Patagonia... So Much Beautiful!

After an amazing trip north to the rio claro, we returned back to pucon for a few days of the classics. We then motivated to head south. We gathered a solid crew, Fusilli, Myself, Nicole, Anton, and Thinhrum. Although Pucon surely has incredible kayaking and is a fun town to be in, there is a lot to be said for traveling all over the country of Chile. There is something incredible about exploring this place. The longer I stay here, the more I want to explore and find cool rivers and beautiful places. This is exactly what we did on this trip. We first hit the rio llancahue. On just the other side of rio palguin, the llancahue is a super fun run with incredible scenery.

Thinhrum stoked to be on the road.

A very cool lizard chillin out at the Llancahue.

A screen shot from my GoPro of the bridge rapid on the llancahue.

After a nice lap an the llancahue, we checked out one of the most stout rapids in chile. The Dirty Gerd.

Oh yea... the dirty!

Chile is an incredible place. The further south I go in this place, the more beautiful it gets.
We then headed a bit further south near Lago Ranco to an awesome river, Rio Florin.


Lago Ranco is an amazing place indeed.



This was our campsite at the Florin. Gotta love this place!!

Nightime at the Florin.

The hot springs at the Florin. Chillin out drinkin 5 liters of delicious chilean wine. We woke with mild hangovers for a beautiful thanksgiving day on the Rio Florin.

A screen shot from my GoPro dropping the Big One on the florin.


Nicole Mansfield firing it up! Running the big one!

Thanksgiving day with demshitz!

We then continued our journey south to the rio corrine... A super beautiful fun class 4+ river.


Our campsite at the Corrine! True gypsy style!!


Beautiful mountain view from our campsite.


You know life is good when this is what ur looking at.



On the Corrine there is a natural land bridge where the river literally dug a hole through the earth. Very cool gorge here.

After a day on the corrine, we decided to check out a small tributary to it. We put on and found a few very cool drops and a 30 footer that unfortunately didnt go.


Here is one of the more fun drops we found.

After good times at the corrine, we packed up again and headed far south to Puerto Montt where we caught a ferry over to Hornopiren. Hornopiren is home to a super fun river called the rio Negro.


Chillin out on the Ferry to Hornopiren.


Driving the long dusty road to hornopiren... Carretera Austral.

After arriving in Hornopiren we spent a few fun filled days running the rio Negro and camping out in an amazing place. The Negro is a super fun run in a very cool basalt riverbed with tons of awesome boofs and clean waterfalls. It was cold and rained almost the whole time we were there, the weather in southern chile is very unpredictable.


The take out... right at our campsite. Anton being a stuntman in the background.


Fusilli and I ready to lay some treats.


Fusilli layin that brown down!


Anton flying off an awesome perfect 20 footer.


Thinhrum with the lookback brown.


One of our favorite rapids... A sweet winding entrance to a treats 6 footer.


How do you get wet wood to light? yes.. add gasoline.


Standard procedure. Brown it.


Crazy Swedes and their shoe surfing!

We then Returned to Pucon to greet the arrival of more demshitz!


Here is a long exposure shot of volcan villarica... Check out the glow from the lava.

check back for a pucon update!

 

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!

Fear Canyon of the Elaho

This is the final installment of Evan, Candace, and myself's trip to BC this summer. We headed for an evening run on the classic big water run in the upper squamish river valley drainage. As we bombed through some sweet rapids without scouting( Evan had done the run 3 years prior) Evan got stuck in a nasty hole and had an intense beatdown. I'll let the video tell the rest of the story.

Here is a photo of me running the last rapid on a later trip this summer. Photo by steve arns.

Fear Canyon Of the Elaho from Fred Norquist on Vimeo.

Thanks to my Watershed drybag, and a great amount of pure luck, my beloved Canon 7D was returned.