Deepdale Falls
Umkomaas River
Natal South Africa

NILE RIVER OVER 6500 KM LONG. IT IS THE LONGEST RIVER IN THE WORLD

CONSISTS OF THE WHITE NILE. SOURCE IS LAKE VICTORIA- UGANDA. THIS LAKE IS SO HUGE IT HAS ITS OWN TIDE. HOME OF THE MASSIVE NILE PERCH WHICH GROWS TO OVER 250 KGS IN WEIGHT. BLUE NILE. SOURCE IS ETHIOPIA AND JOINS THE WHITE NILE AT KHARTOUM.

BELOW LAKE VICTORIA IS A HYDROELECTRIC STATION, THUS THE RIVER WILL RISE AND FALL AS MUCH AS A FOOT ON HEIGHT AS FAR DOWN RIVER AS 60 KILOMETRE'S, THUS DRASTICALLY CHANGING RAPID SIZE AND DYNAMICS.

For some time now I have been meaning to get up to the Nile in Uganda to paddle some of the best white water in the world, so when a good mate of mine Berndt Kharmann come over to visit, it was simply a matter of booking the quickest flight into central Africa with our kayaks in tow. Having to route via Nairobi to Entebbe it was inevitable our kayaks would at best be temporally lost, only arriving 5 hours later in the early hours of the morning. Negotiating a flat fee for the hundred and forty or so kilometres ride to Ginj, we embarked on a journey of hell in the early hours of the morning in a taxi that seemingly was attempting to terminate his, alongside with our existences. Why more people do not die on these roads, I have no idea. The locals would overtake on blind rises, in low gear, would rampage through towns with the only warning of a hooter that we were approaching, and would have no concern of the potholes, cows and other oddments found on route. This turned out to be far more hazardous than the crocs, hippos and large holes and waves that are found on various sections of the Nile. Anyway in the early hours of the morning we found Nile river Explorers, pitched our tents and awake the next day looking down onto what must be one of the most fascinating rivers in the world. At this stage we were probably only six or so kilometres below the source at Lk Victoria, yet the river is massive, breaking into many channels and disappearing between various islands, with fairly easy class three on one side and class six plus on the other. Even on the Zambezi river I have not seen holes the size and power that occurred here, however because of the immense size of the river there is usually an alternative route past them.

In between rapids one finds pools with fishermen paddling around in their dugouts, sometimes crossing not far above some of the rather more treacherous rapids. With no life vests on, they would face certain death should they capsize here. They are in fact incredibly humble and pleasant people to be around, and since Idi Amin in the late seventies decided that in order for his stay on earth to be prolonged, he must relinquish power and exile himself to Saudi Arabia, his country has been fairly stable with new industries, businesses and entrepeneurs starting to flourish. Early on in the trip my paddling partner became caught in a rather large hole in the river and spent a minute or so being tumbled, cartwheeled and generally thrashed about. The end result was his plastic kayak looked a bit like a simba chip with a hole through it. Unfortunately he also damaged his leg resulting in a thrombosis in one of the veins, which apart from being extremely painful, can be life threatening is the clot continues to move or enters the deep veins of the leg.(in other words the clot may end up in a vital organ such as the heart, lungs or brain).

What did amaze me however was the calibre of the local black Ugandan guides and kayakers. Some of these guys have only been paddling between 2 and 6 years with one of them now rated 20th in the world in the free style kayaking discipline. They commenced their kayaking career with no sponsorship and achieved this level of competency through sheer hard work, perseverance and determination. Lets briefly look at South Africa's affirmative action policy. For many years now we have been ploughing funds into the upraisement of the previously disadvantaged. A percentage of all canoe race entry fees is distributed to valley trusts, schools etc etc. The South African canoe federation donates funds in order for young black paddlers to hopefully enter the competitive world of canoeing. Now ten years in democracy, a lot of money and time and effort, yet we still do not have a world class affirmative paddler??(and they still rob us throw rocks at our paddlers). I personally think our policy is wrong. I am not averse to the furtherment of disadvantaged sportsman, but for heavens sake money doesn't grow on trees, and the upliftment policy surely is not simply to create an environment where poor little black children can now simply have fun with our funds, with little or no incentives. Target those that have the potential, give them the facilities needed for success and then create targets, deadlines and goals. If after a reasonable period of time these are not met, them terminate the funding and move onto another disadvantaged paddler that WANTS to succeed and not simply to have their entry fees, boats and whatever else s subsidised. A lot of this money does originate in one way or the other from each paddlers contribution to various events, registrations etc, so surely they should have some say how their money is spent? It just seems to me that lots of money and support have been flowing into a system that has the right motives but unfortunately not the right control, goals and management. (anyway that was just my thoughts after seeing what was possible in a country where no goverment or sporting funding was available, yet now boasts affirmative paddlers that are so far ahead of even most of our white competitors. Read it objectively in the context that it was written and not subjectively as a stunted dysfunctional liberal, who's only train of thought in life is pouring unlimited funds into a system that if left unchecked will absorb everything and anything of value, with absolutely no return on the investment.

The commercial rafting section on the nile is a stretch of river around thirty kilometers long which is really not too bad. All one needs is a good roll and directional control in a plastic boat. From the end of this section at a rapid called Itanga, which means place of danger (as the rapid splits into 3 channels. The far left it drops over a shootable water fall called Gala gala falls. (at high water there is a massive hole at the base, and probably worth while staying away from). The centre channel drops into big, big holes and the right channel is paddlable from the top, however safer from half way down. (there are still three big holes at the end, but usually their main stream will wash you past them). From here down to a really nice rustic camp called the 'Hairy lemon' is about fifteen kilometers and great easy paddling and surfing. About three hundred meters up stream from the camp is a wave called the Nile special, which as long as you have a short boat, will provide unprecidented wave surfing anywhere in the world. Five kilometers down stream from here (flat water all the way), one comes apon another world class surfing wave called Malalu (again only usable on the short boats). Very few kayakers now still paddle long boats such as the dancer, T canyon and other boats older than the era of these. They just are not conducive to stunt paddling and steep wave surfing). I found this out when I arrived with a sponsored boat from some time ago and subsequently spent most of my time upside down, with the nose continously digging in, resulting in involuntary endos and cartwheels).

Lets stay on the topic of animals, where I will now describe a very close encounter with one of those prehistoric grotesquely hideous beasts-a crocodile. Having just finished canoeing the lower section of the Zambezi (One of the biggest rivers in the world), a friend and I were paddling a section of the river above Victoria falls (one of the seven natural wonders of the world). The Zambezi is an incredible river that passes through five countries on it's way to the sea at Chinde in Mozambique. At night we would camp on the riverbank with elephant and lion in extremely close proximity and awake in the morning with hippopotamus and crocodile spoor through the camp. The former animal is apparently responsible for more deaths in Africa than any other. They do not eat meat and are incredibly territorial and vicious when young are around. One of my friends has had his open type canoe bitten in half by a hippo while another has been rolled over a couple of times by a croc that had taken hold of the rear of his kayak.

On one of my expeditions I came within a few metres of paddling into a hippo, mistaking it for a rock in the middle of the river, and let me tell you, these monsters that only ingest vegetation are enormous, especially when they turn and look at you with an open mouth and those small repugnant beady eyes. When they disappear underwater and one loses sight of them, this is certainly the time to retreat with great haste, as shortly it will be attempting to eradicate you existence. It was with this in mind that we kept an open eye on the riverbanks and pools. Most of the crocs are lying on the banks and slide into the water as one passes, however that is as far as they usually go.

My partner Rob Bentley, paddling in the same boat with me this time, pointed out one such creature on the bank, and mentioned it had entered the water. A few seconds later it was still proceeding at us, a visible bow wave ahead of it as it made a bee line straight towards us. As this section of the river happened to be fairly calm, we were paddling a fibreglass canoe, as it is more streamline and faster as opposed to the more robust plastic type designed for larger white water, which certainly perturbed me as it meant it would sink, resulting with us swimming to the shore if this croc attacked. This would undoubtedly attract more crocs and more likely than not we would have been eaten. As this croc reached a few feet from us I took an all mighty swing with my paddle at it's prehistoric scaly head, missed and sliced the water in stead, throwing us both off balance. The momentum of my blow took the racing canoe virtually over onto the upper deck and if it wasn't for the splash covers keeping the water out and the quick balancing of Rob to right us again, we probably would have landed on the creature. The commotion must have momentarily confused it's archaic intelligence, as it now seemed content to simply eye us out as we retreated with a dash of speed.

Women in those days were not aloud to compete and in fact no woman seconder or otherwise were allowed to reside overnight in the valley and no competitor was allowed to exit the overnight stop either. This meant every female seconder had to vacate the valley before dark. Years later in 1981, this changed with women being allowed to compete only while accompanied by a male in a double and then eventually on to singles.

This still was nothing compared to pioneers such as Ian Player, who back in 1951 raced non-stop sometimes through the night taking up to 6 days to reach Durban, having to carry all food, repair gear and everything else in their boat and having been bitten by a snake on the way.

As the years progressed boats became lighter and more paddlers became target practice for bored, militant black youths, hell bent on the irradication of this white alien invasion of their sacred turf. My brother introduced me to paddling at a very young age when I remember trying to balance on his KI called a Lancer which he made at home in his garage. This he gave to me when I turned 13 or 14. At the time this was quite a state-of-the-art canoe and much more unstable and streamlined than the lymphies and wider hull boats popular and in use at the time.

Umzinyathi named after the side river that enters the Umgeni from the left seems to have migrated downstream. Earlir the rapid just above the tributary was always known by this name however nowadays it is the longish, more open rapid downstream which seems to be called Umzinyathi. (It is also easier for spectators to access and view the paddlers). There was also no road winding along the side of the river downstream from the dam wall as found today.

Island rapid has always been fairly high on most people's agenda to avoid. In the early days there was no old causeway at the 2nd drop and no pipes and rubble in the 1st drop but just big waves and a largish hole at the end of isle 2.

The channels into Durban were also quite different with the river taking a different course from today. The old channel can still be seen joining the mainstream just above the pedestrian bridge at Springfield Park. Blue Lagoon used to have the famous Swan boat that was regularly taking tourists on joy rides with the end being right at the mouth and not upstream as it is today.

Interesting today are all the fetivities associated with the Duzi overnight stops. Fireworks, bands etc. I remember in the 70s when cut-off times really didn't exist and many evenings flares were discharged for those paddlers that were still missing, in the hope it would direct them towards the camp site.