After many years I went back to Corsica to kayak the amazon white water rivers with Stefan, Wouter, Sjoerd, Jaap, and Paul. Water levels were great and the rivers were a blast. We ran the Upper Golo (130cm, 5 hours), Calasima (125cm, 4.5 hours), Travo (130cm, 5 hours), Middle Rizzanese (80cm, 4 hours plus 2 hours to the lower takeout), Upper Taravo, Lizola (6.5 hours including a portage around the 8m waterfall), Middle Liamone (100cm, 3 hours), and Upper Liamone (90cm, 4 hours). Two rivers I did not run before: the Rizannese and Lizola. The Lizola was absolutely amazing with super slides, loads of drops and very continous white water. The Travo and the Lizola were my favorite at these water levels, the Travo getting a bit more edge at around 130cm on the gauge. Look at the Corsica, Part 1 and Corsica Part II videos we took with our digital cameras. Especially the slides on the Lizola in part II are worth watching.
Martijn Rutten's Photos
Some of the more interesting trips I made over the past few years. Click on the images to go to the photo album.
Pictures of yet another fantastic Grand Canyon trip, actually the honeymoon of Jen & Martin. I hiked down with Cindy and Kristy to join the El Paso gang at Phantom Ranch. The same day we ran Horn Creek rapid, Granite, and Hermit with Daryl and I in kayaks, entertaining 12 oar rafts. We took out after 10 days on the river at Diamon Creek. I took my pictures with a brand new Pentax Optio W30 camera, always with water on the lens and very dissapointed by the blurry results. See loads of pictures of the trip on http://abovelava.com.
Surfing on the best rodeo wave between France and Norway! Guess where these pictures and videos were taken?? Hint: it's on a major Dutch river... Check out the 7 minute video that Kees and I shot from the action.
Misha, Jim, Wouter, and me creeking the famous Verzasca and other rivers that flow into the Lago Maggiore. The low water levels gave us a chance to kayak the extremely pretty gorge of the Cannobino and survive the middle and lower Verzasca, the Rovana, Ribo, and Isorno. See the video I took of Wouter's huck and tuck on the 14 meter slide/waterfall on the Ribo, and me on the crazy slide on the upper Isorno, some 800 meters after the put-in. We hiked to the double waterfalls of the San Giovanni, the extremely narrow canyon of the San Bernadino, and the amazing slides of the Alpe Basso and Loana. The canyons of these rivers are so extremely pretty and the whitewater so enticing that we will be back for sure!
Pictures of a spectacular trip through the Sahara in Libya with the main goal to see the total solar eclipse of March 29. You may wonder what inspired a fanatic kayaker to visit what is probably the largest country in the world without any natural rivers. I quickly discovered that the beauty of the Sahara easily compensates the lack of whitewater (well, any type of water actually). We saw the eclipse at the center line close to Waw an Namus, the "crater of the mosquitos", which is a vulcanic crater in the middle of the Sahara with the crater lakes infested with very hungry mosquitos. The Libya trip was organized by EWP, with Libyan support by Waradd tours. See the EWP description of the trip with more details on the itenerary, and the Lonely Planet Libyan Eclipse 2006 Guide for more background information on the Eclipse in Libya. For more pictures, see the sites of Joke Meijer and Frans Snik.
Pictures of an awesome 10-day kayaking trip in Ecuador, South America, organized by long-time Ecuador experts Endless River's Adventures. I loved the monkeys that would wrap their tail around your wrist and drag you along into the jungle.
An impression of Derya and I visiting Daryl in Panama for the new year. Not only kayaking this time, but also wave surfing and tuna fishing in the Pacific, and hiking around in the highlands of Boquete. But of course, there's no such thing as a holiday without kayaking. Daryl and me spent two days of safety kayaking on the upper Chiriqui Viejo; Derya's first paddle raft experience, guided by Boquete's best raft guides: Chiriqui River Rafting.
A selection of the 300 pictures we took on an amazing river trip with a big group of friends on the Middle Fork of the Salmon river. Martijn in a kayak, and Derya on the raft enjoying the scenery, hot springs, hikes, and company. We drank a lot of Jerry's infamous strawberry margaritas, can you believe he would actually take a battery-powered blender on a rafting trip in the middle of nowhere?
Kayaking the tributaries of the Sesia river. See this video of me kayaking the final drop on the Upper Sermenza in my brand new Pyranha H3! Wouter's report (in Dutch) of our trip on the Batavier website gives some more pictures. During our visit the Teva extreme week was organized with paddlers coming from all over the globe to compete and share the fun on the Egua, Sorba, and Gronda. Check out the reports and pictures on playboating.italia.
A tiny selection of the approximately 1700 pictures we took in a fantastic private kayaing/rafting trip to the Grand Canyon, USA. We floated 18 days on the Colorado river from Lees Ferry to Diamond Creek. See Paul Schreinemaker's rafting website for more information on this trip.