Setting out from a rainy Kathmandu and driving through the mist to the ‘put in’ point to begin our rafting trip, I was wondering if the ‘sun’ part of Sun Khosi was little more than wishful thinking. Stepping onto the raft with the persistent drizzle of the day turning to more heavy rain, it did seem that our end of monsoon calculations were a little out. We reasoned that it was probably better to be getting drenched on the river- where getting wet is par for the course - rather than getting a soaking trekking through the Himalayas, but the prospect of 9 days of rain was not looking appealing. However, by time we reached the sandy beach campsite of the first night, the weather was already looking up. The next day we woke to a magical misty landscape, which cleared into a prefect blue sky which stayed for the rest of the trip.
The gang included 3 Khazaks, 3 Brits and a German, alongside James and I, as well as a crew of 7 including a yoga master (not normal for the trip but added I think at the last minute at the request of the Khazaks!) Yoga master Mahindra aka ‘The Guru’ was an excellent addition to the trip- he had never even swam before though he embraced learning with much enthusiasm. Patrick managed to make the most progress in teaching The Guru to swim, hindered perhaps by the crews’ sink or swim approach, throwing him in with random and sometimes conflicting instructions (he did have a life jacket on)! The Guru’s enthusiasm to learn something new inspired even the most inflexible of us to have a go at yoga. Even James tried it once ( alas there are no photos, but I am sure you can imagine the look on James’ face when The Guru was asking him to ‘focus on his inner chakara’ while saying ‘ummmmmmmm’).
The rafting itself was not hugely strenuous- though at the end of some
of the days our arms were more than ready to stop paddling- and the rapids
mostly more ‘cocktail shaker/shouting and screaming’ than ‘high speed blender/
screaming in terror’ (not the official terms to describe the grade of rapids,
but you get the idea!). However, there was one set of rapids that will loom
large in our minds for some time. ‘Hakapore 1 and 2’ are two big class rapids
that follow each other in quick succession. On night two of the trip we had
camped within ear shot of the roar of Hakapore 1. The team had spent some time
scouting the rapid to work out the best line to take, so we knew from the sound
and the anticipation that this was going to be the most serious rapid that we
had encountered so far. As we set off in the morning the locals had gathered on
the bank ready for some exciting ‘tourist TV’. These clues should have rung alarm bells,
but we knew that the aim of the expedition was to keep the loaded rafts
upright, so we weren’t that worried. As we approached the rapid with our
command to “paddle forward team”, things started to look interesting. No sooner
had we reached the crest of the first wave, a second wave came from
nowhere……and rest is a chaotic blur. The
raft flipped and we were all tossed into the churning waters. When I surfaced (after
what seemed like forever underwater with those slightly crazy ‘this is the end’
thoughts flashing through my head) there was no raft in sight and I was, along
with 5 other paddleboat rafters, on what seemed to be the wrong side - we couldn’t
get out of the river as there was a cliff in the way, and there was still massive
un-swimmable current that might hurl us into Hakapore 2. James was nowhere to
been seen, and hours later, when everyone was actually on the correct side of
the river and reunited with the raft, we found out that he and Chris had
managed to hold on to the flipped raft through Hakapore 1, but had then been
forced down the treacherous Hakapore 2 ‘swimming’ style. Their bruises were
pretty impressive! Needless to say getting everyone together took some time and
some impressive work from the safely kayakers. The rapid claimed one causality;
the Cargo raft sustained a puncture. It was a bit like an ‘Uma’s Rock’ day on a
desert trip, sitting around in the sand and the sun while the boys worked on
the repair! Unfortunately, there was alot less beer than on a standard desert trip........
Other memorable rapids included ‘Pre Jaws’ and ‘Jaws’
(actually it could have been Pre George and George, we never actually got to
the bottom of the name of that one, but Jaws definitely sounds more impressive
that George), ‘Rhino Rock’ and ‘The Jungle’ which saw the second flip of the trip,
and James adding to his injuries with a bleeding nose!
James did this trip 24 years ago and then they did not see hardly any
people on the banks and there was only one bridge that spanned the Sun Khosi. Things are a bit more lively these days: we
saw a Hindu cremation ceremony taking place; the industry of numerous ‘roxy’ (a
local alcohol)’ factories’; and car ferries that had been washed down the river
in the monsoonal flooding. Still the
river and its shores are tranquil so it was a shock to leave the
peace of the river and be thrust back into the real world with a traumatic 16
hour bus ride back to Kathmandu in what may have been the crapest, noisiest and
bumpiest bus in existence!
We are now in (still) rainy Kathmandu, and it is the Dasain Festival, which means
that even the chaotic tourist Ghetto Thamel is relatively quiet. Tomorrow we plan to get the permits we need to
start our Langtang trek and head off into the mountains- can’t wait!
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| Brrrrr....rainy first day |
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| Camping |
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| Mystic river |
The gang included 3 Khazaks, 3 Brits and a German, alongside James and I, as well as a crew of 7 including a yoga master (not normal for the trip but added I think at the last minute at the request of the Khazaks!) Yoga master Mahindra aka ‘The Guru’ was an excellent addition to the trip- he had never even swam before though he embraced learning with much enthusiasm. Patrick managed to make the most progress in teaching The Guru to swim, hindered perhaps by the crews’ sink or swim approach, throwing him in with random and sometimes conflicting instructions (he did have a life jacket on)! The Guru’s enthusiasm to learn something new inspired even the most inflexible of us to have a go at yoga. Even James tried it once ( alas there are no photos, but I am sure you can imagine the look on James’ face when The Guru was asking him to ‘focus on his inner chakara’ while saying ‘ummmmmmmm’).
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| Early morning yoga |
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| Mad Guru |
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| Saturday Nght Fever Guru |
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| Getting rescued....though I would flip the kayak! |
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| Hakapore 2....where James went 'swimming' |
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| Cargo raft shenanigans |
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| What Himal our raft guide called a 'little big' wave |
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| Hold on...... |
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| All forward! |
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| Nice day for paddling! |
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| Whoops! There goes the car ferry.......... |
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| Suspension bridge |
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| Farm life |
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| Temple on route |
