Austrian Alps - July 2006

Registered Company No 2612775

Those regulars at the club might have noticed that I was unusually absent from the club at the end of June. No I’d not had enough, but Sarah had allowed me to escape for a week so I’d headed off to Austria for a week’s paddling.

Having discover Paul Scarborough was also on the same trip, we agree to travel over together - but I’m not sure what he though when I picked him up just over an hour later than planned for the trip to Plas Menai in Wales, ready for the 24hr minibus ride to Austria - suffice to say the travel either way wasn’t the highlight of the week!

Sunday - we were all a bit bleary eyed, so a nice warm up paddle to get used to the speed of the water. Leaving from the campsite, we paddled down the Sanna and on to the Inn, just big and bouncy but nothing more than grade 2 really. Also a few sizable standing waves to catch and surf as we went along.And back to the campsite in plenty of time to watch the England match.

Monday - full rested it was time for something a bit bigger, the Imst Gorge section of the Inn, with a mere 300 cumecs of water going through it. (If you can’t picture that, it’s about 11 time the volume of HPP or 30 time the Tryweryn!) Its only a grade 3, but the there are some enormous wave trains to run down and huge stoppers to be avoided - the standing waves were flipping people, so I wouldn’t like to think about paying a visit to one of the stoppers!

You soon get used to looking ahead from the top of each waves to make sure you're not about to head straight into the next stopper. The other noticable thing is how fast the river is going - its a real chase to catch up with swimmers and boats on this volume of water.

Tuesday - instead of a big volume river, we opted for a tight technical Alpine river today. So it was off to Garmish in Germany to paddle the Loisach. What a gem! Continuous grade 3 with a few grade 4’s thrown in, steep and twisting, clear blue water . . . Fantastic. Just in the nick of time we changed and loaded up before the most almighty hail and thunderstorm hit - that should out some water in the rivers. Sadly there wasn’t time to fit in another river today.

Wednesday - Its seems the rain and hail had gone right across the Alps. So it was a case of heading up the valley to see which bits might be suitable. A couple of the sections we were hopping to run were massive - looking down from the bridge at the start of the Tössens sections, the grade 4 section was just too big, with very large logs hurtling down the river like pooh sticks.

Fortunately we’d packed our passports, so it was on into Switzerland to run the Martina section of the Inn - one that isn’t often run-able as the water was diverted into hydro–electric schemes. Again this was another superb paddle - with a few more friendly holes to play in. The final run in to the get out was the best bit. Quite a continuous section of grade 3 and weaving line round a few holes and avoiding spinning in the micro eddies along a section of rock wall.

In the afternoon, we headed further into Switzerland for the Schuls Gorge section of the Inn. This was both technical and was running at a high level, giving pretty continuous grade 3 with a few big grade 4 rapids thrown in. The last of these was right by the get out, allowing us to spend an awful lot of time inspecting and pondering from every possible angle. Just three of us ran this one with our coaches - giving a first chance for photos from the bank!

Having focused so much on the last rapid, we almost overlooked one of the other grade 4’s. I can’t describe this any better than the guidebook “water swirls and surges round a spur of rock jutting out, and a waterfall enters on the right, but most don’t see the waterfall as they are staring intently at the large hole into which they are about to drop”. Yep, time to get up close and personal with that big hole!

Arriving at the final rapid it was time for another look - simply nip between the two big boulders and run through the stoppers, oh and avoid the water slamming you into the wall! (hence the name of the rapid ‘Against the wall’). So with a couple of throw lines in place off we went - yes I'm in that picture somewhere - what a buzz running down it.

Thursday - Again heavy overnight rain had pushed up the Inn further - so we opted to redo our first day’s run with a bigger volume in it.

For a late afternoon run we drove up to St Anton to run the Rosanna, for what looked to be another run down a clear blue alpine stream. Having decided it had enough water, off we went. Within minutes we were rescuing, just after the first boat was recovered, came the next swim. This resulting in a white water race to catch the boat, then aborting the trip to take Michael off to hospital. Having only done about 1km, this is definately a river I'd want to go back and finish.

Friday - An early start to head off the Rissbach on the Austrian/German border. This was another classic. Clear blue water, sunshine, grade 3 with a few grade 4’s thrown in. And for good measure a tight twisting grade 3 gorge for the last 500m to a must make get out - with a monstrous grade 6 fall around the next corner - we looked at it from the bridge, that was enough incentive to make the get out!

Determined to get one more trip in we hoofed over to the Isar. Oddly, to do the upper river you have to get a taxi up to the get on!

Well worth it as this was the highlight of the week . Clear water, sun, gorges, grade 3 (you get the idea by now) and to top it all one of coaches loosing his paddle, he threw it up and over a foot bridge, only for it to land on the bridge rather than back in his hands - hilarious!

Further down the gorge section got quite technical, lots of blind corners and in the second gorge towering limestone cliffs offer no way out other than down the river - not a place to loose a paddle.

Saturday - After a week of paddling I was done in. While there was the opportunity to run the Sanna down the campsite before breakfast, I opted out - it was very tempting, but the thought of a (very) long swim if I stuffed up Pianser Cataract (quite possibly the biggest rapid I’ve ever seen!) just tipped the balance. So off we went on the long trip back to North Wales.

A big thanks to Dave and Dave at Plas Menai for leading us on such fine rivers. Inspired? If you’re up to paddling grade 3 in the UK then the Alps is a must. Please can I go again next year Sarah?

Les Ford