campsite, and then on Thursday started home. It should be observed that as we left the Isere was honking, and during our 2 days there had never been low - touch wood but I have never had low conditions in this area, mainly I'm guessing due to the river flow regulation here; Briancon aficionados take note. We drove over three days from the mountains via Beaujolais, Beaune and Reims (coincidentally good wine regions) and also did some time on the WW1 battlefields, which was v.interesting. Then to Calais and home. Boo!
Thursday
Irritatingly when we eventually got to the shop it was
shut so we headed off to the Ubaye with Mikey boat-less.
Somehow we had
failed to communicate where we were going to Goose so off he went to the
get in for Chateau Q. This we only found out when we phoned him to ask
him where the hell he was which precipitated the following discussion:
Chris: "Tim we could carry our boats up to round the corner and just
paddle them down when Goose arrives and pretend we've run Fresq"
Tim: "Yeah or we could run it"
Beth: "Will you stop going on about it and just run it"
Tim: "Shall we? I'm keen and Andy's up for it"
So with Mr Willoughby's bluff called and without really meaning to, a
bunch of us were committed to while away the time before Goose arrived
running Fresq.
Fresquieres (IV+)
Awesome
is the only way to describe this! As Andy, John W, Chris and
Tim sat in the eddy at the start Andy confided thart the only previous
time he had tried to run Fresq he had walked off with in 100m, not
confidence inspiring. The run got straight into hard grade IV water
which continued to a grade V drop that we had seen people running on
Tuesday and had already agreed to walk. The river flattened out and we
started to think that the end was in sight then as we came round a
corner the river dropped away and everything got good again. There is
though something very reassuring to be able to turn round and see John
in his massive Diesel and Romer face guarded helmet!
Whilst we had been having fun Jon was smothering the bottom of his
boat with silicon sealant in the misguided belief that it would make it paddleable. When the other car arrived they were in a bad mood and only
Eric wanted to paddle. With a little encouragement we managed to bully
Martin into paddling but Goose was determined to play gooseberry (do you
like the pun?) to Mike and Michelle.
Ubaye Racecourse (IV-)
With slightly less water than earlier in the week on we piled for
another joyous play run. Andy, John W and Ben had been very generous
and brought Mikey and Jon a raft so that they could run the river
as well. Unfortunately even Suzie might have had difficulty being able
to fit inside it, nevertheless John W was not to be denied and towed
it the length of the river. By half way down it had become very
apparent that Jon's attempt at DIY boat repairs were less successful
than would be hoped, while the InaZone slowly filled with water and sank
beneath the waves Jon's cag filled with the displaced air and he started
to resemble the Michelin Man! With a decided party atmosphere pervading
the group Beth and Tim decided to have a mud fight which resulted in Tim
first trying to sink Beth and then have to rescue her boat as it tried
to make an escape for freedom! Now that his boat was only slightly more
use than the baby raft Jon decided to emulate Tim and threw himself
off the jumping rock in his boat much to the annoyance of a local raft
guide who was certain that it was too shallow.
Whilst some of us were enjoying the safety of the Racecourse
Goose took his life into his hands and ran the lower lower Ubaye (also
known as Lac de Serre-Poncon) and had a minor epic resulting in the
hasty exiting from his craft.
On our return through Embrun we again stopped for a play and for Mike to
borrow a demo Project 52 for the next day's adventure. Then it was back
to the Rab for more wave action and another BBQ. Jon took the
opportunity to dismantle his boat entirely and try and plastic weld it
shut. Some people even managed to finally drink huge quantities of
spirits and have a cocktail night.
Friday
With only one day left paddling in the Durance valley region the heat
was on to get as much done as possible on the last day. This involved
Chris doing what he is often thought to be best at; being highly
irritating whilst waking everyone up. The plan was to run Chateau Q,
the Middle Guil, Lower Guisane and to end the day with the Gyr.
Ambitious definitely, possible no (the Guil was too low for the middle
to go). So off we went to the get in for Chateau Q and even managed to
get everyone there first time!
Chateau Queyras Gorge (IV?)
The level was slightly higher and therefore harder than before. There
was a curling stopper half way down that was destined to make people
roll leading to even more rock braces than before. Beth rolled in the
meat and Martin ran the majority of it upside down before eventually
swimming and breaking his glasses! The bottom drop was different again
at this level and Chris blind-probed to be followed by a multitude of
bad ways to run it. Sick boy took a particularly "interesting" line and
required numerous roll attempts before confirming himself as upright and
happy.
After a quick change it was off to Col de l'Izoard for a team photo and
then back down into Briancon for the Lower Guisane.
Lower Guisane (IV)
Slightly lower levels than Sunday made the river not quite up to the
same standard, but still very good. We as a group made the mistake of
having Beth follow Mikey who was paddling the demo Project 52 for the
first time and was therefore a little more nervous and less concentrated
on looking after Beth. After a while Beth decided she would quite
understandably rather swap into Andy, Ben and John W's group. This was
made possible by the second of Jon's DIY repairs lasting only
slightly longer than his first and him being forced to walk off due to
now being a submarine! Unfortunately Beth swam on the hard part and Ben
took a technical trying to get her paddles (backward vertical pin,
nice). The rest of the river passed without much incident and we were
soon back in that lay-by changing again in preparation for an inspection
of the Gyr.
Gyr (V?)
The Gyr, for anyone who has never seen it, is an odd river. Possibly
the most ugly river in the Alps as it appears to run through the middle
of a building site, on closer inspection it turns out that the building
site is just the destruction instigated by the river itself. Fed by glaciers, by six o'clock the Gyr is massive and you can hear boulders
crashing against each other as the river slides off the mountainside.
With the river changing potentially by the day those wishing to paddle
it walk the length of the section (about 3 km) to check it is OK. By
the time everyone reached the top the only ones of us up for the
challenge were Mike and Tim. Beth was heard to mutter something about
men and egos before heading off to the bottom with the other
non-paddlers. Twelve minutes later, having had to wait for a raft Mike and
Tim were at the bottom to be joined about five minutes later by Eric who
had run the length of the river trying to provide safety cover!
Apparently it had all gone well and had convinced Mike that he wanted a Project 52 as his new boat.
In the evening we decided to indulge in a bit of local culture and
cuisine and headed into Embrun to eat at a local restaurant. All
smelling lovely due to the thick layer of insect repellent required to
keep the midges away we feasted on foi gras, tartiflette,
duck and donkey's ears! Thankfully the donkey's ears were a spinach dish and
nothing to do with real donkeys. After cramming seven into Mike's car for
the journey home most people slipped off to bed, the notable exception
being Mike and Michelle who headed off to the Rab to try and finish off
their red wine supply.
Saturday
After some more fafftastic packing we left the Rab and its mildy irate
and irritating owners behind and headed to Embrun and the Gap in the
hope of doing another new river. With only rubbish maps to guide us we
somehow managed to get to the Bonne.
Bonne (IV)
The Bonne seems like it should be in Scotland! It is a bit like the
Spean Gorge crossed with the Findhorn gorge and the Onde but that still
doesn't explain it. The river starts with a mini gorge that you need
to inspect from the right bank to ensure there are no tree hazards.
Andy and Ben did this by following a path from the road that Chris and
Tim reached by bashing their way through the undergrowth. A couple of
stoppers (which caused several people to roll) were followed by the
gorge narrowing dramatically to about 1m wide! Some reasonably normal
paddling followed before there was another narrowing when the river went
into an almost pinball machine style rapid. Just after half way there
was a portage of a nasty grade V+ drop. Chris ended up at the front and
made a total mess getting out of his boat. Beth went one better and
decided the eddyline above the drop was the best place to practice her
rolling! The rest of the river was punctuated by more drops, several of
them with trees in and to complete the Scottish feel there was a walk
out to the cars reminiscent of the Findhorn though thankfully not as long!
After not really saying our farewells the stealth mobile headed off
homeward stopping in Grenoble to watch the second half of the football
in a cafe. Though the Cafe we stopped in had an England flag on the
wall it was above the way to the toilets, this gave an indication of
their support! After loosing we were treated to the entirety of Grenoble
high street turning into an impromptu Portuguese victory party which
having taken a few photos we avoided in our English plated car. The
drive up was pretty uneventful, after deciding against trying to drive
through the night we stopped in a service area, got our sleeping bags
out and kipped for four hours under the stars.
Sunday
After stopping in Calais for breakfast we went to join the massed queues
of English football fans returning from Germany at the ferry port.
Unluckily for us this meant we had to pay a £60 charge to change our
ticket. A short drive on the English side and we were back in very
sunny and hot Southampton unpacking and wishing we had gone for two weeks.
So in the end in seven days we ran sixteen different sections, had three proper and one
technical swims, wrote off three boats and drank more beer than was healthy. All in all an excellent Alps trip.
For the moment, our photos are in
Andy and Chris's PhotoBuckets - they'll be linked in to succ-olds.com
soon. Honest. More to come too...