Fluid Dynamics

Christmas Eve 2009 some of the Murray paddler crew decided to do an early run of the Upper Collie before heading home for mince pies, cold beers and presents from our favourite kayak shops.

The team consisted of myself, Yvonne, Jen, Amy & Kelvin, and “Collie” Rob. Here’s a shot of us at the Put In just below the Wellington Dam wall.

put in upper collie

The water release was about 400 megalitres so we hoped for quiet a good run.

The Sun was out and the crew keen to get on it. Despite that we had two swimmers within the 1^st 5min as both Yvonne and Jen got slammed by the jet of the release flume. I had a couple of deep braces but managed to stay up in the first peel out into the flow.

After that it was pretty smooth sailing (err paddling) , except Rob snapped his nice paddle about a km down the river at the water gauge wave, where a roll went wrong, he must have caught his blade in a rock. It gave us some time to have a play on the wave and just take it easy, while he had to walk back to the put in cars to get a spare paddle (next time I will bring my breakdown in the boat)

Here’s a few shots of me and Kelvin playing at the water guage wave – while Rob ran back to the car.

As an interesting aside – Rob took his broken paddle into MainPeak as it was still under warranty, it was an AT2 paddle. MainPeak had no response from the supplier in the USA but still replaced the paddle – so big UP’s to them – they are a good bunch of people and good paddlers.

The next few hours was a combination of tight channels through trees and rocks (classic west coast creeking) – very tight, technical and bumpy. Its pretty low volume so you can bet away with mistakes with just a scratch or 10 and a few slaps from branches.

There are a few nice drops on the upper section, and some really cool rock slides which are great fun. Next time out I will get some video and more pics.

One of the bigger drops is called the “Rapids” – obviously not named by a paddler. I had a rubbish line and bounce-boofed off the bottom rock. Not pretty. Jen had a similar line but managed to tip off the side of the bottom rock. She didnt nail her roll and ended up pinned close to a strainer and log. Luckily me and Rob had got out our boats and had a rope ready. Rob dived in managed to extract her from the boat and pulled her to safety. Not a good place to be pinned or stuck and a good reminder to have safety set up on the more challenging sections.

A woman drowned in a very similar rapid on the upper section, she had apparently gone down the rock slide on an inflatable mat, hit the bottom, shot off the front and got stuck in syphon/strainer.

The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful and heaps of fun.

Most rapids cannot be scouted, as the are either in or just after narrow channels through the trees. Kelvin has paddled this section a lot so gave some lines (mostly just follow the flow buddy) when it mattered. Cheers Kelvin.

There are a couple of long pools to just lay back, stretch out and enjoy the sun and paddling buddies.

A brilliant way to spend Christmas Eve….I think I will make it an annual event.

OUT