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Prologue to the Alps Canoe Trip
By chris dalby | September 23, 2008
If you follow me on twitter, you probably know that I have disappeared for a few days on a canoe trip to the south of France. I have hooked up with a friend of mine that is running a canoe instructor training course down here and it was too good an opportunity to miss.
I arrived last Thursday afternoon, courtesy of Ryan air from Luton to Nimes and transferred to the Ardeche, South of France. My connection with the Ardeche is that I worked there for a few years when I was a lot younger as a canoe instructor. Paddling the river, teaching groups of English children how to paddle a canoe at an outdoor activity centre.
I left the outdoor education industry when I was 22, having completed 5 summer seasons working for an outdoor education company, as I felt there was not a career path capable of paying the right money for the amount of responsibility. This was shortly after the Lyme Bay incident that massively shook up the whole of the outdoor education business. And rightly so. I shudder to think how many lives I was responsible at the tender age of 22. Leading groups of 50+ people down the Ardeche river on a weekly basis in the southern French climate on a white water river. The buck stopped with me. They were the best days of my life and those memories stay with me always.
Things have changed somewhat since I left. Many of the people I worked with are now top of their game in the canoing world. Something that I hugely admire. Both professionally and from a lifestyle point of view. It’s something that I felt I would never be able to achieve. So I moved on. But I still enjoy paddling and I am making a huge effort to get out there and paddle as much as I can again. It’s something that is good for the soul. You just can’t beat a days hard paddling, followed by a few glasses of wine around a camp fire on a bivvy site.
This post should act as a bit of background to the trip, so you can understand where I came from and how much canoeing and the south of France means to me. I am recording video, taking photos and will be blogging the whole trip. The first three days of the trip should follow shortly:
Day 1 - Drive from Ardeche to Serre Poncon in the French Alps. Paddle to the bivvy site and camp out.
Day 2 - Via Ferrata - an unexpected beauty. Brought my climbing days back. Truly awesome.
Day 3 - Paddling La Durance in open canoes - A grade 2/3 river
I was inspired to blog this trip after reading the most excellent blogs by Thomas Otter about his recent Italian Cycle trip.
November 11th, 2008 at 8:20 am
Nice blog.
Why don’t you write as a travel journalist? Could submit to some big papers. You have a nice engaging style.
I’ll read some more perhaps tomorrow
November 17th, 2008 at 10:43 am
You know what, Dad is right. Puts me in mind of Eric Newby’s writings.
I too, was with the author during those tender years when we were put in charge of youngsters with nothing more than our collective common sense to rely upon for the safe return of the group. Fortunately as a group we were good, very good, and no compromise was ever made to safety or welfare of the kids.
I stood watching the rip tide at the harbour entrance to Llandanwyg last weekend and Lyme Bay came to mind - the amount of rafts of kayaks that Chris and I towed through to safer water. gave me a similar shudder.
You’re right though fella, it is good for the soul!
I should read your blogs more often
November 17th, 2008 at 11:49 am
Thanks for your comment stu, those were the best days, i have happy memories.