Drew's exciting account of our week on the
Upper Grand Canyon of the Maranon, Peru
Standing at the bottom of canyon walls
that tower hundreds of feet above the river, staring at a maelstrom
of whitewater knowing that it would be the biggest rapid we had ever
run, and having been told that there was no way to walk around the
exploding chaos named Shapalmonte we studied the rapid intently while
walking back to our kayaks. Once at our kayaks we tightened our life
jackets and slid into the flooded river above a rapid larger than
anything on the Grand Canyon of the Colorado. After splashing my face
with water and energizing myself I looked at my wife Christie and
said, “We have the skills to do this, we know our line, stay on my
tail, fight for vision, and paddle hard. You ready?” With a nod of
her head Christie indicated it was time to go so we began paddling
into the largest class V rapid either one of us had ever attempted in
our paddling careers, each of which span well over a decade. At that
moment we had no idea that neither one of us would make it to the
bottom of that rapid safely until the next day. Spending a week on
the Rio Maranon in Peru, also known as the Grand Canyon of the
Amazon, with just my wife was an experience chalked full of trying
hardships, lasting memories, and endless smiles.
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| Awesome surf wave below the narrows section |
When Christie and I first became
friends in 2008 I recall her sharing a desire to visit Peru on a
whitewater adventure. Having heard stories from friends that had
visited the South American country it seemed as though any
adventurous whitewater kayaker should include Peru in their travel
plans. Due to other commitments as well as financial and time
restraints it wasn’t until the fall of 2014 that Christie purchased
two plane tickets for her and I to finally fulfill a dream to go
kayaking in Peru.
Knowing that we would be in Peru during
a time that the majority of the country experiences a rainy season we
knew that the typical kayaking destinations of the Colca Canyon, the
Apurimac and Cotahuasi Rivers would be out of the question due to
dangerously high water levels. After doing some research we decided
that our adventure would lead us to a six day, five night expedition
on the Rio Maranon, which is the mainstream source of the mighty
Amazon River. Receiving water from glaciers on the highest tropical
mountains in the world with elevations over 20,000 feet our trip on
the Rio Maranon began at an elevation of about 7,000 feet above sea
level. The arid canyon that squeezes the Rio Maranon into it’s
valley is more than twice as deep as the Grand Canyon of the Colorado
and contains rapids that rival anything on the iconic rafting trip of
the U.S.
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| Nevado Huascaran near Huaraz |
Beginning our trip in the
mountaineering town of Huaraz located at the base of the second
highest mountain range in the world we were about an eight hour drive
from the river. After our first ride decided the roads weren’t good
enough and it was too far we managed to find a different ride to the
river and agreed upon a price. The ride to the river was incredible,
taking us over a 13,000 foot mountain pass and near sites of Inca
ruins we were in awe of the beauty of the country. Our driver was
pleasant, pointing out points of interest. Suddenly the car stopped
in the middle of nowhere and our driver demanded a couple hundred
dollars more if we wanted to continue, despite our previous
agreement, and threatened troubles for us should we not pay him.
After nearly thirty minutes of arguing on the side of the dirt road
we foiled his attempted extortion scheme and we got back in the car
to continue the drive. Although it was an awkward ride it was a mere
thirty minutes more to get to the river where our driver wished us
luck by exclaiming “Buena suerte!” and sped away.
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| Drew packs up his boat at the put-in |
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| Starting our journey at Puente Copuma |
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| Camp #1 |
After paddling the first class III
rapid on the river we immediately felt the power of the water and it
took some getting used to the volume of the river. Living in the
Columbia Gorge and regularly paddling the Hood River along with other
local stretches of rivers in the Gorge we are used to flows of about
2,500 cubic feet per second (cfs). The Rio Maranon boasts flows of
over 10,000 cfs in December.
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| The Narrows |
The second day, Christmas Eve, was littered with many class IV rapids, sunshine, and surf waves. There was even one section where the river boiled it’s way through a narrow canyon no more than eight feet wide. Having an amazing day on the water we arrived early that afternoon to our campsite, which was on a huge sandy beach. The sun was hot and the water was cool so we went swimming and worked on our tan while enjoying the serenity of our private getaway.
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| Camp #2 on Christmas Eve |
The next day was Christmas! After a delicious breakfast we began our float. Christmas day included a couple of really cool side hikes to ruins and waterfalls. We even found some mango trees and enjoyed some of the delicious fruit.
Mid-way through dinner on Christmas
night our merry excursion began it’s morph into an epic adventure
as I found myself having a sudden urge to dig a hole, the kind of
hole used to bury human waste. I’ll save all the details from this
story but by dawn I had experienced a restless night of diarrhea and
vomit sessions. In the morning Christie began her fight with the same
symptoms that had struck me. We weren’t sure if it was our
breakfast, the water, those mangos, or something else but we knew
that we were days away from help and in a precarious situation. In
addition, it began raining that night and the river came up to an
estimated 15,000 cfs. Having few options we packed our gear and made
our way downstream. After several large rapids and more great scenery
we made it to camp and hunkered down in the rain. Christie suddenly
experienced violent shivering and more vomiting as we both continued
to combat diarrhea. Observing the rain become stronger throughout the
evening our concern continued to grow. In the morning we noticed the
river had came up again, this time several feet. Now we had flows
near 25,000 cfs and the largest rapids were downstream.
Arriving at the first of the “big”
rapids, which were supposed to be two class IV rapids, we were faced
with one long and difficult class V. We managed to find a good route
through the exploding whitewater and we made it to the bottom safely,
albeit humbled by the power. After rounding a few corners and
enjoying some large waves we made it to Shapalmonte, the largest
rapid of the trip and the only rapid that we were told we could not
portage. After spending an hour or more scouting and discussing
possibilities to get through the rapid we found ourselves torn to
find the best option. There was just so much happening in the rapid
with a large hydraulic at the top on the right, several unpredictable
features in the middle, crashing waves throughout, and a scary
hydraulic at the bottom on the left, which happened to be boxed in by
rocks. All of the water was pushing to the left into that scary
hydraulic. We knew it would be a tough rapid. We knew that it would
be the biggest rapid we had ever paddled. We knew that paddling this
rapid with just the two of us was not an advisable move but we didn’t
have another option. After taking a moment to collect ourselves we
attempted to run the rapid. Making it through the first few waves I
looked back only to notice that Christie had flipped over in one of
the crux sections at the top. After I passed the large hydraulic that
was on the right I looked back again to watch as Christie went into
the aforementioned hydraulic upside down. Fearing the worse I made
the decision to get to shore and prepare to rescue Christie by
throwing her a rope. On my desperate scramble to shore I noticed
Christie had miraculously made her way out of the hydraulic, rolled
her kayak upright, and got to shore quickly. I managed to stop my
kayak in the last possible spot above the scary hydraulic that lurked
at the bottom of the rapid on the left. After catching our breath we
walked back upstream to the top of the rapid and began weighing our
options. After feeling the power of Shapalmonte we knew that
attempting the rapid again would be a roll of the dice. With rain
beginning to fall again we were aware that waiting for the river
level to decrease was a pipe dream. We made the decision to portage.
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| A quarter of the way up the portage |
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| Camp #5 at the bottom of Shapalmonte Rapid |
Attempting to portage a rapid that has
previously been determined to be “unportageable” is a daunting
task. At first look we thought the portage would go pretty well,
however, after beginning our climb out of the canyon with our eighty
pound kayaks we realized that the soil was rocky and loose. A few
hours into our portage the sun began to beat down on us. We had grown
exhausted and had run out of water. Being several hundred feet above
the river level and becoming increasingly dehydrated we didn’t have
any way of accessing water. As I sat in the minimal shade behind a
cactus I decided to cut into the water bearing plant. The cactus
produced zero water. Still sitting and thinking how I could rehydrate
I decided I was going to urinate on my shirt and ring the liquid into
my mouth. To my delighted surprise Christie came into view from above
me and exclaimed, “I found a trail over the saddle and back down to
the river!” With this new knowledge we left our kayaks behind, took
a few essentials, and scurried over the pass and down to the river on
the other side of the canyon that we had been climbing. After filling
our water bottles, twice, we trekked back up to where our kayaks were
and decided to leave the boats for the night. At this point it had
become dark and we had been working on the portage for seven hours.
We took all of our camping gear back down to the river where we set
up camp, ate some much needed food, and developed a plan to retrieve
our boats in the morning.
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| Quebrada Parco |
At first light we went back up the
canyon wall, over the pass, and down to our kayaks. We set up a
pulley system to make hauling our kayaks easier and within three
hours we had our kayaks and all of our gear safely at the bottom of
Shapalmonte. After sharing a brief sense of relief and reflecting on
our portage that required ten hours of teamwork we happily resumed
our trip downstream. With the river still at flood stage we could
hear rocks rolling on the stream bottom as we made our way through
the remaining twenty kilometers of our trip that contained fifteen
foot tall waves. We once again experienced a sense of relief when we
saw the bridge that marked the end of our river trip and found a ride
to a town that awaited us with a hot shower, a warm meal, some
antibiotics, and a toilet!
We still had another week to enjoy Peru
and become tourists. We visited the ancient town of Cusco, explored
the ruins at Machu Picchu, and walked along the beaches near Lima.
However, our trip on the Rio Maranon strengthened our ever-growing
love and respect for the natural world, in particular rivers. I don’t
know that we’ll ever return to the Rio Maranon, or even Peru for
that matter, but we’re incredibly grateful to have had such an epic
adventure that provided us with a few trying hardships, so many
lasting memories, and most importantly the endless smiles. Like our
driver exclaimed after dropping us off at the beginning or our
journey, “Buena suerte!” to all you kindred spirits.
