Yaque del Norte – John Long
| River: | Other |
| Skill: | All |
| Trip Date: | 08/01/2005 |
This is the third time that I paddled the Yaque del Norte near Jarabacoa in the Dominican Republic. The Yaque is drop dead beautiful with mountains all around. I have been down 3 sections and each time was a real good time. The first time I went whitewater rafting with Rancho Bairguate. I had a great time and there was some real big and fast water. I would recommend staying there and taking trips with them. After that I went Kayaking on the river with Chad Wallace, the friend I met through Leland Davis (from TRR, one of the canoe clubs I belong to). I am a canoe and c1 paddler and I have never paddled a kayak in whitewater before. It shows too.
The first time I went kayaking, with my friends Anne and Chad, down the lower part of the river that we rafted the day before. The first rapid was Grave Yard. Anne flipped and swam at the top of the rapid. It became quite apparent that she did not have the boating skills to make it down the river, so she carried her boat out and we continued. Now that we were late, we had to make it down to the bottom of the river quickly so we could pick up Anne and make it to the bus. Chad and I played follow the leader down the river. I did not have a chance to scout the rapids before I ran them. I missed one move and flipped but pulled the boat to the shore and got back in. A little while later we went down a rapid called the Toilet Bowl. Chad went down slow and barely made it out. I went down slower and got stuck in the bottom of the drop. The nose of my boat turned up stream and I was just working to stay up right. Then I caught some down stream flow and paddled like crazy to get out of it. I was so tired that I just fell over but I had to go on and, after a short rest, headed down river. The last rapid was rather large so Chad stopped so I could take a look at it. He told me the line and I took the boat right down that line just perfectly. It felt good.
A few weeks later Chad and I went down another part of the river. The water was a bit lower and I made the run with out a hitch. Then last weekend I made the same run in a different kayak and I did not do so well. It was actually rather embarrassing. This time we had Roy, Brad and Chad go down river. We also had a practice session with Johnny and Autumn. Roy was doing the teaching and did a good job showing the folks who had done much paddling. We did some roll practice too. I could not do a full roll in a kayak even though I can roll an open canoe and c1. The way I was sitting I could not get my head far enough forward. It was raining during practice but that did not matter and the sun came out as we started down.
This was the same section that I had done without a hitch a few weeks earlier. It is also quicker that the Nantahala with more difficult rapids, and a lot of rocks. With Chad in the lead and Roy paddling sweep I headed down river with the rest. We had just run a few rapids and everyone eddied out to run the next. I slipped out of the bottom of the eddy. No problem, I saw what I thought was a eddy further down. When I tried to get in the eddy it was just to shallow and I could not get in. Worse I was now going quickly down backwards on the wrong side of the river into a rock garden. Needless to say I went over and had to punch out, drag the boat to shore, dump the water out and get back in. A little further down I went over a ledge and went sideways and became stuck, side surfing. I could not get out so I rolled but this time, surprise, I rolled up. My first combat roll in a kayak. I could not do it again in a million years at least not without practice. Before the last rapid Brad and I traded boats and I rolled over again in that rapid. Now at least I could not blame it on the boat.
We pulled out at the bridge and were greeted by the local prostitutes. We told them that we did not understand what they were saying and asked them to go away. Roy got a ride on a local motorcycle for $50 DR (about $2 US) and got his truck to shuttle us all back. You know even if you have a bad day on the river it is a better day than if you stayed on shore. Next time I go down I will try to go again. Jarabacoa is beautiful.