Mellte - Late October

So you may have noticed the amount of rain we have been having recently. This has been good to the South Wales rivers (and to the whole of the UK really) in terms of kayaking, however there has been one issue; the rain is coming mid week, and then the weekends are usually drizzly and not providing the swelling torrents that I am after. This isn't an issue for my freeloading (student) chums, but when I am stuck in work on a Wednesday whilst all I receive is boating messages, it makes me a little sad inside. Luckily, not being Amy Winehouse, I'm not gonna drink myself to death trying to numb the pain, but maybe harbouring hatred for all my friend's free time isn't that healthy either.

Luckily this Sunday just been (the 27th) was the weekend I was back in a White Water kayak; I was happier than the children of America were when they read the obituary list for the June 25th 2009. Having been out on the Saturday night, the Sunday morning was seen in with a slight headache. Not being able to boat on Saturday had meant I was chomping at the bit to get out. A cheeky text to Stu (A Procrastinate boater) said that levels were looking low and asking what he thought (later deducing that I may have messaged him in the middle of his breakfast). His attitude seemed similar to mine, tiredness was lowering motivation. Half an hour of non-committal messages the ensued. The information exchanged was about as meaningless as Lib Dem's next election campaign is going to be, so Stu got hold of Fran (Procrastinate's founder) to see what his thoughts on the situation were. With Fran providing the motivation to do it, Stu got hold of Simon (OSBC founder) whilst I got hold of Phil. The plan was set, meet at the Mellte for 10:00.

I picked up Simon, Stu and Fran to set off on our way. I had taken a cheeky shortcut (which in reality ended up being longer, but as a man stuck to the story of it being a shortcut) only to get abuse for the decision. Apparently the scenery of Cardiff is not to the other's taste, but they soon got over this and we met Phil at the Mellte car park in the pouring rain. With Cardiff having been lovely on departure, we were without waterproofs, and getting changed was horrible. Huddled as close to the car as possible, thinking that vehicular proximity would somehow repel rain, we were changed but wet. A quick shuttle saw us at the top:

I took the photo, so wasn't originally in it. However, with the marvels of photoshop, I have subtly added myself back in

With this being Simon's first run of the Mellte, his nerves were apparently running higher than a hipster's turn-ups, and when getting to the 15 ft drop he was now hit with the harsh reality; our get in is straight into a 15ft drop. Phil and I went first, Simon followed with a successful boof, but a bit of a wobble after.

My line 

Phil on the edge

Another group from the South Wales area were also on the water, and we were within seconds of each other for the whole river. We caught them up on the big drop, and whilst people were deciding lines, I decided that one way of seeing the line is to be shown it. Therefore I got in my boat and run a God damn brilliant line. Like, seriously, this line was blooming perfect. A sweet boof on the top, with the line nailed, gave me a huge autoboof which raised my bow high into the air. A majestic landing led to a humbled and dignified 'That's what you get' aimed at the world.

Unfortunately the photographer had a premature flick on the shuttle button for my run

Phil mid drop

Stu also got a sweet line, corkscrewing during the second half to show the ease with which he does things.

The rest of the run was fun, good rapids and solid boating from the five of us. We got to the bottom being elated at our decision to come, and impressed with the boating everyone managed (esp. Simon on a cracking first run on the river).

Hopefully the trend will continue and more boating is to come.

Till then...

Cardiff Uni Canoe Polo Tournament

The 16^th and 17^th March saw the annual Cardiff Uni Canoe Polo (CUCP) tournament held at Taf Bargoed near Trelewis. This is where a horde of students, who thrive in freezing cold conditions, descend on South Wales to play a sport that was invented to bore the pants off even the blandest of people. I imagine that Jeremy Vine would even find this game to tedious to discuss on his seemingly never ending radio program.

You may be asking why the hell this game is being blogged about on STC as opposed to PTC, and the reason is that CUCP marks the anniversary of the first post on STC, so I have decided that it is an apt place to post the CUCP blog.

Cardiff Old Boys entered a team, who Dave Underhill (of MadeAlmostEntirelyOutOfSteel fame) was meant to be co-ordinating. However the buck eventually was passed up the chain to yours truly, despite my never dying hatred for the game of Canoe Polo. Luckily Sam Austin and Eira Jepson were able to sort boats and kit out, so we had the equipment to play. All I had to do was rock up on the day and inspire.

Cardiff Old Boys Team

Saturday morning was the reunion of the Old Boys and Old Girls, some of whom hadn’t seen each other for nearly a year. This meant that excessive bodily contact was in order as well as having to hear about each other’s boring lives and what codswallop they had been up to recently. To save the suspense for all you readers, the latest and greatest piece of news from the camp was that one of us is thinking about buying a new car, but they may decide not to (at least we wasted each other’s time by going through the incessant routine of exchanging pleasantries, as opposed to getting on with our lives and getting this polo malarkey over and done with). Once this was complete, the day started.

A couple of the players hadn’t been in a polo boat for a while, which meant skills were lacking somewhat. However what we lacked in skill, we truly made up for in muscle definition. It was as though I had plucked a team from members of a local Hollister photo-shoot.

The team at their best

Our first game was against Bangor, who in previous years have gone on to win CUCP. We got our game faces on, and with 7 people we knew that each player could go all out (as we had two substitutes). The game was well fought from the Cardiff side, and the first goal of the day was scored by the teams Captain. Yes, that is I and the goal was a blinder. The goalie was throwing the ball out, and I managed to get contact with it mid-flight and deflect it back into the goal. We went on to win the game, which was likely down to my truly epic leadership. This was a good start to the day, where the first game tends to be a difficult one.

Bangor Game

With a short break, we then had two games on the bounce: Southampton and then Nottingham. Southampton started with 3 men, because they were running seriously late and didn’t have the technical leadership Cardiff Old Boys had, meaning we got a decent lead in the opening minutes. The game was easily won once they were up to a full team however, so the lack of players didn’t affect them much.

During this time, the Cardiff A team were not doing so well. I wasn't really paying attention to their games in the long run, but they were loosing quite a lot, and with skills shown below one wouldn't know why:

Max laying down the law

Handy ball carrier too. With Jonny King just chilling in the background, probably wondering what day it is.

Cardiff Old Boys Managed to get to the Nottingham game before Nottingham were ready, due to the fact that the Old Boys are as superbly organised as the carbon atoms in a diamond. We had a hard game on our hands, Nottingham are a notoriously good team, and we had our best 5 ready to go. The game was close, with Nottingham missing a couple open goals which was lucky as we finished the game only 1 goal in front.

The way the first division was run, the 8 teams were split into 2 groups, meaning that we were currently at the top but having to play the same teams one more time. This lead to us playing Southampton again and for a second time they couldn’t get their team ready on time, so we got a fair few goals on just 3 players. This farce of a game lead to a win from Cardiff, and it was Bangor next.

The day up until now had been fairly wet, and the polo secretary for Cardiff had been hospitalised. The President then went on to make a call to cancel the rest of the games in the day due to the poor weather (which for some reason was catching everyone by surprise. Who’d have thought South Wales in winter could be cold and wet?) This effectively meant that the Old Boys were top of their group. However, Bangor were still up for playing, being Welsh themselves they had factored in the cold and were coping well. Despite the risk that losing to them could cause to our position, we bravely decided to play despite the cancelation, as they had driven 4-5 hours to play polo. Luckily we still managed to give them a decent opposition and won the game, although I believe the game was a lot closer than before. I do remember the water being so cold that catching and holding the ball was a real chore. It was so cold in fact that the local rats had found body warmers and were confidently strutting their stuff around the tarmac:

A rat in a coat - very strange!

This thing is making it look a lot warmer and cosier than it was, believe me.

This ended our first day on 5 successive wins, and the Old Boys at the top of their group. We then headed back to Cardiff to watch the deciding Six Nations game. What a travesty, once again Wales somehow pulled it out of the bag. I would like to say they were lucky, but they simply dominated. So to drown our English sorrows, we ordered a Dominos and had some beers.

Hangover free and ready to get the weekend over with, I woke up Sunday morning to get a lift with Helen Jarvis of the Old Girls team. With a 1050 start against Birmingham, the Old Boys were feeling confident. However this was slightly misplaced, as we played truly badly. The game seemed sluggish, without any urgency that we displayed the day before and we only scraped a win against a side that was doing poorly in the competition. However a win is a win, and this took us to the Semi-finals where we were to meet Bangor once again.

With two wins against Bangor so far this weekend, you may think that this would be an easy game, however we were seriously not on form. I assume the loss in the Six Nations had taken away our drive or even the sorrows that James Grant (of I’m Not Injured) had taken the day off playing, because we were just embarrassing. Somehow we had snatched the win, although I am sceptical as to whether we deserved it, and therefore we were in the final.

James Grant looking smug with his decision not to get on.

With 3 hours between the Bangor game and the final we got changed into dry kit. Mez Williams decided to go for a shopping spree in Cardiff, whilst the rest of us remained in polo mode. During the weekend the Cardiff Old Girls and Cardiff Uni Ladies had done brilliantly, also remaining undefeated so that they would face each other in the final and Cardiff Uni Bs also made their final.

Cardiff Uni Bs were facing ULU, who are an exceptionally good polo uni and their B team hadn’t conceded a goal all weekend. The game was very well played by a Cardiff side that had mostly only started playing this year, showing a lot of promise for the future. Cardiff eventually won the Silver medal, unfortunately being piped by ULU, but scoring the only goal ULU conceded.

The ladies final was also close, but an experienced Old Girls side showed the youngsters what for. The game was full of cards, the first of which was shown 20 seconds in and with a yellow in the second half, as apparently the two sides had put aside friendships and sportsmanship for a win!!!

This is an example of one of the fouls. You may not know, but grabbing the nose of someone else's boat in a bit of a no-no.

With Mez back from household duties, the men’s final was Cardiff Old Boys vs. Warwick Uni. Warwick had been playing amazingly all weekend and this was clearly to be our hardest game. Both teams were slow playing the first half, trying to get a good shot at goal, yet neither team was letting up.

Mez with a good save

I missed our first chance, which was a half-way shot at an open goal and the ball hit the top rope that holds the goal in place. I believe Warwick scored first, but we quickly equalised.

Tussle for the ball

Sam splashing a Warwick chap in the face - dirty tactics come into play

The result of the Second Half sprint, this turned out to be a foul! Controversial if you ask me, it all looks kosher.

With Warwick’s second goal coming in the second half, we knew that it was all or nothing and pushed out. However with a couple minutes to go Warwick’s No. 5 managed an over the head shot which flew into the net. Albeit a good push from Cardiff, and the best game we had played all day, Warwick took the win at 3-1 as well as the gold medal (probably very deservingly).

A shot by Farrow, if he had made this then we may have won. But he didn't.
Thanks a lot Farrow!

Warwick's No. 5 doing the deed

The weekend was sponsored by Canoe and Kayak Store, and a massive thanks has to go to them for their support:

Cardiff Old Boys team - Only Silver :-(

The Gold winning team

A weekend of fun, facts and Parkour

Friday 15^th to Sunday 17^th Feb saw the annual Cardiff Uni Kayakers trip to Devon to try and run some of the English classics. However, the typical British weather failed us, as there was not enough rain beforehand to really give the rivers what they needed.

I drove my new car, who has been christened Matilda, down to Devon with Stu Sheath, Max Emery and Jonny King of Procrastinate. Having the day off on Friday meant we could get away early and grab a pub meal before the Uni lot turned up for another evening of drinking and games, hopefully similar to that detailed in our North Wales adventures. We managed to get away early because of Jonny King's new resolution to be more punctual. It seems to be working at the moment, so lets hope that it stays that way.

Matilda fully loaded

The drive down was traffic free and Matilda did her job well, getting us to the pub to meet Simon and Chris (a couple of the Uni Kayakers currently on placement). Although Matilda got us to our destination, is wasn't as simple as getting from A to B (there was a small amount of C, with a pinch of D thrown in for good measure). The four of us got slightly lost in Dartmoor itself; rumours do tell of pixes, headless horsemen and rabid dogs, but we all live in Cardiff which is descended upon weekly by much scarier creatures - Valleys folk. So none of us were fazed by the apparent danger we may or may not have been in. To be honest, I would much rather be attacked by a headless chump riding a horse than be out on a Saturday night in Walkabout and have a Valleys slag wrap her cellulite ridden legs around me, screeching in some incomprehensible Welsh tongue!

The food in the Pub in Widecombe was cracking and set us all up for a good evening. The six of us got to the bunkhouse and managed to get the fire going and have the place warming up by the time the Uni lot arrived. Then we all settled and had some beers and some laughs. I was back on the Gin and Juice, but didn't hit it as hard as I did in North Wales due to the fact that I needed to be able to drive the next day. There were a couple of drinking games played, and because we had no playing cards, therefore meaning that High Card Something Bad couldn't be enjoyed, we thought of another way of working it in. We played a game that is notorious with Cardiff University Kayakers, called The Grand Old Duke Of York. This is basically where you go round in a circle, and in order each person has to say the next word of the nursery rhyme. However to make things more exciting, if a person got the word wrong they had to do Something Bad. I can't relay details, as that is against the spirit of the game, but there were copious Bad Things done including a shot of alcohol from someones hairy belly-button (This was in no way one of the worst things, but it was a certain current President of the club that had to do the shot!!!).

Waking up Saturday morning I was feeling slightly hung over, but this was slept off before the club had the chance to get ready. A quick jump out of bed, a shower and into clothes, I was in Matilda ready to drive to the get on for the Dart Loop. Although the morning was cold, we kitted up and people were looking ready to take on the river. Because the Uni lot faff so much, it was easy for Jonny King to merge into the background and seem as though he was running at a good pace;

Jonny King; don't let his devilishly good looks fool you, he is truly clueless

The plethora of boats at the get on

The loop was fun, and our group managed it with style and grace. The afternoon run was the Upper Dart, but with very little water :-( It took about an hour to an hour and a half from getting off of the loop to starting the Upper section. Seeing as there were around 20 to 25 people, that is at least a whole day's worth of man hours wasted! Think of the achievements that could have been accomplished in that time. Jonny may have even been able to finish the latest novel he's been engrossed in within that time frame!!

The middle section of the run was a good laugh, but once again I messed up Surprise, Surprise (although my line apparently looked OK). The group behind us took a while to get down, and therefore Max, Stu, Jonny and I went to meet the people who didn't boat the Upper, at the River Dart Country Park, where they apparently had a wicked afternoon of Pirate Ships, Zip Wires and Climbing Frames.

With a little bit of fear that the group still on the river may not have finished before it was dark, we went back to check the score, only to find them pass us in the minibus half way there. So we headed back to the bunkhouse to prepare for the evening. This composed of a shower and a snooze. Unfortunately I seem to have arrived at a stage that a simple snooze didn't recharge the batteries, yet allowed them to drain completely. This meant that the dinner call was completely unwelcome, but I hauled myself out of bed, and after food was consumed it proved the right thing to do.

Saturday evening was when Lucie Parkinson, a soon to be doctor, stated as fact that any alcohol above 20% concentration is not absorbed by the body. She apparently was told that the body would absorb 20% alcohol and no more would enter the body (I'm finding her logic hard to re-explain due to its absurdity, but I will continue). This is clearly not what she was told, but what she thought she heard. I have found a link that gives the fact a lot more clearly and well explained. Essentially above 20-25% there is a potential delay of the alcohol to the Small Intestine, meaning that there is a clear delay of it being in the area of highest absorption rate. Lucie seemed to make the assumption that this meant any other alcohol was not absorbed. Dave Underhill put it to her that a person who drank a pint of 40% would therefore be at the same blood alcohol at the end of the night as a person who consumed a pint of 20%, which Lucie said would be the case, as the extra 20% that the first hypothetical person drank would not be absorbed... No Lucie, the theory states that it wouldn't absorb in the same amount of time, not that it isn't fully (or at least close to fully) absorbed. This is a scary world when Doctors think along these lines! This is enough of a rant on this subject, but I thought that it required a mention. 

The end of Saturday night saw some loud drinking games and at least three completed rounds of Grand Old Duke Of York. Clearly the small contingent of people left on the Saturday night/Sunday morning were nurtured as kids, and were taught the words of many a nursery rhyme.

On Sunday we went for a walk in Dartmoor, which was rad. About two and a half hours of easy walking, nice scenery and climbing tors was a pleasant way to spend a day that couldn't provide any kayaking.  The wind was absolutely ragging it, making standing on top of the Tors a more nerving experience. Myself, Blake May and Huw Beckett (two new lads to Cardiff Uni Kayakers) Parkour'd our way around the Tor's of the moors, with numerous flips, rolls and 360 spins (although the photo's don't do it justice, there were some dope-whack moves pulled out):

On top of a Tor

Huw, poo-kour'ing in a hide away.

Blake mid parkour move

Blake and Huw having back-flipped onto the top of a Tor

Seeing the scale of it makes the move more impressive!

Some pleasant Devonshire scenery

Getting back to Cardiff at around 1700 on Sunday evening led to a crash of energy and a bedtime of 2100. Sad I know, but much needed.

Cheeky Time Lapse of the start of Friday night

Till next time...

Taf Fechan - the night before & the journey home

Friday 14th saw the end of term for Cardiff Uni, and the usual ' Drink The Bar Dry' which I attended with some of the Cardiff Uni Kayakers. A few pre-drinks at Jonny King's saw some laughs, then a sweet night spent in the Student Union. My memory does not serve me overly well, so tales of the evening will have to go un-regaled.

Rowan rocking it RSB style

This night on the 'razz' saw in Saturday feeling absolutely shattered. Unfortunately I am not built for late nights; apparently my body likes it's 8 hours sleep to start on the night prior to my wake up, as opposed to the early hours of the day that I am meant to be getting out of bed. Therefore at 08:00, when my body feels though it should normally be getting out of bed, my head was spinning.

Everyone in a merged orgy

Luckily my brain kicked in, knowing that I had nothing planned for the day, I headed back to the land of nod. 11:30 came, and from the warmth of the bed, I saw there was water in South Wales. Getting hold of Procrastinate's Max Emery and Stu Sheath, both of whom were also hung over, the Taf Fechan was the river of choice.


Stu's girlfriend had his straps and roofracks, so all 4 boats went on Joanna (my Saxo). This made her heavy and sluggish, increasing my view that overweight women are just no help! The slightest incline saw her power drop, and our speed decrease! This was thoroughly annoying, yet we got to the river, and there was water in it!

Stu getting ready at the Taf Fechan get on

Stu and I went to run the shuttle with Max map reading. This meant that we were leaving Jonny at the top with the boats. Now you may think that this is a bad idea, and reading the NSPCC website, namely "what the law says", it does show that children shouldn't be left alone (I assume this also means adults who have the intellectual capacity of a child as well!). Luckily Jonny met someone to whom he was intellectually superior:

Jonny's latest friend

Apparently her name was Abigail, and Jonny and her shared an apple together.
Actually, now I am thinking about it, if it was the same Jonny we saw at Drink The Bar Dry on Friday, he was probably flirting with her!
Hhmmm... Now I'm glad that no-one else turned up.





With the Shuttle over, we were getting onto the river at around 15:00, so I was hoping for a relatively fast run, as we estimated about an hour and a half of useful light left. This increased my nerves a bit, but when on the river it didn't seem to matter any more. The run was a beaut. and although there were trees in some of the sections, which was a real shame, the run was great fun.

A cheeky Go-Pro screen shot from the river

It was a real treat to be boating again, even if motivation was low during the drive up. The best part of it was that this was a first run for us all, which made it tremendously fun. We finished the river at around 16:20, so perfect timing really, as it was just getting dark. And by the time we picked up Stu's car it was dark.

Screen Shot of the get off - Showing just how dark it was

Now, I have always been sceptical about the roof-racks on Joanna, and today confirmed my suspicions. Jonny and I were in the Saxo, and on the A470 when it happened. The rear bar of my racks came off. All I heard was a noise from above, and then in the rear view mirror I see Stu's boat flying! I pull over immediately and Jonny and I get the boats off the road, running onto the A470 like mad-men. Luckily the cars behind stopped in time and didn't get hit by the boats. Max came running up to help, and him and Stu were close behind, and we cleared the road.

A Copper pulled up about a minute after, with the small amount of traffic behind us now cleared and made sure everything was OK, seeming very casual about the while thing.
Copper, "Everything alright boys?"
Me, "Yer, the roof-rack has broken."
Copper,"Oh, OK. Wanna make sure everything is off of the road now I'm here?"
Me, "Yer alright, sounds like a plan"

As he reversed up the road, I had a quick sweep over, but the lads had done a good job getting the debris off of the carriageway.

The Officer then asked us to pull our cars off the road a bit more, and then to all our surprise he just drive off, clearly he thought we had it under our control. Both Stu and I put on our high visibility jackets to look the part (a very important part of roadside safety), and Max got on the case of getting someone to help get the boats back, as my roof-rack didn't fair well in it's tumbling to earth.

This is the part of the story where the Hero's of the day are named. Max managed to get Helena Goode and Zoe Pelech to come and pick up the boats. A conversation that started, "Hi Helena, can you do me a MASSIVE favour..."

So Helena and Zoe drove to find us on the A470, and took the four boats back to Cardiff. Dunno what we would have done without them, and a massive thanks has to go out to them both, coming to find us and give us a hand on a Saturday night.

Assessing the damage to the boats showed that they were in good nick still, and the roof of Joanna also seems fine. The only thing that broke was feet of the roof-rack, and all in all a good outcome from what could have been a catastrophic f**k-up.

Hope that was an interesting read, and a Merry Christmas to Everyone.

Till next year...

A Weekend of Fun

So, its Thursday evening and I get hold of Dave Underhill. Its been raining so much that boating is needed. With the boat on the car, and kit inside as well, we're contemplating a new river, which always adds the danger factor. I'm nervous and excited, its like a school girl getting ready for her Prom; you know you're gonna have a cracking time, however there is a large chance you could get fucked!

So now it's Friday and I'm at work, but as ever, the slightest talk of boating had dried up the sky. It's as though Mother Nature isn't getting the foreplay she desires! However we decide that the Rhondda may have some water in, so the plan was to meet at 13:00 at the get off. As I drive up, it is clear that the river is nice and full. We get changed, both boats on Dave's car, and off to the top. The run was a real good laugh, and getting to the bottom we decide another is in order. So quick shuttle and back on it. This time Dave decides that I need to follow him close so that we can get a good video of him on the rapid. However this sort of takes from our sense of how to actually run the rapid, and we both get dangerously close to getting munched by the rather large stopper.

Seeing sky after following Dave

But it was sweet to get back on a river, and I'm glad we did get on something.

Now it's Saturday night, after a day of chilling out and watching Wales lose to New Zealand, and I am once again getting prepared for tomorrow's boating adventure. It's raining hard in Cardiff, so hard in fact that it's as though the clouds have employed the best fluffer money can buy! I've still got that feeling of being a girl on her way to the prom, I just really don't want the get spanked too hard tomorrow!

Sunday morning took too long to arrive, and waking up at 07:00 wasn't pleasant. Getting my stuff together to meet Dave for 07:30 did excite me, but checking the online gauges took this feeling of inner happiness away, and I really don't enough that I can afford to lose any! Although the gauges were reading medium for the Mellte and Tawe, this meant that the Giedd would not be running, nor the Upper Tawe. These were the two rivers we were gonna be looking at if water was high. However the option was to meet Max and Stu from Pro-crastinate at the get off for the Nedd Fechan, along with Will Bevan. Now if you're a reader of the Stuff The Consequences blogs, you may notice the name Will Bevan, and this is fo sho the one and only Adam West to my Christian Bale. This was gonna be his first time on the Nedd and the Mellte, so it was still gonna be an interesting day, regardless of the boating we could have had.

The Mellte was on a 0.7 in the morning, but as both Dave and I hadn't run the Nedd in a while, and the others not at all, this was gonna be the first river. So a drive to the top and a quick shuttle saw us on it. The first couple small drops saw us on form, and the river was a treat. It did have a fair amount of trees in, two of which were in drops that would have been quality to run, but this really didn't detract from what is a spectacular river. The most notable event on the Nedd Fechan was the drop that has a shallow landing. A quick look, and Stu said he was doing it. Dave and I looked on nervously, but Stu styled it; a nice boof and a as-good-as flat landing.

Stu headcam on the lip

Then I was to run, again I got a good flat land, however pulled slightly too hard, trying to gain some speed, and landed sideways. However the fact that it was flat was all I was concerned with.

My headcam still from the lip (what's nice about this is that you can still see the Welsh Club stamp on my hand from Friday. I swear the ink cannot be washed off!)

Then it was Dave's turn! Well, as the last to run it, and seeing that both Stu and I got a nice flat land you could probably have agreed that the run was OK to go, but we still were not sure on depth. Dave now wanted to prove just how deep the pool was, and wasn't gonna give a dam about his body during this escapade. There is a slight rumour going around that Dave is 'made almost entirely out of steel', and I dunno how true this is, but he re-surfaced unscathed. 

Dave nice and vertical

Apart for this, there was not much else of massive note about the river. Getting down to the bottom, it was obvious that Will had a sweet ride, and then it was off the the Mellte.

Getting to the top of the Mellte, we met a couple lads who were waiting on the rest of their group, and had been for about an hour. If I had been made to wait over an hour for others, there would be some serious law being laid down when they eventually turned up. We ran the shuttle, and by the time we were ready to crack on, the boys had found out the rest of the group had been caught in some floods. They seemed to think this was a fair excuse, but if it were I who was caught in a flood, do you know what I would do? Not be caught in a flood! But it seemed as though these fools hadn't considered that approach. I guess that's why I got a First Class Hons Masters degree, and they're just mincing around some puddles! So we let the lads join in our group, and to the get on it was.

So the 15ft drop was gonna be the first drop that Will would have done (except a low Right Angle on the Etive), and he did it very well. When he got to the bottom you could see on his face that he was happy. Do you know that face a baby makes, straight after it has been crying because it crapped itself, and just as its mother is opening the nappy to find a holocaust of liquid excrement? Well that's the face that Will had at the bottom pool! A smug smile, whilst saying with his eyes, 'yep, that just happened. I did that', and well deserved too.

Will on 15ft

My 15ft

15ft head cam shot

Stu's 15ft run

The run down to the big drop was quick, and we had a cheeky scout of the large drop. All of us, except Will, were gonna attempt the double, with Will giving the full whack a go. Here are the results:

Dave going first

Now I didn't see Dave go, as I went second, and was on the water by this point. What I did see however was him stopping at the top of the drop to line up. This messed with my head, because I was under the impression that we'd already decided a line, but oh well.

My head footage

So straight after Dave I ran it, and its wasn't amazing. I got the boof on the first drop, but was far too left, and didn't react fast enough going down the second, and went in at about 50 degrees.

Andy (one of the chaps who we met) nailing his line

Andy was one of the boys we met at the get on, and he ran the double after me. And he fucking nailed it, a beautiful double boof to crowning glory.

Max running double

Stu running double

Will running the beast

Will once again did very well, and run the full thing almost perfectly. When he tucked up, he rotated with it, and therefore re-surfaced upside down, but still, it was cracking.

From here the rest of the river is still a beauty to run, but not much to really talk about. There were trees about, but all could be paddled around. The whole day was awesome, and even though it wasn't the boating expected, it was still a beaut.

We went to the pub at the get off for the Nedd Fechan for a swift drink before returning to Cardiff. Lucie Parkinson had spent the day slaving over a hot oven to prepare a cottage pie for us lads, and a vegetable whatever for gay boy Max. It was a sweet way to end the evening, and the cottage pie was cracking. A massive thank you to Lucie, and to whomever taught her how to cook, one would assume Lucie's mother, who I hear is a Stuff The Consequences follower ;-).

There will be a video coming from somewhere of this trip soon, although how soon cannot be disclosed for security reasons.