Turkey 2007

From ICCC

People

Unofficial club trip consisting of lots of ex-members and one current member of ICCC.

• Jon "Pinky" Lovell
• Paula "Shortie" Volkmer
• Ralph "Mr Motivator" Evins
• Tim "Negotiator" Burne
• Amie "Yellow Girl" Young
• Claire "Milkman" Browne
• Mark "Intergalatic Hitch-hiker" Flower

Explanations:

Jon bizarrely wore a pink shirt for the entire trip; Paula stupidly only took a shortie cag on the multiday; Ralph got up early every day; Tim bargained with the touts like a pro; Amie as a blonde got called yellow; Claire's boat mysteriously filled with milk; Mark always knew where his towel was (and as the only person who took one on the multiday, was asked this very frequently).

Trip Report

7th, 8th, 9th : Getting There

Mark and Ralph left directly from the French Alps, starting at 5:30 with Rachel driving them from Canoe Control to Outz. They then spent the next 65 hours travelling. This involves putting creek boats in train seats, bicycle racks on trains (not being able to speak Italian to the train guards seemed to help), overhead luggage racks on trains, luggage trailers of buses, aeroplanes, and blocking the doorways of buses. They finally arrive in Istanbul physically ruined.

Upon meeting up with Tim, Amie, Paula, Claire and Jon it is discovered that it's a public holiday so there are severe issues getting buses to Erzurum. Eventually 7 people and 3 boats got on to 1 coach, with 3 boats and Jon's bathtub on another. Everyone was very pleased to see all the boats on arrival. Extensive negotiations with touts at Erzurum bus station were then conducted by Tim, eventually blagging 5 people and bags on 1 coach, 2 people and 7 boats on a minibus, (which subsequently picked up large quantities of roofing insulation as well).

On arrival at the Greenpiece campsite it was decided that the best way to feel better after a 30 hour bus journey is to get on the river straight away. Mark and Jon chicken out (Mark having ankles the size of grapefruit), the rest went for a 5km evening cruise on the Barhal, ending at the campsite in the dark.

10th : Tortum

The first day's paddle was the Tortum, a tributary to the Coruh, which flows in below Yusufeli Gorge. A shuttle was provided by Birol's van, which dropped us all off at the top - although a brief stop was made at the top to look at a waterfall and drink Cay (addictive Turkish tea). Everyone appreciated the warm-up nature of the Tortum, with there being only one slightly harder rapid by the road, which everyone ran.

After this the river moved away from the road, and into a slightly harder section, which needed to be inspected. Birol advised us that it's best to walk around this, so Paula and Annie (a Canadian we met up with) took his advice, and went round by van - happily they met us at the end of this section with lunch! This bit was slightly harder, and consisted of two rapids, with a pour-over / gorge section followed by a narrow slot - something that you wouldn't want to run in high water! Only Tim and Zack (Annie's other half) ran it, with everyone else portaging round the side, accidentally crushing some onions in the process. After this the river carries on, picking up volume and gradient, turning into a sometimes slightly pushy grade three. Everyone ran it with style, with Birol picking us up a few hundred meters before the confluence with the Coruh.

11th : Barhal (Upper and Lower)

Following our start on the Tortum we carried on with the Barhal, all 32km of it (both the upper and the lower), putting on at Barhal village. Only Mark, Ralph, Tim and Zack put onto the upper, which was pushy grade three / four until it hit the first mini gorge where Mark swam (after wandering into the undercut guarding the entrance, sideways) before swimming and walking out / running off scared. Sadly he snapped his paddles in the swim, which does provide a nice excuse to buy some ones which are actually long enough. At this point the river picked up to continuous grade 4, with a few pour-overs! Jon put on below some of the pour-overs for a couple of kilometers (Ralph described it as the more continuous section). Somehow Mark got a little confused, since it involved the group going upstream again, leaving him behind. He started to walk down, thinking that he'd been left behind in the valley, reaching Sarigol (10km downstream) and continuing further, before finally being found by Birol halfway down the lower, heading for the campsite, a good 16km from where we left him.

Below this section, where the river drops away from the road, the grade picks up again, prossibly even to a grade 5. Certainly very continuous, steep and high-volume. think Cayoosh creek in BC. Ralph (after missing 2 eddies in a row and getting a brief working) described it as the some of the hardest water he had ever run. The lower is much easier, officially starting at Sarigol, although some put in slightly further down, below a river-wide tree strainer. Apparently a few days earlie) a group of Israelis had got their raft wedged under this tree, and had spent a day getting it out. Everyone ran the lower section with some style, though given Mark's earlier paddle breakage Tim and Zack alternated with handpaddling duties. Following a practice handroll completed with ease, Tim went for an ambitious paddle-free creekboat kickflip on a wavetrain, subsequently discovering that his handroll could perhaps do with more practice.

12th : Yusufeli Gorge

In preparation for our multiday thought we should get on the main river of the trip, the Coruh, with empty boats for some big water practice. We put on at the campsite, paddled through Yusufeli until we hit the Coruh. This created the first cluster fuck moment of the trip, with 9 people trying to punch an boil line that was too powerful to punch, at the same time. Surprisingly there were no rolls, although there were a few desperate braces.

The Coruh is large here, when we ran it hitting about 150 cumecs (complete guess). There are a some interesting rapids here, although they all can be scouted from the road. The big water rapids certainly got some respect, with Annie walking out pretty high up, and Amie taking out at the petrol station, where the Coruh joins the Tortum. Above the Tortum there are some feature rapids in the section known as Yusufeli gorge, while below it's pretty much grade II (although with about 250 cumecs, so expect big waves). Further down still is House Rock, best inspected by taking out at the pebbly beach 200m after the second wooden foot bridge. It's pretty big, and deserves respect. Only Ralph, Tim and Zak ran it, with Mark, Paula and Claire taking out above it. Amie meanwhile spent a boring four hours at the petrol station (confluence with the Tortum) with some gun toting military types (who demanded her passport) before being rescued by an apologetic Tim.

13th : Rest Day / Mini mission

With so much boating having happened, and a multiday trip to plan, everyone generally decided to have a day off, except Claire and Paula, who ran Yusufeli Gorge again with a rafting group from Water by Nature. Everyone else chilled in the pool of the hotel Barcelona, playing all sorts of games with a large pink bouncy ball (which was covered in nipples).

14th : Multiday Day 1

We eventually headed off a day later than planned to begin our multi-day adventure. the drive up to Ispir took all morning, so when we got there of course we stopped for Cay and lunch. This mean that after considerable faff-time spent fitting a vast amount of luggage into the backs of our boats, it was 4:00 by the time we got paddling. We started about 20km upstream of Ispir, and only did 15km on the first afternoon.

It started raining as we set up camp, but we soon had a fire roaring and tea brewing. the weather soon cleared in any case.

15th : Multiday Day 2

The next morning saw a repeat of the jumping-on-it method of fitting kit into boats, and we carried on to Ispir, stopping to buy bread and water (having broken the water filter). Below Ispir was a nice gorgy section, then below that we found the first of the Big Five main rapids. The big five have the potential to be quite nasty in high levels, but weren't too bad while we were there. The first three are very close together, with the last two being futher down - infact we didn't meet the final one until day three. All are easy to inspect.

The first drop is a clear - a river wide hole (although there may be big stuff above this) that had been described as terminal. Paula, Claire and Jon all showed that it wasn't, by pulling various windowshading moves. Happily no one swam. Ralph then showed us that the second one was undercut river right (start right and go left) before we arrived at the third where everyone but Tim Ralph and Jon took a vague chicken shoot round the right, while Ralph and Tim ran it all the way down. Sadly Jon got the line slightly wrong and ended up swimming.

Thinking that this was the end, with no forth one for miles we headed off down the river, looking for a suitable spot for some lunchon. Sadly the 10km or so (that it is meant to be) evaporated somewhat, and everyone but Mark found themselves at the forth drop, in a micro eddy above a large river wide pourover. Amie took one for the team and showed it was fine by running it first (and backwards). With the confidence that it was fine everyone else followed her down.

After some lunch we headed down the river, looking for a spot to camp, which we found at a confluence with another river (and hence with clean water). Just as we got off the river the inevitable rain started, and we huddled toghether around a large fire.

16th : Multiday Day 3

Day three started off as wet. It hadn't really stopped raining all night, and people elected to get changed inside of tents - which Claire found out isn't easy inside a bivy bag.

The cold that we had experienced for the last two - three days finally got to Aime and Paula, and after about 10km they got off with Tim to find a shuttle back to Birols place. Jon, Claire, Mark and Ralph carried on down, all the way to Yusufeli - a 60km paddle.

This wasn't so much of a mission as the river was moving pretty quickly, and they made it back easily before darkness, however it was mentally and physically very demanding. Mark led down the fifth of the big five, only reaslising that it was when halfway down. Thankfully no damage was done, although a prize gurn was registered by Ralph (who had overtaken) at the bottom when he almost missed his line. With only one read and run (approx 1m) pourover left on the river (and a few grade 4 sections) no futher epics were had, although there was one point where Jon and Ralph had to watch Ralphs boat drift off as they were, err, otherwise engauged. With a swift rescue and no damage done to Ralphs boat Yusufeli, and the others, were a welcome sight.

Sadly for Jon it turned out that his boat had cracked, which he had to weld shut in the campsite - the water had been kept out by his outfitting.

17th : Barhal (Lower)

Everyone was up for an easy day after the excessive distances of the multi-day, so a lazy morning was spent around the campsite and in town. In the afternoon a few of us went for a cruise down the easy section of the Barhal from Sarigol. Easy, that is, for those in sensible boats. Ralph decided to make it more interesting for by taking Jon's open boat (Jon had said not to worry if the weld broke open), since Jon had decided not to paddle. Up to this point his whitewater C1 experience was limited to the Session (which he can roll) once at Nottingham for the NSR. He'd never paddled an OC on moving water before, and more importantly had no idea how to roll one. All went well on the grade 2 section, better than expected in fact. Then came the grade 3 rapid. "Marginally" missing the line, he ended up dropping backwards into the hole and capsizing. He then held on in a big high-brace, face just out of the water, for at least 30 seconds, attempting to roll, push off the bottom, push off rocks or get rescued by the boats at the bottom. When all of these failed, he decided to face the music and swim, only to discover that he could only reach one of the two straps holding him in. This resulted in the total time from capsize to swim being almost 1 minute.

After this Ralph had lost both contacts, swallowed lots of water, bashed his knuckles, and felt the phrase 'open canoe' needed to be prefixed by many varied expletives. He carried on briefly before scaring himself again by missing many many eddies on a grade 2/3 section; once it's full of water it's an absolute bastard to paddle. At this point Tim gallantly agreed to paddle the OC for the rest of the trip, which he did annoyingly stylishly (though on much easier water, obviously).

18th : Yusufeli Gorge Again

With only one days boating left everyone except Claire (who was still broken from the multiday) headed down the Yusufeli gorge as far as the petrol station.

With it being the last day there was a general requirement for some carnage, which was provided by Jon, twice. His first contribution was in Yusufeli, where he decided to pile up on some rocks and capsize, drifting down stuff backwards. Happliy Ralph helped him out. Once on the first large drop of the gorge proper his paddles decided to sypathetically break (for his boat), and left him unable to roll up on one of the large sections of the gorge. Pulling him out, paddleless, he wandered back up to the road with his boat.

The next comedy was provided by Ralph and Paula, who decided to go down a rapid (where there was only one line) at the same time. Paula lost the inevitable crunch, being surfed into a hole which she (eventually) managed to fight out of.

Finally, and below the last rapid above the petrol station (look for a big (almost) river wide hole) we stopped and Mark, Tim and Ralph made use of the play wave. Tim provided us with a rather special air guitar, while Ralph led the way with a vertical shudder rudder. Taking out at the mosque / petrol station / bridge / confluence we were taken back to Birols place for a chance to clean and dry out kit ready for the journey back.

19th, 20th : Getting Back to Istanbul

With a lift arranged back to Erzurum (from the same person who brought us here) the return to Istanbul proved relativly easy. Some swift negocations from Mark and Paula saw the boats on the brand new (air conditioned) bus to Istanbul for only a little extra cash. The multitudes of small children, however, did nothing to help with people getting sleep.

Arriving in Istanbul at 6am we crossed the Bosphorus and found a kayak friendly hostel that didn't mind us checking in at early o'clock. Everyone then went seperate ways, and saw the sights.

21st : Istanbul

More sight seeing, including that Hagia Sophia (Ralph was the very first person in when it opened in the morning), and the Blue Mosque.

22nd : Fly Home

Re-tracing our steps, we got the tram back to the ferry terminal number two and then the first ferry to Kadikoy (second stop) before getting the E10 to the airport. Some swift blagging (and a slightly irritating Turk who turned up trying to help) saw us getting all out boats on the bus.

Some further blagging at the check in desk - and the fact that Jon had left his broken boat behind with birol, saw us all checked in and getting back to the UK at a reasonable time.

Logistics

Next time, a number of members of the group would spend the extra money and fly to Ezurum, rather than take 6 kayaks and one canoe on the buses. If you are opting for the busses however, travelling via Artvin also seems to be an option (if like us, you turn up in the middle of a public holiday/election and have real difficulties finding a bus. Dolomus's are easier to get from Artvin to Yusufeli, and it's apparently quicker and cheaper. The roads are also meant to be better. Without Birol this trip would have been very difficult, since he picked us up and dropped us off at nearly every river. Perhaps more expensive than hitching/taking local transport, but very convenient and a nice bloke. He also has a rather nice campsite (the Greenpiece campsite, complete with rooms and tree houses) that we stayed in.

Most nights we ate at a local resturant (first on the left coming from the campsite) once you have crossed the wooden suspension bridge. Quite simply the best food in town.

Media

• Photos
• Video
• Zack's "Level 6" blog