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| Reviews & Photos | Usk, 04-06 November 2011 | |||||
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The first river trip of the academic year began in the usual fashion of a trip to the Usk in a dodgy choice hire minibus. However, unlike last year, we managed to take the bus all the way. I again managed to avoid the minibus fiasco by being driven by a new Matt’s amazing car with Christina, Vic and Nic. For us, it was a smooth journey and we managed to get to the bunkhouse by about 10 or 11. We met Doug and Deb, and shortly afterwards Tristan’s car joined us, Tristan performing a slight detour to Bristol in order to get his new canoe at a Petrol Station, due to the chavs and the fog, David wondered whether Tristan was getting a new boat or getting mugged. Luckily it was the former. We spent the night drinking through the alcohol, singing and regaling a few songs, creating a few new (terrible) verses to the old canoe songs, failing to watch Toy Story and after everyone else had retired, David, the two Matt’s and I got up to a bit of mischief on Christina’s camera which she was not happy about the morning after. The Saturday morning, after breakfast and a few funny heads we all headed towards the first river, to do the Sennybridge – Aberbran section. Last year’s bus hero, Steve met up with us so we all became one big happy family. After a safety talk led by Nic, we all headed into our teams, I was with Dave Christina and headed by Gareth. Even Vic paddled! My line was absolutely spop on at the first drop (one where you need to paddle to the hard right to avoid a bit of hassle) last year I managed to swim on that drop, so it felt quite nice to get it right this time. I was practicing my stern rudders and managed to take some nifty eddy turning, Christina disappointed Dave and me by not swimming and being too good in general, denying us some interesting boat chasing antics. Rest of the day went absolutely textbook, there was a bit of a funny period at the end when we were all wondering where the get-out was. The next evening, we went to the fish and chips pub, and then continued on to a lovely pub where you could buy nice pints for 2.50. Afterwards, Matt C organised no trouser hour, and later on at the night I and the two Matts built an amazing pyramid of chairs for the early risers to enjoy. Next morning we headed to Mill Falls in glaring orangey sunlight, everyone had a good time, only one swim on the big feature courtesy of Alex, who to his credit managed to get his boat stuck in a surreal, straight fashion where the rock was almost using the boat as a hat. Rest of the day went well; I swapped with Dave to the back a few times. Jenny practiced leading and seconding, and a decent paddling day was had by all. Driving home, eventually team minibus gave up on it and were all driven back home courtesy of the AA! Great weekend. By Sammy Jones |