“Mekong” Mick O’Shea–Chapter 2: Wherein the mad Australian paddler finally hits the water and discovers both beauty and a river of such power that it immediately starts playing with his head. Read on…
At around 55 kilo’s the heavily laden kayak sat low in the water making it hard to maneuver and portaging it if necessary would be difficult. I set off from the town of Nanqen in the late afternoon on June the 1st 2004. Around 15km south of town the water slowed almost to a standstill and continued at this pace for many kilometers. The Mekong in China does not stay still without reason. I guessed that it must have been backed up by either a unmarked dam or a huge avalanche creating a natural dam. Sure enough 12 kilometers down stream I heard a distant roar and finally eddied out above a massive class rapid. The river suddenly dropped on a tight right hand bend in a sheer sided canyon. Fortunately there was a disused horse trail cut into the wall with explosives on river right which allowed me to survey exactly what was creating the thunderous roar from dry land.
I trekked up part of the avalanche to the path to view a brutal class VI (Class VI tops the white water scale in terms of technical difficulty and danger) cascade created by a recent avalanche and extended for one kilometer around a sweeping left hand bend where the canyon widened into a more open valley. Dropping 12 meters in all, from one man eating hole (Extremely dangerous re-circulating hydraulic of water) to another before climaxing in an almost river wide ledge/ hole at the bottom, it was a monster and intimidating just to look at. The rapid was un-runnable and would become the first to be portaged as part of the Mekong First Descent. Although slightly disappointed that it would no longer be possible to kayak every inch of the Mekong, I was also relieved that there was a convenient path with which to bypass the rapid as anyone who entered it, regardless of their kayaking or rafting ability would be lucky to come out the other side alive.
I camped above the impressive drop and hoped I would not encounter such a monster in the much larger canyons down stream that would not have pathways around. This probably gave me a little too much time to think about what might be to come. In the back of every white water kayakers mind lurks a distant fear of some kind of white water disaster. For some it is being re-circulated into oblivion by a house sized hole, for others it’s being pinned under water against boulders by the overwhelming force of the water. For me it is cruising down a sheer sided canyon towards a suicidal class six rapid with no way of stopping before going over the edge. With no locals around to find out the name of the cascade I called it “raging thunder” and although it proved easy to stop before this particular drop, the potential for disaster was clearly evident in the features it displayed. I also considered the consequences of the natural dam bursting under the strain of rising waters and releasing millions of tons of water suddenly into the gorges below. I moved on early the next morning and encountered a second rapid that the Japanese team had described as extremely difficult but at higher water it proved relatively predictable and I paddled it without scouting.
I crossed into the Tibetan autonomous region and into the area where the Japanese team had been attacked yet after meeting overwhelmingly friendly and hospitable locals until this point I found it difficult to be too concerned. The setting was beautiful with robust stands of pine backed by snow covered peaks and waterfalls. Terraced fields of barley tended by farmers swayed in the swift breezes that wafted up the gorges and Tibetans would yell out in amazement at seeing a foreigner in a weird looking boat cruising down rapids which I considered quite mild but they obviously perceived as life threatening. I had two encounters with deer, one of which was within 10 meters. I was finally in Kham Tibet and it was every bit as beautiful as I hoped it would be. I took many photos of the flora and landscapes I encountered. I camped on a sandy beach and noticed the next morning that the river had risen over 30 centimeters. I had to move fast.
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