Over the weekend Bjorn and I joined on a 3 day/2night rafting trip with our kayaks on the Ganga River with Red Chilli Adventure. We started the trip in Devprayag and finished in Ramjhola. The first day of the trip we waited for over 3 hours in the scorching sun for the clients to arrive (they were delayed as they had been on a 3 day trek prior to the rafting trip). This didn't matter though as we only had about a 40min paddle down relatively calm water to our first camping spot for the night.
Bjorn and Rob at the Deprayag put-in Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
Waiting for the clients to arrive Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
You can see the white wooden stakes in the background. These are measuring sticks for the river level. This year during the monsoon the river came above where I am sitting on the log (over 23m!!!).
So much rubbish has accumulated along the banks of the river from the monsoon. It is pretty normal to see plastic bags and other rubbish up in trees along the river Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
Our first night we helped the clients settle in and Harinder our cook made us a feast of tomato soup with croutons, vegetable momos, and even tomato, mushroom and cheese pizza! All of this was cooked with only a gas stove. Rob, Bjorn, Kumar and I all slept under the stars using the raft as shelter while the other guides slept in the kitchen tent while the clients had their own personal tents.
Day 2 we again woke up to hot chai and another feast made by Harinder consisting of omelette, toast and chips. After packing down camp we had a pretty easy day on the river. We only had to kayak about 20km in pretty flat water with some sizable boils and whirlpools to keep our interest. Along the way we were able to buy 2 fish from the local fisherman and Harish our safety kayaker stopped in one of the villages to buy some more food for the evening. After a couple of hours we reached our beach campsite for the second night.
Kumar rowing all of our gear down the Ganga Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
Bjorn helping unload all the gear from the cataraft Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
Bjorn and Rob searching for frogs in the ''swimming pools'' on our beach camp Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
We had a pretty relaxing afternoon at the camp so Rob, Bjorn and I rowed the cataraft over to the opposite side of the river in search for a waterfall which Arvind had told us about. After heading back to camp we helped prepare the evening meal which again was another amazing feast this time comprising of Indian food - dhal, fish curry, aloo ghobi, chapati, rice and rice pudding for desert.
A donkey on it's way on the opposite side of the river we found whilst searching for green chillies, ginger and a waterfall Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
View of our campsite for the second night of the expedition Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
Preparing the vegetables for dinner
Arvind about to demonstrate to the clients how to make dhal Photo: Jacqui Whitehead
Day 3 was all the action. We kayaked down from camp about 3km and met up with Anvesh, Flo, and Gapoo (also kayaking) and another client who was joining on with the trip. The first rapid 'The Wall' is well-known for a huge hole on the left which will 95% of the time flip a raft. As we moved further downstream we went through rapids such as 'Three Blind Mice', 'Return to Sender', 'Rollercoaster', 'Golf Course' and 'Hilton'. The Ganga is a pretty friendly big volume river, with huge wave trains and pool-drop rapids. It is the river which I learnt to kayak on and even though it's my third time back to Rishikesh I never get sick of it.
Golf Course rapid on the Ganga River
Now we are hoping to make it onto the Sarayu and Kali River Expedition which is leaving in a couple of days time, before heading into Nepal.
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