The Risk, Nilahue

Mark Taylor setting hero safety at the base of Nilahue

Salto del Nilahue

I’m sharing this experience with the hope that it will educate. Kayaking can be a very dangerous activity. All participants need to pay attention to the risks and rewards to properly arrive at their own threshold.

waking up to the beauty of Lago Ranco

Salto del Nilahue has been changing relatively rapidly. Less than ten years ago it was run as a fifty foot waterfall with a thirty foot reconnect. Then it changed into a sloping forty foot slide that transitioned into a thirty foot vertical. Now it’s a two foot tall curler that drops you into a fifty foot waterfall. And if these changes weren’t wild enough, the landing zone has been changing as well. The left wall is constantly being eroded, creating a heinous cave. It was in this cave that Juanito De Ugarte passed away just over a year ago.

Nilahue from Chris Baer on Vimeo.

Having dealt with access issues near Salto del Nilahue before, our crew was taking every precaution to be kind and upfront with the landowners surrounding the waterfall. Our goal was to attain consensual access to the river right property. Unfortunately the property owner was not around so, instead of risking an ensuing confrontation, we decided to use river left access.

Aeon Russo charging the curler

The new lip is pretty ugly. A two foot lateral is churning off the right wall. The line is to get up onto this curler and then do a massive pitch and yaw change mid-plummet. I wasn’t sold, but Aeon Russo sure was. Mark Taylor and I headed to the bottom to set up safety and media.

looking down into the Nilahue Valley 

Aeon’s line was beautiful. A powerful stroke pulled his boat up on top of the curler and then swiftly leaning forward and twisting, he corrected his angle, and stomped the bow down with a tight tuck into the massive boil at the bottom. As Aeon resurfaced the boil ripped his left hand off the paddle. Thankfully he was able to quickly re-index, roll up, and take a couple strong strokes away from the left wall. I was sold!

Very rarely do I change my mind after watching someone run a line. I usually like to stick with my gut feelings, but rules are meant to be broken and Aeon dealt with the curler at the lip amazingly well.

Chris Baer clearing the curler

Chris Baer nose down, but not a tight tuck

Sliding into my boat above the drop I was a little nervous. Partially for the seal launch, mainly for the curler, and also just a tiny bit of concern about the undercut left wall. Seal launching went well and I gave myself a quick pep talk floating in the eddy. My mind was clear, and positive I was about to have a ton of fun.   A couple of solid strokes and I was up onto the curler. Quickly I disconnected from the water and found myself airborne. Mid-air adjustments followed, small weight shifts to change the angle of the boat, and a lean forward to get the nose down. I was still steering as I blasted into the landing zone. The impact ripped the paddle out of my hands. One quick hand roll attempt got me most of the way up. It also gave me a quick glimpse of my surroundings, and in that glimpse I saw the left wall was coming at me at a much faster rate than I had anticipated. I stood up out of my upside down boat and did my best Michael Phelps impression, ripping out strokes, trying to work my way downstream as far as I could before making contact with the undercut wall.

Chris Baer hand roll attempt heading towards the cave

The initial contact was rough; my legs slid under the wall at a forty-five degree angle and I was just barely able to catch a hand hold. The water was violently sweeping past me, siphoning under the wall. Looking over my shoulder I spotted Mark, who had covered a huge distance and was now amazingly close. He tossed a throw bag in my direction. Unfortunately, throwing a throw bag from a kayak is tricky business and the throw was a little off. I knew I couldn’t hold myself on the wall for long and started bouldering my way downstream, one sketchy move after the next. I had attained close to ten feet of progress when one of my mossy hand holds slipped and the water flushed me under the wall.

Initially, I fought like hell to get purchase on the wall and climb back to the surface, but the rock was slick with moss and the hydropressure was way beyond the brawn of my lactic-filled muscles. Quickly it became apparent that I wasn’t going to be able to climb out from under the wall. A moment later I got flushed into a dark room speckled with little bubbles, the walls were smooth, and buoyancy felt neutral. I started to get scared but remembered to stay calm in an attempt to preserve my remaining oxygen. About that time another surge of water hit me and I got blown deeper. Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye I spotted light and gutted out a handful of strong swim strokes. Then something got tangled around my arm; it was the throw bag. I gripped it with everything I had left and after five or six full-length pulls I hit the surface, twenty-six seconds after disappearing. 

Extended hugs were given.

another beautiful horizon

So, what is the moral of this tale… Have amazing people set safety. Pay as much attention to the landing zone as the lead-in, or the falls. Be Strong. Be Calm. Be Careful.

By no means would I tell someone not to run a rapid, everyone has their own skill set and risk to reward threshold… That being said, the current situation at Salto del Nilahue is super sketchy.  

adventure by Chris Baer

Merry Huckmas from the Rios Palguin, Puesco, and Maichin

Casey Tango showing off the beauty of the Rio Palguin

Palguin

Twenty minutes out of Pucon you come across the Rio Palguin, its attributes are stunning. The crystal clear water cascades down steep gradient that manages to pool up at appropriate places and plunge off of clean waterfalls the rest of the time. Two years ago I celebrated Christmas by trying to paddle as much of the Rio Palguin as I could in a day. This year I tried to step up and run even more, it didn't work...

Christmas morning the group started coming together, and early that afternoon I put on the Rio Palguin with eight friends. To paddle the entire river takes skill, guts, and a bit of luck. Our group of nine was about to test the limits of all of these attributes. The run starts with the very optional Salto Palguin, an 80 foot waterfall with a super tricky entrance. The entire group, and most mortals, start below this impressive Salto. The normal run starts with a busy lead-in rapid that drops into a sticky hole immediately backed up by a rolling eight foot ledge. Next is a fast paced hallway that hangs a tight ninety degree turn and falls off of a twelve foot ledge. The ledge has multiple rock flakes to launch off of at it's lip and one big hole to land in at its base. The third rapid is a super clean twenty foot falls. The twenty footer has an island in the middle, whichever way you pick, right or left, it offers similarly clean lines. Beyond the third falls the run transitions into boulder gardens for a bit.

Approaching the next horizon line is the first exit point out of the canyon, and on your right there is a well beaten trail. The horizon line is a twelve footer referred to as the Crack Drop. There are two islands separating the water into three different cracks. The left and middle cracks are paddle-able, but have a very marginal risk to reward level. The other exit point is just downstream on river left. This exit is exceedingly hard to spot from the water, and a guide is suggested for your first run. It would be very easy to miss the take out and accidently paddle into The Portage.

It's Christmas day and I am standing above The Portage, I'm feeling good and I have watched a handful of my friends paddle into it. Their lines all look very similar. Paddle to the edge of an eight foot crease and fall into the trough. Then they disappear under a rock that your standing on and reappear fifteen feet downstream. I have yet to see anyone in control as they reappear and immediately fall another twenty feet into the hydraulic below. This is the kind of rapid I have a tendency to laugh at and walk around. The risk to reward in my head just doesn't calculate.

Looking towards Casey Tango I giggle and said, "For the past four years I have been doing foolish things for Christmas."
Tango smiles. He says, "You have been doing foolish things your whole life."
That sealed the deal. I was going to borrow Casey's plastic hand paddles and doggy paddle my kayak into the rapid known as The Portage... I was thinking this isn't foolish, this is plain stupid, as I was trying to put the hand paddles on.

Hand paddling in moving current is something I have never done before. Sure I have played around in a heated indoor pool, but never ever tried to go downstream with them. The only reason I was contemplating the hand paddles is that the entrance move is rather easy, and once you fall off the entrance you are simply out of control. It doesn't matter if you have a paddle or not in there. There is absolutely nothing productive that you are going to do in that violent melee of swirling water under a rock. The fact is that a fair amount of people break their paddle, or worse, the paddle breaks them. The hand paddles seem to eliminate some of these variables.

Clutching the hand paddles in my teeth and sliding into the kayak my smile started to grow. I was doing something way outside of my comfort zone. The hand paddles were adjusted and slipped over my fingers, again my smile widened. Pushing away from the eddy I got the first feel of the moving current on my new means of propulsion. A couple strokes later and I eyed up my target. One last big push and the water engulfed me. I felt the immense power of the entire river landing on my shoulders. Then the chaos started, and I was flipping over. I expected the rapid to be violent and chaotic, I knew I was going to roll at least once. What I didn't expect was the next blow. My shoulder felt a sharp stab. All of my body weight, and most of the river's power slammed my shoulder into a rock. There was a fair amount of pain but the ride wasn't over. I felt my boat start to resurface and gave my wrists and hips a good flick. An eternity passed as I went cart-wheeling backwards off the twenty foot ledge. The impact at the base of the falls was rather unimpressive compared to the beating I had taken above. A few moments and thirty some odd feet below I snapped my hips and hands one more time and was sitting upright. I slowly hand paddled over to the edge of the eddy. My paddling companions with cameras and smiles on there faces awaited me.

"Sorry guys, my Christmas is over."

The throbbing in my shoulder was starting and I was concerned that I had done legitimate damage to it. The hike out of the canyon was by myself. I pondered what I had done in the last year to piss Santa off so much. Coal for Christmas was starting to sound good compared to the beating I just received.

The rest of the group continued downstream, minds set on a Merry Huckmas. A little boogie water and there is a mini canyon that has a tendency to acquire wood. After the mini canyon is another ominously named rapid, Boof to Swim. It is a twenty foot curler that comes off  the right wall and lands in a pocket hole. Depending on flows this rapid can be fun, or a guaranteed swim.

Josh Oberleas ditching his paddle on the Medio Palguin

The big one, Medio Palguin, is up next. This rapid has more video, stills, and write-ups then any other in Chile. It is a spectacular seventy foot falls that consistently gives paddlers the big waterfall taste they are looking for.

Gordon Klco peering over the lip of Medio Palguin

From Medio down the run tames a bit. There is one more suggested portage around Brennan's, a tight mini canyon that leads into a deadly undercut room. The take out is a few kilometers downstream at a well traveled bridge.

Puesco

The Puesco is the best kayaking I have done in years. The tallest drop is under six feet and there is a good eddy every couple hundred yards. Rio Puesco is all about kayaking, there are no stunts, no portages, and the photos look bland. I have been referring to it as Chile's North Fork of the Payette. Heads up kayaking at it's finest for kilometer after kilometer.

Maichin

Casey Tango paddling into another beautiful canyon on the Rio Maichin

Beautiful is the first word that comes to mind when describing the Maichin. The river passes through a handful of gorgeous moss covered canyons. The overall class of the run is 3+ with fun boulder gardens and multiple channels. There are two rapids of note, the first one is early into the run and easily scoutable from river left. It is a multi-tiered drop that lands in a blasting hole, the downside to the rapid is that both walls are severely undercut. The other rapid of note is towards the end of the run, you can scout and or portage river right.

Casey Tango boofing the "hard" rapid on the Rio Maichin

Story and photos by Chris Baer