Mangles and Matakitaki

Today, Sunday, was a day full of boating.  I first ran the Mangles river with Zack here from the hostel.  We met up with two Scotsmen and two Canadians.  The river was very easy and a good warm up to my new boat.  Then we tried to check out the rodeo down where the main festivities were going on.  But we missed it.  So we then headed for a run on the Matakaitaki Earthquake run.  A good class III run with a class IV double whami at the end.  I swam both of those.  But it was a great run still.  Basically today all that I did was kayak, which is good.  I'll probably hang out in this place and boat some more while I wait for Justin to come down.


Granity rapid.  Big water.  I ran it real clean.


Took this while driving to a town on the west coast to get some cash to buy a boat.

Earthquake run on the Mataikitaki.  The guy behind the boat is a local paddler from Nelson.  He is a cook.  He said he lived in Australia for a couple of years but became homesick and had to move back home.

This is me on the Maitakitaki.

Murchison Video


(updated 2/17/06)
Mangles River
Class II+
Level: Scrappy
Paddled with Zack, 2 Canadians and 2 Scotsmen
Did this river 1 times during my whole stay in New Zealand.

Matakitaki River
Earthquake Run
class: IV
Paddled this with Zach and 2 guys from Nelson. This is a short run with tins of play.
Later the next week the NC couple got their van stuck on the side of the hill while setting up a shuttle for this run. I bailed out of running this at that time because I figured it was destiny that got that van stuck and I was to help the guy and not run the river.

Zack taught me all about catching eddies and peel outs this day. I learned so much about kayaking in New Zealand. I really was a noob when I went over there. Still am!