On Thursday evening, Jack, Jamie, Vanessa, and I got in the car and headed down south to the illustrious Cheshire. Having spent the night at my house, and witnessing Jamie getting a Mawwdach-esque beatdown from my mother we headed off bright and early Friday morning to the Dee.

Vanessa, being reasonably new to kayaking and being a virgin to our high quality banterfest trips was our main consideration when choosing rivers. There was also a severe lack of water to consider.

We got onto the Dee at a 9 on the gauge and headed down to Serpents' tail. I was in my demo Stomper (THANKS ROHO !!). I ran it quite a few times down both lines with no problems. I have not however got to the Jamie/Jack level of hitting all the eddies on the lead in. Meh.. oh well. Vanessa got down Serpents' tail, and then swam in an eddy :P Typical. There was another little fiasco which involved Vanessa temporarily losing her paddles, but everything came together and Vanessa was a star for continuously trying/not complaining.

The rest of the river was pretty cool - I practiced my surfing (I am getting there), I practiced hitting eddies, and paddling in a straight line (always important :)). At the end we ran Town Falls with resounding success.. ok.. that is a lie. Vanessa did not hit her line and ended up with a little scratch on her chin but as far as I am concerned, that is simply because Jack picked a bad line ;)

After quite a bit of faff, an hour in Cotswolds looking at sleeping bags that we did not own, and some awesome food in Betws-y-coed we headed to the get off of the infamous Fairy Glen to kip in the layby with a beer or four and some lambrini (classy group). We were met by Mute and Franca, and the festivities commenced. I vaguely remember being chased down the road by Matt and Jack wielding lighters excaliming "Burn the witch!". Dont ask.

We got up at 8.30am - a little later than Matt's overly ambitious 6.30, and headed to Swallow Falls. We were met by a lovely couple who were very polite and helpful. Unfortunately an evil heathen came along and said something about access but I was not really listening because he looked like an idiot. In the end we walked away from running the falls such that we could keep up the good reputation of kayakers.

We then headed over to the big T, Where we had an hour or two on the upper graveyard before running Vanessa down the lower section. I hit every eddy that I tried to hit at least once :) Next time i want to hit every eddy every time.

I also ran NRA wave and Chapel falls for the first time. I made the mistake of following Matt (on his instruction) down NRA, and then missing his line - i ended up hitting a nice boof line instead :P. Note to self - pick and follow own lines as I tend not to f**k up my own lines.

On the lower section Vanessa did really well. There was only one swim, and she ran Bala Mill well - I was impressed.

After some chips we got in the car and headed back to Leeds. Jack and I navigated home with no problems, and no wrong turns. Turns out we are exceptionally good navigators who are unappreciated due a lack of confidence in ones own abilities. We got back home in time for a few hours sleep before heading out on the club trip...

The boys (& Vanessa) being generally great.

The club trip was a beginner/intermediate trip to the Lune. We had about 18 people, and it turned out to be an awesome trip (apart from my shock absorber on my car disintegrating). On a personal level, i once again aimed to hit eddies on the way down. I did - hitting near enough every eddy I tried to hit. A few little panics in micro eddies saw me back in the flow quite quickly, but I now know what I need to work on. Magnetic rock turned out to be particularly underwhelming - well trying to spot the huge rock that scared the living daylights out of me a year previously, I actually hit the magnetic rock and curled around it pondering as to why it had attained the status of 'rapid'.

All the people in our group put in an awesome effort, and did really well. Particular props to Aidan and Paddy who did not swim, and styled some lines. Zero probs to Jamie for pushing Sean in and making him swim :) I hear the other group did really well too - notably Becky.

LUUCC styling the Lune.

Arriving home we headed for a nice curry at 7 Spices, and then retired for a well deserved early night. Overall it was an incredible weekend in all respects. As Jamie noted however, it would be good to get back running some limit pushing stuff. Beth will be back in the world after NSR, so I imagine/hope we will be hitting some decent runs in the near future. Dart?!

As regards my quest to find a boat. The Stomper is in my opinion way better than the Burn, but in my non-technical lingo is quite slow, and likes to turn for absolutely no reason. By the end of the weekend I felt at one with the Stomper (how sad), but I don't know if it is for me. I really like the Liquidlogic outfitting, so after I have tried a Mamba I may try the remix, diesel, jefe and the like.

Lakes weekend 2012 was over the weekend of the 20th-22nd of January.

This is a weekend organized by LUUCC each year.

Usually around 60-80 members of the club head up to the lake district and enjoy the whitewater that the area has to offer.

I am not sure if it is intentional, but we usually paddle something a little different to normal over the course of this weekend.

We catered for all ability levels by running an advanced session (Upper Duddon) in the morning of the Saturday followed by an intermediate session (Middle/Lower Duddon). On the Sunday we ran an Intermediate river (Leven) in the morning and a beginners river in the afternoon (Lune).

On a personal level, it was once again a great weekend. On the Upper Duddon I was involved in a widely discussed incident - I ran the top of Wallowbarrow gorge, messed it up and ended up with a gash to the top of my eyelid. I managed to get back up pushing off a rock, and was pretty much pulled off the water (kudos Beth/Matt). Even though I injured myself I was pretty chuffed that I managed to stay in my boat, and not panic.

The discussion was over the question as to whether the trip had been run in a 'non-safe' manner because there had been an injury. So as to avoid having to type it again, I'm just going to publicly post my 'incident report'. I'm posting it publicly - I stand by it.

"Having discussed the river at length prior to getting on, and noting my ability level I personally decided that I was suitably skilled to run the river. I was aware of the two harder sections on the river. The first gorge was portaged by all, the second (Wallowbarrow) was scouted by all, and people made their own decisions as to if they could run in.

I felt that there was a line that I could hit on the first few rapids on the gorge, but that I could not hit the final grade 5 drop. As such I decided to run the top of the gorge, and then portage the final drop.

On the first drop I missed my line ever so slightly, and ended up upside down. The drop was more rocky than i had initially anticipated, and I ended up with a small laceration to my left eyelid.

I rolled back up using a rock, and got myself into an eddy. I then got off the river, and Beth (Morgan) administered suitable first aid.

I am fully aware of the dangers of kayaking - it is the reason I do the sport. I enjoy an adrenaline rush, and the challenge of hitting my planned lines. That being said, I am not an idiot and am fully aware of my ability level. Some people portaged the rapid, I didn't. I thought I could do it, and I still believe I could. It was an unfortunate incident, needless to say, I am glad I was wearing my helmet. Further to the above, I cannot see any way the situation could have been dealt with better."

Because of the incident I ended up not running the Middle and Lower sections in the afternoon. I was a little disappointed, but i will get around to doing them at some point !

On the Sunday I ran everything. The Leven was awesome - I finally got around to running everything. Backbarrow falls is surprisingly powerful, yet such an odd rapid - it is intimidating, but technically not difficult.

The Lune in the afternoon was one of the hardest rivers that I have ever got on - because we were leading. Well.. Jack and Jamie were leading our group, but I like to think that they were appreciative of my presence as well as that of Paddy and Lee. We had quite a few swims, but the beginners were awesome. Every time they swam, they got back in and battled on. They showed some awesome progression over the day and were really keen to improve. My highlight was Megan's awesome line on 'unnamed v-shape into mini-not-really-a-gorge' rapid, mainly because she followed my line, and i think it was my most technically perfect line on anything in my paddling career (if you can call it that).

Overall, an amazing weekend. Everyone was amazing. Ruth and Sean did an amazing job with the organization - the hall was amazing, and everyone had a lot of fun.