John joined us for our trip of a lifetime, 9 days of whitewater, camping on sandy beaches paddling the Sun Koshi overlooked by the Himalayas, in Nepal. Read about John’s first trip outside of Europe.
I had made my mind up around about June 2013 that I was going to Nepal to run the Sun Koshi River in Nepal. I had not been outside of Europe, let alone been boating outside of Europe so there was a mixture of nerves and excitement. Ross at New Wave was running the trip and was super helpful from day one of deciding to go. Everything from which vaccinations to get, to the best bivi bag to buy, Ross had covered and was regularly in touch to make sure we were all prepared.
After a fairly smooth flight (except the great security at fiasco at Delhi international!) we arrived at Kathmandu and Ross was there to meet us. We jumped straight in a taxi and headed towards the hotel we were staying at. The taxi journey was a culture shock for me, finally seeing first-hand the hustle and bustle of Kathmandu! (I have never seen live goats ‘surfing’ on moving cars and do not think I will again!) That night, we hooked up with the others on the trip and shared a meal, and few well deserved Nepali ‘Everest’ beers. The following day, we had a day of exploring Kathmandu and the ‘Monkey Temple’, before meeting the guys from Paddle Nepal, for a quick run through of what to expect over the next 10 days. We were made aware it would be an early start the next day so had early nights all round.
Bleary eyed we left the hotel at 6am and got on the bus that would take us to the put in. This journey was amazing; taking in gorgeous green valleys and snow covered Himalayan peaks had every person on the bus in awe of the surroundings. After a couple of hours on probably the best shuttle in the world, we arrived at Dolalghat*, our put in for the trip. We unloaded the bus, got the rafts and boats packed and set off on our 9 day journey.
The Sun Koshi River flows from Dolalghat to Chatra over a distance of 260km. The trip is characterised by big volume rapids featuring big wave trains to surf, laterals to punch and holes to avoid! There are many small rapids and around 12 major rapids all providing good fun. I don’t want to give too much away as you should check it out for yourself, but memorable sections for me were the size of the waves on Hakapur 2 and Jungle Corridor, which has 6 large rapids within 10km. The beaches where you camp are beautiful and when the sun disappears, the stars are incredible!
If you want to paddle some world class whitewater, and have an adventure in an amazing country, I could not recommend Nepal and the Sun Koshi River highly enough. The Nepali people are super friendly and will make sure you enjoy your trip. If it is your first experience of international boating as it was mine, going with New Wave meant everything was taken care of to an incredibly high standard! Get yourself booked on for 2014 and have the trip of your lifetime!
Nepal Multiday Adventure, a set on Flickr.
New Wave Kayaking 