Chile 2010 Video Update

Another great video by Gareth Tate on our recent adventure to Chile this past winter. Enjoy!


Trip Report: Chile 2010 from 7 Finger media on Vimeo.

Going Big in Pucon

The last part of our trip, Gareth and I ventured down to the town most people think about when they hear of going creek boating in Chile- Pucon. We got there by hitching a ride with some people we met at NubleFest and took a few days to make our way down and paddle a few rivers along the way.

Taking a break to enjoy the view and review the map

The Laja (one of the rivers we paddled on our way to Pucon)



One of many volcanoes in Chile

After arriving into Pucon we quickly hooked up with Matias (an Argentian friend who lived in the states for a long time) and spent the weekend hitting up the Pucon classics. That weekend we knocked off the Puesco, the Upper Palguin and multiple laps on the Nevados. The nice thing about Pucon is that everything is super close and relatively short so you can usually squeeze in 2-3 different sections of river in one day. Unfortunately while I got a photo on just about every rapid of the Nevados, I didn't get any shots on the other sections we did.

Matias and Gareth trying to figure out the stove

Gareth at the first drop of the Nevados

Matias sliding down the Nevados

Gareth dropping off the edge on the Nevados

Nicole Mansfield stomping the crack falls on the Nevados



Gareth at the Auto-boof rapid on the Nevados



Matias at Dulce Amor aka the wall boof on the Nevados



Nicole scouting the Demshitz drop



After saying goodbye to Matias, Gareth and I spent a few more days exploring some other runs in the area, including the Maichin and the Llancahue, both very enjoyable and beautiful sections of river. But before leaving town, there was one more beast so slay, the Middle Palguin waterfall. While Gareth was sold on this being something he had to do before leaving town, I was less certain of my interest in dropping off a 70 foot waterfall in my kayak. The second to last day we were in town, the opportunity arose to run the drop. I am the kind of boater that makes deciscions by the way I'm feeling, and I just wasn't feeling it that day. Gareth on the other hand was fired up and so I went for moral support to take photos and play safety. After a bit of scouting, our friend Danielle fired off the drop with a clean line and it was now Gareth's turn. I was anxious watching him up there alone getting ready to seal launch. That's one of the scariest parts about this drop, that to get in the water to run it, you either have to run a very stout 10 foot drop above it or seal launch in right above the falls.



Gareth scouting the falls



Danielle at the bottom after his run of the waterfall

Gareth going big off the Middle Palguin

Gareth had a beautiful line off the drop, but definitely took a hard hit at the bottom. He ended up hurting a couple ribs and rupturing his ear drum. That's part of the risk of running something that big- you might get hurt even if you have a good line. All in all though he was excited for the experience and was still encouraging me to have my go at it. I decided to see how I felt the next day.

I woke up our final morning in Pucon to cold and rainy weather, but also with a feeling of urge to go huck off a big waterfall. We joined up with the Demshitz crew and after managing to squeeze eight of us into a tiny truck, we were off to the falls. After watching a few of the boys give 'er, I decided it was my time to jump. I visualized what I needed to do one last time, then slid off the rock into the water. My seal launch went great, which I was pretty psyched about. Now it was time to go big, and I paddled off the lip. My plan had been to slowly get into my tuck and once there, simply drop my paddle right before hitting the water. I was a bit nervous about throwing my paddle since I had never done that before but it ended up working out really well. I tucked up tight as I slid into the water. I was waiting for the hardest hit of my life, but alas, it never came. The hit was soft. I couldn't believe it. And my skirt didn't blow. Another plus. I hit my first hands roll and paddled over to where my paddle was floating and smiled big because I had just run the biggest waterfall of my life.

Me getting ready to tuck up and toss the paddle

We then quickly headed back to Pucon where we grabbed our bags and made our way to the bus terminal (after a few celebritory beers of course). An overnight bus ride, a layover day in Santiago and an overnight plane ride later I was back in the states with only the memories of what turned out to be a way too short but very awesome trip to Chile.

NubleFest 2010

When most people think of kayaking in Chile they think of the steep creeks of Pucon or of the big water at the Futa, but I was fortunate enough to spend the past week experiencing another gem of Chile, the Rio Nuble Valley located in the small mountain town of San Fabian. I was brought to the town because of my good friend Jon Clark, who found this place many years ago and has since been returning yearly to experience the beautiful vistas, play on the river's waters as well as to support a movement to fight the hydro electric projects that threaten the Nuble River and its tributaries.

San Fabian's town square

Five years ago Jon started organizing "NubleFest," a festival to promote the town of San Fabian and showcase the value that the river can have to not only the people of San Fabian, but to greater Chile. The festival lasted the whole weekend with its primary goal to get as many people as possible excited about the river. This involved taking hundreds of people on free rafting trips, a boatercross event, a raft race as well as a freestyle rodeo.

The raft racers plowing towards the finish line during NubleFest

The Nuble watershed has something for everyone. The Nuble River itself consists of over 25 miles of whitewater with a number of different sections including a harder class four upper section, a class three middle section and a lower class two stretch. When the water is flowing good, it has a feel similar to a cross between the Gauley and the Ocoee. If creeking is your thing, there are a number of tributaries to the Nuble that will give you what you're looking for. The week leading up to the festival, Gareth and I were fortunate enough to get to experience the magic of one of the Nuble's tributaries, Las Truchas.

I had heard about Las Truchas from Jon years ago when he went up there and got the first descent of it. He spoke of an overnight trip, with a big hike in and lots of creeky style rapids. Immediatley I knew it was right up my alley. Then a few weeks ago Jon did the second descent with some other friends from the states, and again the stories drew me there. With Jon busy preparing for the festival, Gareth and I decided to venture into the upper reaches of the Nuble Valley for a little expedition of our own.

The adventure started by hopping on a bus from San Fabian that took us as far up the watershed as you can reach by road. We were dropped off next to another tributary of the Nuble, Los Sauces and proceded to gear up and paddle ten minutes downstream to the beach where we would be meeting our cowboy in the morning to load up our boats on a horse and start the long hike to the creek.

The view from Camp One on the banks of Los Sauces

First thing in the morning our cowboy arrived and we helped get everything loaded up on the horse and started the 8 hour hike to the put in of Las Truchas. Intially, Gareth and I were skeptical about paying for a horse to carry our boats, but by the end of the hike we both conceded that Jon was probably correct to push us in that direction. The hike itself was one of my favorite parts of the whole trip. We were staring at snow capped peaks and mountain waterfalls pretty much the whole journey. We spent the night camped out by the river ready for a full day of kayaking down the Truchas the next day.

Our hard working horse getting loaded down with Nomads

Preparing to cross one the first of many cold creek crossings

Our first view of Las Truchas from high above on the hike

Gareth taking a break to enjoy the view

The aftermath of our little box of wine in the food bag disaster

The shelter we made at camp two after spending the previous night soaked by dew

Las Truchas turned out to be a great class 4-5 creek, with a steep boulder garden feel and lots of moves to make and boofs to hit. The steepest miles involved a lot scouting and managed to keep us both on our toes the whole day. In the end it took us eight hours to make it down to the confluence with the main Nuble and because we wanted to shorten our final day, we pushed on another hour down river before discovering an epic campsite below the Andean peaks.

Gareth nailing the line at the waterfall rapid (I personally decided to nail a rock instead, not recommended)

Another big boof by Gareth

Enjoying an Andean sunset by the fire

Our magnificent night three campsite

Our final day consisted of a full day of paddling on the Nuble, from the top most section all the way back down to the town of San Fabian. We arrived just in time to get showered and experience a real Latin American Thanksgiving, complete with a lamb asado and to make us feel at home, they even threw in some turkey and mash potatoes.

If the proposed hydro electric projects were to happen, it would flood the Nuble valley all the way up to the confluence of Las Truchas, eliminating the Los Sauces tributary (which is known to have some steep creeking class 5+  sections) and creating a lake where the best rapids of the Nuble currently sit. The easy logistics of the Truchas, with busing up from town and paddling all the way back to town would be lost and the experience not nearly as magical.

If you come to Chile, make sure to make the beautiful town of San Fabian and the waters of the Nuble watershed a must make stop on your itinerary. The more people that come and experience this wonderful place the better chance that we will have it in its current state (without dams) for many many more years to come.

If you would like more information on the festival or the logistics of visiting San Fabian, feel free to email me or contact Paul Jimenez of Extremo Sur Expediciones at extremosurexpediciones@gmail.com.

Experiencing the Rio Claro, Chile 2010

Gareth on hour 36 of our travels to Chile

Last week Gareth and I decided to break away from the impending winter back in North Carolina and sneak away for a few weeks of kayaking in Chile. Our trip started out with getting denied at the Greenville airport with our boats, managing to change our flights to leave from Charlotte and eventually finally getting both of us and our boats on a plane South. After two full days of traveling, we finally made it to our first destination, San Fabian where we met up with my good friend Jon Clark.

Looking for a ride to San Fabian

Our first adventure took us up to the Rio Claro, most known for the Seven Teacups section. What I hadn't realized before, was that the Rio Claro also contained two other steep waterfall style sections that were exactly what I was looking for. First we did the Veintidos Saltos (22 waterfalls) section, which was aptly named as it contains 22 pretty sweet waterfalls. 

Me at one of the veintidos waterfalls (Photo by Jon Clark)

Gareth disconnecting with the water on a huge boof (Photo by Jon Clark)

After a quick snack we headed back on the water to venture into the section (and more specifically the one rapid) which we had been talking about since our arrival into Chile. The section is called the Entre Saltos which contains the infamous, Throat of the Devil rapid. The section starts off with some fun drops then quickly walls up. This is when you know you've arrived. The Throat of the Devil probably drops about 50 feet in total, with the first 20 feet dropping steeply through what I would describe as a mix between a skate park and a drain pipe following which the water falls about 30 more feet of verticle. Jon went first and I followed quickly behind him. Gareth shot video of the drop before taking the plunge himself.

Jeremy Anderson dropping into the skate park/ drain pipe on a previous trip to the river (Photo by Jon Clark)

Gareth beginning his ride (Photo by Jon Clark)

At the bottom of the drop you end up in a toilet bowl pool with a pretty sizeable exit drop to get through. What happens next is something that you really can't put into words. The river narrows down and the gorge walls fly to the sky and you find yourself paddling through the most magical place I've ever been in a kayak. Then you turn the corner to find a 30 foot tributary making the most beautiful waterfall pour down just beside you. Unfortunatley because of the nature of this, it is very difficult to take pictures, so you are just going to have to come experience it for yourself.

Finally we dropped through the "Vaginas," two very narrow slot rapids which its best to stay upright in. After a couple more drops the walls start to open up and you are transported back to the real world. That section of river is officially at the top of my list for one of the msot amazing places I've ever seen.

The next morning we dropped the classic, Seven Teacups section, which includes, you guessed it, seven waterfalls, before hopping in the truck and cruising back to San Fabian.

Gareth at the first of the seven teacups

Gareth finishing off the seven teacups section dropping the final 25 footer

Waterfall vista on the way out of town

The Hillux loaded down for the trip home

The Good News and the Really Bad News

Me paragliding off of the newly discovered "El Torro" launch behind Jon's cabin*

I have decided to start this post off on a happy note, before moving on to the oh so sad story of my travels...



The good news is that I spent the better part of the last two and a half weeks living at Jon's cabin and having an amazing time. The three paragliders (Paul, Ben and L.E.) arrived into Chile safely and almost immediatley they were flying with condors 5000 feet into the air. The week to follow involved lots of paragliding, mostly for them but they also each took time to teach me a good bit as well. I was so excited to learn a new sport, and loved being there while the group of experts explored the Futaleufu valley by flight. One of the main goals of them coming was to help Jon find new launches and paragliding possibilities in the valley, and that they did.

Jon working on his high wind kiting

Jon's neighbor, Moses, cutting grass with his oxen (notice the paraglider in the upper left hand corner)

Besides getting familiar with the wonders of paragliding, we also managed to squeeze some kayaking into the week. On one of the days that we all headed into the town of Futa to stock up on supplies, Jon and I split up from the group to paddle the Upper Canyon of the Rio Futaleufu. It was the final section of river that I had needed to do, and also the most challenging. After an easy class 2-3 paddle from town down the Espolon river, we hit the confluence of the Futaleufu and quickly entered into the canyon. The canyon section was awesome and involved lots of back to back class 4+ rapids.

A view of the canyon from above

After the canyon theres a good bit of flat water before arriving at Zeta, the most dangerous rapid on the river. Jon and I quickly decided to walk around this one and considering that all of the water narrows down and bounces off of multiple walls filled with undercuts and potholes, I think we made a wise decision. After a little bit more flat water, we arrived at one of the other big name rapids on the Futa -- Throne Room. We decided to get out and look at it and after some quick debating, Jon and I decided to fire it up. I was a little nervous, especially since due to some sketchy (to me, not Jon) rock jumping, I decided not to scout the entire rapid, and just take Jon's word on the line. In the end though, we both had great lines and were psyched to have run the rapid. Jon (knowing that it would have affected my decision), waited until after the rapid to tell me that it was only his second time running it. We both took a second to celebrate our succesful runs and finished the paddle back to his house.

Okay now the bad news....

During the excitement of learning to paraglide, I managed to hurt my ankle. I basically came down hard on my landing, due to a number of circumstances that I will refrain from going into, and my right ankle twisted. I didn't think it was that bad, but because I still could not put any weight on it by the next day (last Saturday), we decided it would be in my best interest to take another visit to the Futa hospital. The doctor there took an xray and said that I had a small fracture in ankle and that I would just need to wear a cast for 10 days. That was okay news for me- 10 days in a cast I could handle. They didn't have any crutches so Jon made me some really sweet crutches out of wood around his cabin.

Standing in front of Jon's cabin with my cast and crutches

After a few more days hanging out at Jon's place, the group decided that they would head to Argentina to do some paragliding exploration and I decided I would take that opportunity to get a ride to Esquel where I could catch a bus north. I took an overnight bus from Esquel to Mendoza (at this point I had ditched the crutches since they were impractical for city life and made carrying my stuff difficult). The doctor didnt tell me anything about not walking on my foot and since he sent me out of there without any crutches, I imagined he'd expected that I would have to walk on it.



My plan was to catch another overnight bus from Mendoza to Salta (a city in Northern Argentina) and the following day head into Bolivia. This is where the story really heads downhill.... While waiting in the Mendoza bus terminal for my next bus, a couple of guys snatched my bookbag (containing my passport, ipod, camera, etc.) and ran off. I couldn't believe that they had the audacity to steal from the handicapped, but they did. Had it not been for my leg being in the cast I would have ran after them, but instead I basically had to watch them run away. So after an afternoon in the Mendoza police station filing a report, I hopped an overnight bus to Buenos Aires to get a new passport.

After a 16 hour bus ride (it was supposed to take 12) involving a flat tire and a flooded interstate, the bus finally arrived into Buenos Aires (on my birthday of all days). I headed straight to the US embassy to try and get my new passport. Even though I arrived after what was supposed to be the cut off for getting a passport for the day, the people at the embassy saw the exhaustion in my face and made some phone calls and made it happen. I went pretty much straight from the embassy to the hospital to get my ankle looked at and my cast taken off. At this point I was thinking that they would just take the cast off and maybe I would get a walking cast or something and move forward with my plans to meet Brian in Bolivia to do some kayaking. Unfortunatley, thats not how it worked out.

The doctors in Buenos Aires removed my cast, looked at the old xrays and at some new ones and told me that in no way should I have been walking on my foot for the past week. They told me that they needed to put another, better, cast on my foot and that I needed to wear it and be on crutches for at least a month. I argued with them for a while, saying that I wanted a walking cast so that I could continue my travels (although no boating), but they refused. They told me that if I continued to walk on my foot I would probably end up needing surgery. That got my attention and I let them put the cast on my foot.

I left the hospital feeling pretty defeated and at a loss for what to do. After spending the next 24 hours thinking about the situation and talking with my parents, Brian and some other friends, I decided that traveling alone with two bags (my main bag and my kayaking gear) on crutches through South America would be close to impossible and probably not much fun anyhow. That said, I made the very difficult decision to book a plane ticket back to the states for two weeks to get another opinion about my leg, let my ankle heal a bit and lighten my load. I booked a ticket at 6:30pm Friday night, got on a flight at 12:40am Saturday and arrived into Tampa yesterday morning.

It was very nice to see my family, but I am still having a difficult time adjusting to being in the states and accepting the fact that I will not be able to see all of the places I had wanted to. As of now, I have a flight booked to return to South America on March 19th into Quito, Ecuador, which means that if I am going to see Bolivia and Peru like I had planned I will have to either extend my trip or save it for another time altogether.

Tomorrow afternoon I am going to see the doctor and will hopefully learn more about what to expect for myself over the next few months. Keep your fingers crossed for me....

The Outhouse at Jon's cabin

*Thats not actually me paragliding, its Jon, but I wanted to make my injured ankle paragliding story seem cooler than it actually was. In reality I was only about 15 feet off the ground when I hurt my foot -- although I must say being 15 feet off the ground is still really fun. I would also like to say that this has not at all hindered me from my desire to paraglide and I still plan to launch of "El Torro" one day!

Exploring the Rio Futaleufu and its Surroundings

The last two weeks I have spent living in the Futaleufu valley and lets just say that the river, and the entire valley, have certainly lived up to all its hype.

After catching a bus from Esquel to the small town of Futaleufu, I hitchhiked up the road and hiked into Jon´s place. The next morning Jon and I woke up bright and early to finish our preparations for the start of a 10 day NOC Adventure Travel trip on the Futaleufu river that Jon was leading and I was helping with. One of our necessary tasks was to transport some of the kayaks from Jon´s cabin to the road. Luckily, I came to visit Jon just months after he got his new four-wheeler, so rather than having to carry all the boats out the trail like we might have had to in the past, we got to load them up on the four-wheeler and rode out. After getting the boats and the gear situated, I rode with Jon back into Esquel where we picked up our two guests for the trip, Wes and Lauri, from the airport.

Jon finishing up overloading the four-wheeler with boats and gear

Surprisingly enough, the guests arrived on time at the airport and after a quick lunch, we were on our way again back to the Futa valley. That afternoon we checked into the cabin, located right next to the river, where we would be spending most of the next two weeks and then hit the river for my first taste of the Futaleufu.

During that time I was still recovering from my earlier sickness and had developed a pretty bad cough. After two nights awake coughing, it was decided that I needed to go to the doctor. After a visit to the Futa hospital, I was diagnosed with Bronchitis. The doctor told me I needed to stay off the river for three full days. That was pretty tough news for me, as I had only gotten one full day on the river at that point and was dreading the idea of sitting around the cabin and not paddling. Long story short, I decided that my sanity was more important than my physical health and I was on the river by the next day (taking it easy of course).

Over that first week, my health gradually returned to normal and Jon, Wes, Lauri and I spent everyday exploring all the Futaleufu river had to offer. We paddled the Terminator and Bridge to Bridge sections many times, as well as the Rio Azul, a lower volume river that flows into the Futa. Among the highlights was Jon´s first bull riding experience, Jon and I´s evening surf session of the Moondocka wave and horseback riding up a mountain in the Futa valley.

Jon preparing for his bull ride, which lasted less than two seconds
¨If you´re going to be dumb you better be tough¨ -Jon´s new phrase

Jon and Wes about to head down river

Me paddling down the Rio Azul with a view of the ¨Tres Monjas¨ peak in the background (Photo courtesy of Jon Clark)

Doing some horseback riding in the Futa Valley

A view of the upper section of the Rio Futaleufu during the horseback ride

Surfing out onto the wave in Moondocka (Photo courtesy of Jon Clark)

Me surfing the wave

After a week of boating on the Futa, we decided that it was time for a little Patagonia road trip up to the town of Chaiten to check out a river Jon had been wanting to do there, as well as pick up some gas for the truck (there is no gas station in Futaleufu). So last Friday night, after a day of boating the Futa, we all loaded up in the truck and drove two and a half hours to Chaiten. The river we were planning to do the next morning was the Michimahuida and involved 16 miles of class 4-5 whitewater. We started the day early, knowing that it could potentially be a long day, especially since it would be everyone´s first time down. Jon, Wes and I (Lauri decided that she would rather sit that adventure out) were at the river by 7am, ready to get our boof on.

The run turned out to be more spectacular than we could have ever imagined. I feel like I say this in every post, but that river truly was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been in my entire life. It took us through deep deep gorges, that always seemed to remind you that you better have good lines, cause there was no way out of there besides on the river or in a helicopter. We were also surrounded by glaciers and the Volcano Michimahuida pretty much the whole time. Along with the scenery, the whitewater was amazing and good lines were had by all, making the overall experience an excellent one. Wes´s comment, while loading up the boats after the run, was that he felt like breaking his paddle and throwing his gear in the water because it ¨simply can´t get any better than that.¨

A view of the Rio Michimahuida with a glacier in the background

Me peeling out of an eddy preparing to run one of the class four rapids on the Rio Michimahuida (Photo courtesy of Jon Clark)

A view of the Volcano Michimahuida from the road on the way to the river

The sunset over the ocean in Chaiten (Photo courtesy of Jon Clark)

After another night in Chaiten, celebrating our successful trip down the river, we loaded up and headed out, without really knowing what we were going to do that day. There was talk of a hike, visiting some hot springs or just returning home to the Futa. Somehow or another we arrived back at the Rio Michimahuida and after speaking with some locals, decided the three of us would put back on, higher up than the previous day, and see what we could find. We had no idea what the section of river would be like and were pleasantly surprised to find the short section filled with classic class four whitewater.

Our ¨Go NOC AdTrav¨ pose on the truck while driving through a river to get to the put-in (notice the volcano in the background)

Jon and I drinking some Cervezas Negras riverside after the paddle

The final days of the trip were spent back on the Futa. With the fluctuating water levels, huge waves and epic surfs, there is certainly no getting bored on that river. One evening we all headed to Jon´s cabin to watch him do one of his newest extreme sports, paragliding. From his cabin, he basically throws on a large backpack with his wing inside, spends 45 minutes hiking up the mountain behind his land and then essentially walks down a few steps, allowing his wing to inflate. Within 10 minutes he was flying high above the mountain´s peak. He spent about an hour and a half in the air on what he said was one of his best flights yet, before landing in the field in front of his house.

A picture of Jon paragliding over the Futa Valley (look in the middle of the sky on the left side)

The trip ended great, and Wednesday morning we all loaded back into the truck to drive Wes and Lauri to Esquel to catch their flights out. Jon and I had lots of errands to run in Esquel and after surprisingly completing them all, we headed home. We were both pretty excited to get back to Jon´s cabin and relax after the trip.

Thursday morning we woke up expecting bad weather and were pleasantly surprised to find a nice day. Even though we had talked of not doing much productive that day, we soon decided neither of us were cut out for that and went on a mission to fix up Jon´s paragliding launch sight in preparation for the three paragliders that were to be arriving in the coming days. So off we went, with a rake, cutters, machete and weed whacker in hand up the mountain. We decided to go up the rocky path, since Jon did not yet have a trail cut all the way through the forest. It proved to be extremely steep and well, rocky. I really don´t know how Jon hikes that heavy wing up those rocks in 45 minutes, but he does lots of pretty crazy things, so its no surprise. After finally reaching the top, 1200 feet above Jon´s cabin, I was blown away by the view. Just from there I could see why Jon has fallen in love with paragliding. We spent the afternoon weedwhacking and raking the launch site, then continued down through the forest and cut and marked a trail all the way to the bottom. It ended up being much more of a mission than originally expected, and took us over 6 hours.

Jon doing some weedwhacking at the paragliding launch site

Yesterday morning we headed back to Chaiten, in order to pick up the paragliders that are arriving here on a ferry later this morning. After our discovery of the short section of the Michimahuida, we decided we could not go back to Chaiten and not do it, so we brought boats and a bike along (to run the shuttle with) and did a quick paddle yesterday afternoon. Following the paddle we drank some more cervezas negras and took a dip in the local hot springs.

The three paragliders arriving today are coming from the states to do an exploratory Chile paragliding trip with Jon. I am pretty excited to be around to see how it goes and am hoping to get some free lessons along the way. With any luck, I´ll be flying off the mountain behind Jon´s house next week (not likely really, but I´m being hopeful).

I plan to spend the next week or so back at Jon´s place boating and paragliding then I´m off to Bolivia to start the next leg of my adventure. I will be meeting my friend Brian, from North Carolina, there to explore some of Bolivia´s whitewater. Should be epic.