Chile! Rio Claro and Pucon

Well I have made it to chile after lots and lots of traveling. I cant express how much i love it down here. It is an incredibly beautiful country and has of course some of the best kayaking in the world. We arrived after 10 hours of flying, then spent ALL DAY sitting at a bus station in santiago awaiting a bus down to pucon.
Gypsy Life!!
We caught our bus and 10 more hours later we arrived. Ian picked us up and we headed to the rio turbio.
After a day and a half of rest we got our kayaks and loaded up for an amazing trip north to the Rio Claro! The claro is an incredible river in a very unique basalt gorge. Its one of the most amazing places I've ever been.

A rediculous stout at the claro.

In the deep incredible gorges of the claro.
The Garganta del diablo "throat of the devil".

Nicole Firing down the stout.
Fusilli doing the same.

A still from my helmet cam. This is one of the most unique rapids i have ever run. Its incredible in the deep gorge of the claro, at some spots it will be flat water but only 2 feet wide. Very Cool.

After the garganta, you drop into gorges that are incredibly narrow, and a couple rapids are super narrow slides.

Thinhrum running the second one.


Here is my view of the same rapid.

After spending 4 days at the Claro, I must say it is easily one of my favorite rivers. Its warm, the drops are very clean and the canyon is one of the coolest places in the world. Me encanta este rio.
Here is the video I made from our trip down to chile, and the days we spent at the rio claro.

Rio Claro, Chile W/Demshitz from Fred Norquist on Vimeo.

We then headed back down south to Pucon. After some deliberation, we headed to the middle palguin.

Flying down the stout!

Here is a sweet video from our first middle palguin run. Big thanks to Immersion Research for making a sprayskirt that i dont worry about imploding.

Middle Palguin w/ Immersion Research from Fred Norquist on Vimeo.

We paddled a lot of the pucon goods for the next few days, the nevado, the upper palguin,the carhuello. We then decided to pack up our stuff and head south. Stay tuned for more from chile!