Wales February 2011
From ICCC
People
- Alby "I fought the rock and the rock won" Roseveare
- Ally Cott
- Chad Sankey
- Derf
- Florian "just wandering off" Rathgeber
- Katharina "one shoe" Zeissler
- Mark "handle" Wardle
- Paraic Scanlon
- Rachel "pancake queen" Fox
- Ralph "photo-boating" Evins
- Stefan
- Tom "unwilling treehugger" Haywood
- Tom Leeman
Trip Report
We left the union early on Friday night; Tom nearly wasted this advantage by forgetting the Paddington keys, but Ally's genius saved the day. We made good progress Waleswards, and started planning rivers ridiculously early, with a full schedule for Saturday sorted by around 9pm. We made it to the hut just after 12, to find Wardle, Alby and Chad awaiting us, though strangely no MacRae (turns out he forgot all about the trip until Sunday afternoon). Drinking ensued, ending at around 3:30.
Many of us then amazingly got up at around 6:30, leaving for the mission to the Mawddach just after 7 and getting on around 9, exactly on schedule. The Upper Mawddach was in a nice medium-low level, perfect for our rusty and hungover group. The first fall required Alby to punch a rock to avoid faceplanting it; the rock was apparently harder than Alby. Tom ran the first of the serious drops in an annoyingly stylish fashion; Pariac then ran it with less aplomb, nearly piling head first into the far wall. We portaged the 6m drop, and shortly afterwards Rheadr Mawddach, although in retrospect it looks fairly straightforward.
One further portage around a slot too narrow to pass through, a couple of silly swims from Chad, and we made it down to the Three Nasties, which were actually very nice. Not that that stopped us from making rather a mess of the middle one: Tom took the far left sneak and powerflipped at the bottom, Alby and Leeman bounced off the rock on the lip and dropped in backwards down the left, but the prize must go to Pariac who bounced off the rock to the right, capsized, and ran it half upside-down.
All in all the run was great fun. Could maybe have done with slightly more water, but not much. Lots and lots of lovely grade II/IV in awesome scenery in the sunshine.
We met the rest of the group near the confluence with the Gamlan, to be greeted with pancakes and fruit for breakfast - very civilised. The others got on, with Rachel making a very good job of Public Toilet Falls. The lower section was completed by everyone, with Katha, Stefan and Florian taking swims but generally having a good time. Tom and Ralph formed a separate roving patrol for photography and safety, giving Leeman and Alby some river leading practice.
People debated whether to go and run something else, but in the end decided not to. After much shuttle faff we attempted to visit the pub in Beddgelert, but found the village overrun with bikers so retired to the hut. Chilli was prepared to the usual high standards, preceded by a starter of roasted mystery vegetable. Tim and Amie made a surprise appearance having missioned down from the lakes to see us. The ladder was successfully negotiated by Tom, Rach and Katha. Some drinking games followed, with Derf again making I Have Never more interesting. A fairly complicated game of Ring of Fire ended with Wardle getting the fourth king as the final card of the game. Tom degenerated into the mumbling and stumbling stage of drunkenness, and the last people got to bed around 1am.
Tom and Tim were the only volunteers for a planned morning mission to the Fairy Glen, everyone else preferring a lie-in. They found the Colwyn at a good level on the drive down the valley, so decided to run that instead. Leaving the car on the main road so as to be visible to the rest of the group, they got on slightly above the normal place. Tom promptly got caught in a tree, with a branch through his BA strap; Tim couldn't see that his head was still above water, so a frantic few moments ensued. This clearly shook Tom pretty badly, and he swam again almost immediately. They decided to abort, having paddled about 500m, getting out at the main road right by the car. They got back to find the rest of us just preparing to leave following pancakes part-2.
We all headed off to the Dwyfor, some by more eclectic routes than others. We put in at a farm by the main road bridge, thus missing ff about 5km of fairly flat stuff. Ralph managed to reverse the bus into a large pile of sugar beets, causing something of a landslide. We again took advantage of the chance to give other people some leading and chase-boating practice: Ralph, Tim, Mark and Tom formed a group by themselves and left Alby, Ally, Pariac and Leeman to look after everyone. The Dwyfor was at a pretty good level, again could maybe have done with a little more water, but not too scrapy. It's nicely continuous, with lots and lots of good II/III rapids. Katha and Florian racked up an impressive swim count, but all made it to the end ok eventually. We broke with tradition and went for chips in Dolgellau. A fairly late start and slow progress on the river meant we left pretty late, and only just made it back for last tube.
