Futaleufu

Well, we just finished a fantastic week on the Futaleufu - one of the premier whitewater rivers in the world. What a fantastic river!

It definitely took us a little time to get used to the big water feel and we feel fortunate that our introduction to the Futa was during a low water year. We had four days of beautiful sunshine followed by two days of full on rain that brought the river up and gave it quite a bit more punch. Arn was glad that he knew the lines on Bridge-to-Bridge before the water came up!

Arn managed to run everything except the class V rapids - so no Inferno Canyon (though Arn did this in a raft), Zeta, Throne Room, Terminator and Casa de Piedra. He'd say many (most) of the rapids were easily 1/2 class easier than what we've seen them rated because of the lower water levels.

While Arn boated everything on the Fu except what was mentioned above, the most fun section for him, by far, was Bridge-to-Bridge. His first full run on Bridge-to-Bridge was not pretty - he flipped at least 5 times and managed to get clobbered by Mundaca. He was so incredibly nervous - even though he had done the section above Mundaca a couple of times before doing Bridge-to-Bridge. His second run through Bridge-to-Bridge was much better in general but he landed in Mundaca backwards that time. He can tell you that the beat-down was not as bad with a rear entry as front!

His third run was very good and his fourth run, with quite a bit more water, was almost perfect. That last run was a super fast run because we wanted to stay ahead of the rafts in our group (who were doing a virtually no eddy-out run) and get into the eddy after Mundaca to see if any of the rafts chose the beat-down route. Arn guesses they all wanted to swim because the carnage was total - there will be a video posted soon - it is pretty awesome.

The instruction and tips that we learned during the week were awesome as well. We really can't believe how much we learned. We definitely have a few more arrows in our kayaking quivers.

Deborah boated every day as well and enjoyed some of the easier sections of the river including the "Wild Mile" and the "El Macal" section below Casa de Piedra. It was an amazing experience for her as she was able to practice in the boils and the swirly eddy lines - something that basically gives her lots of fear. Having a super positive big water week with lots of skill building, surfing and rolling in scarier situations was fantastic for her. The other big thing for Deborah was that basically her "group" of paddlers was her and another woman and their guide/instructor was also a woman. It was such a different experience for her to be in a group of all women instead of being with a group of people suffering from testosterone poisoning.

The place we stayed at - Bio Bio Camp - was amazing. We had such good food, great place to stay right next to the river and amazing guides/staff. I can't say enough good things about those guys and would both highly recommend them and happily go back again. Check out their trips at Bio Bio Expeditions!