Bellingham Whitewater

More Kayaking in Ecuador: River Festivals, The Classics, and More…

Posted by Chris on February 23, 2008 at 9:14 am | In Trip Reports, Rivers |

The Rio Jondachi is one of the classic Ecuadorian rivers. In fact, it’s not uncommon for boaters staying in the the town Tena to do nothing but the Jondachi for days on end. This phenomenon is partially due to the fact that it is a friendly class 4-5 run with a bus shuttle right from town. The main reason is, of course, the character of the river. Nowhere else in the surrounding area is there the same mix of gradient, granite boulders, and jungle scenery, which is what really makes it the classic it is.

The first month down here I found myself too busy for a chance on the Jondachi, but finally my day came in December.

With a typical boater start, we were on the bus by 11 o-clock in the morning. I was a bit nervous, as Hilary and I had never paddled the Jondachi and were in playboats, Logan, our guide, hadn’t paddled it since the year before, and that on top of a late start, changes in the river since last year and the notorious afternoon flash floods kept the tensions high.

As the bus drove over the take-out bridge our glimpse of the creek revealed the flow to be just about perfect ¨Sweet, I thought, as long as it doesn’t flood on us and nothing goes wrong, we’re set.¨

The bus dropped us off on the side of the road and we began to suit up for the 20 minute muddy shlog to the put-in. In the future we would play a game on the way to the put-in where the 1st person to fall had to buy beers for everyone, if another person fell they would split the cost, etc..

Jondachi hike in.

Arriving at the river at 2 o clock, we all quickly made the decision to skip the 1st half of the 1st rapid below the bridge and get moving.

Immediately we found ourselves in some great class 4ish rapids with great technical moves. Logan was doing a great job remembering the rapids, though we did have one close call where Logan went under a small log that was just above the water. Logan lost his paddle and went over the ledge nearly upside down, handrolled and got his paddle back before the next drop, luckily. I bought a saw and took care of the tree the next time we were on the Jondachi; it’s a really fun boof now.

The rapid known as ¨Sideways boof.

We worked our way through the crux half mile with a few quick scouts, and a sneak past the undercut-hole combo known as ¨Sticky-fingers.¨

In the crux zone now!

The rapids mellowed out a bit, but, they never stopped coming; this run is stacked with rapids and even when they are not difficult you still can’t always see around the large boulders to know if the rest of the rapid is free of wood or not.

At around 4:30 we made it to the 1st portage, known as ¨Tres Huevos (3 eggs)¨. This year, Tres Huevos had a log in the entrance ledge, making it a difficult move to stick; the out-come of an un-stuck line was to be flushed toward a sieve-crack between 2 of the 3 ¨Eggs¨ with only one chance to catch a eddy above it. This is also near the halfway mark, and with dark coming around 6 o- clock everyday it also meant we needed to start boogieing.

Rail grabs still rule.

Hilary coming thru.

Theres scenery like this in every eddy.

About 20 minutes downstream was ¨Typhoid falls,¨ which had a sneak-portage line down the right. From Typhoid falls down, the river eases up to class 3 plus boogie water with a few decent rapids thrown in here or there. We made good time through here but still ended up at the take-out bridge at 6 o-clock. Close one.

Lucky for us, a bus came by immediately. Hilary passed boats up to Logan and I, and as we were working on tying the boats down to the top of the bus, the driver must have gotten antsy and started to drive off. With no other option, we finished tying down the boats and sat on top of the bus for the hour long ride back to Tena. It was a beautiful sunset that night and we had the best seats from which to view it from.

The ride home…

kayakers on the lower Jondachi.

Here’s a couple images from Feliz Año Nuevo (New Years). The local custom is to make a doll of straw and dress it up with masks and clothing to characterize the change, or habit, you hope to make or see in the new year. Then you burn it!

Decorating…

Dousing…

Burning.

During another week off Hilary and I had a chance to hook up with Pat from the Wesnatchee zone and Marco from B.C. They had a couple of weeks of vacation and were looking to get after it. After a couple laps on the Jondachi and a ridiculously long 28 mile day on the Rio Hollin, we headed back to the Quijos drainage and fired up the Papallacta, a major trib of the Quijos.

The Papallacta is a steep small creek that is roadside if you don’t mind hiking up 1000 ft from the river to the road. The creek starts off mellow enough for a half mile before dropping into a mile long gorge full of twisting ledges, menacing holes, and very few eddies; all of this makes up the crux of the run.

Stopping for some media.

The rest of the run eases up a bit, but continued to challenge us with some complex boulder gardens that had super classic boof moves interspersed with must-make moves. A sick boof into the Rio Quijos marks the end of this run.

Brian killing it.

Another classic run we hit up was the Rio Oyacachi. The Oyacachi has a great multiday upper section that rarely ever gets done. Most boaters head to the put-in 8 miles up from its confluence with the Quijos where the Oyacachi immediately tilts downhill and into high gear, sliding around, over, and sometimes under a streambed of medium-sized boulders.

Hilary in the maelstrom.

When the Oyacachi is running high it is an unstoppable maelstrom of monster hole after monster hole with tight twisting lines between them. It F&$! rules. Highly recommended.

Yup thats a ¨Y¨ boat.

In January the Ecuadorian Rivers Institute holds the annual Napo Fest. This festival is to raise awareness for the Napo river and its tributaries. The main issues of awareness are pollution of garbage, fecal matter, and rising sediment levels due to in-river quarries.

Pat on a Rio Napo tributary. Land of Giants, Rio Misahualli

The festival started in Tena on Friday night with some music and dancing in the town square. On Saturday the festival moved down to Puerto Misahualli for a day full of river games. Lets see, there were free kayaks for kids to play with, which was probably the most popular activity all day. There were also a handful of competitions: raft races, balsa wood boat building race, kayak sprint and of course a rodeo, which was won once again by Jaime, a Tena local who has been winning the rodeo for the past few years. The evening held a candlelight vigil and local indigenous dancing.

Locals on a balsa wood raft.

Chillin in Ahuano.

On the 3rd day anybody who could find something to float on was invited to join the mass flotilla from Puerto Misahualli to Ahuano. In Ahuano there was painting for the children and more local indigenous dancing. All in all it was a great weekend: lots of fun to see the locals so excited about the preservation of their river, and I think they just like a reason to party too.

Don, Darcy, Hilary, and I spent a few days doing some paddling on the Rio Coca and its tributaries. The Coca is amazing remote overnight jungle run with some of the grandest scenery I experienced in Ecuador. A quick look at a topo map will show you the run is in the deepest canyon of the Rio Coca and every part of it is an adventure. First you have a 1.5 hour hike in with a quick side trip to look down into the craziest chasm I’ve ever seen: the whole river (and when I say river I mean like 20-30,000 cfs) gets squeezed down into a chasm 4-500 feet deep and only 10-20 feet wide. It is an amazing scene, and you put in right at the bottom of it.

A really big river in a really small canyon.

The Coca put-in. Above here the river is called the Quijos.

Below the put-in is 4 hours of huge water read-n-run class 4-4plus in a sick canyon. Besides the canyon and the whitewater, this river corridor is infested with tons of monkeys, birds, and other random jungle dwellers.

Hilary floating out of the Coca canyon.

Big water surfing.

Heres a few other random pics from our travels:

This is what happens to you when boating in the jungle of Ecuador.

Chichi monkeys. I would make that face too if I had that much banana to eat.

This is what happens when kayakers have to play with rafts.

Well, that’s it for the Ecuador updates for this spring. Sometime this fall I will post video of the rivers and surrounding area.

Hasta luego.