Wednesday, April 1, 2015

Hydrospeeding

March 20th, 2015

What is hydrospeeding you may ask?  Well I had no clue either.  Obviously from the word it means “water – fast”.  Sounds good.  Think of river rafting, but substitute the raft for a meter long boogie board with four handles on it, two on either side near the front and two more about 2/3’s the way down.  You don a life jacket, helmet, little flippers and chuck yourself into the rapids.  Sounds easy right?!?  When I first heard of it I didn’t think it would be too exciting as I’ve gone snorkelling down the Campbell River back home on Vancouver Island and we have our face right in the water as we tackle the white water with 35 kilo sex crazed salmon coming at you…what’s this business about riding on a small surfboard?  Well I was pleasantly surprised.

My decision to attempt this new and developing sport was a very last minute choice.  In the lobby of my hostel, the Macondo, a Canadian woman Kristina and her Swiss friend Michael had signed up and were about to head out.  I hadn’t planned anything for my first full day in San Gil and on a whim thought “Sure, let’s try it.”  So I had 10 minutes to get ready and off we went.  Some other people from our hostel jumped in the mini-van of the Colombia River Raft Company, however the others were rafting, except one other guy, a German named Jannick who was also throwing the dice and going hydrospeeding.


Arriving at the river entry point the gear was unloaded and right away we noticed that there were three boards that looked the same and one, smaller, red and differently shaped “hydrospeed” board.  Initially I thought it was for Kristina as she was the shortest of the four of us but one of the guides stated that the little board was, well, let’s say “more exciting” than the bigger boards.  So immediately myself and the other two guys starting jockeying for possession of the “little red devil”.  We played a version of rock, papers, scissors to determine the winner and it was Michael, although we agreed that we’d try to each take a turn as we went down the river, provided that was possible.

 The Happy Hydospeeders!

Suited up and ready to go...

Our guide, who liked to be called “Red Bull”, gave us a safety briefing and I have to admit that it raised more questions than it answered.  His English wasn’t great and at times he broke into Spanish and rambled on about to do in certain seemingly dire situations but it definitely wasn’t clear to me.  Poor Kristina looked more and more panicked with each passing minute.  She started to say “I don’t know if I can do this” repeatedly. 

Red Bull's instructional safety video:

To start off Red Bull instructed us to paddle up the side of the river about 10 meters to a small pool of relatively calm water to practice flipping over with the board and then back again.  Well just getting to this little eddy area was challenging enough as the current was pretty strong.  I tried a few flips and it seemed easy to get righted but it could be a different matter in big rapids.  It’s time to set off for the real deal.

Jannick was off first with Michael and I close behind.  Kristina had gathered up enough courage to give it a try with Red Bull guiding her which meant that she was holding on to his kayak with one hand with only one on her board.  The first section we hit passed under a bridge and the rapids were looking pretty gnarly.  Well what to do but “Go with the flow”.

Action sequence...I'm the one in the background, on the black and green board:


I blew this one up so you might be able to see my smiling face.


Another action sequence...this is Kristina being pulled along by Red Bull:

Okay, she's starting to look a little distressed...

Really distressed:

For good reason...hitting a big standing wave...

Poppin' out:

Where is she?



I managed to stay on my board but as I passed under the bridge I heard a woman from up above yelling “Stay left, stay left!”  Then I saw a massive column of white water which I presumed was caused by some kind of obstacle.  I flared my board on its side to use it as a shield as I approached what turned out to be a massive branch sticking out of the river.  Thankfully I was pushed off to the side of it and into the calm water down river.  Wow!  What a blast that was.  I checked in with the guys and they were loving it too but Kristina and Red Bull had pulled over to the side of the river and were out of view from us.  The raft came through the first set of rapids and then pulled over to where the other two were and Kristina jumped in the boat since she had banged up her leg already.  Sadly I think had she not been holding on to the kayak she would have fared better, at least she had given it a try.

Michael and me passing under the bridge:

Into a calm section...for a while...

There were four or five more major rapids and about the same number of minor ones over the next 11 kilometres that we floated down the river.  A couple of times I either got rolled onto my side or even flipped completely backwards onto my back (that was from entering into a big hole with the rapid curling back on itself…a bit scary when you’re only on a flutter board!).

Do you like my "horned" hairdo"?

Hydrospeeding gets a solid thumbs up!

Rain began to fall as we approached the end of our run and I have to admit, I was ready to get out.  Not from lack of excitement but it was starting to get a bit chilly after being in the river water for close to 2 hours.  We pulled over to the side of the river and carried our gear up to the company’s storage garage.  Everyone was sporting smiles on their faces, both river rafters and hydrospeeders…although secretly I thought that the latter group definitely had a better time!

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