A day Cayoning at Wentworth Falls
Trip Start
Jan 12, 2009
1
32
44
Trip End
Mar 07, 2009
Wentworth Falls,
New South Wales,
Australia
Sunday, February 22, 2009
What is Canyoning? Its any way you see fit to traverse a terrain - abseiling, rock climbing, sliding, wading, swimming, jumping. The lot. And thats exactly what we did. As I type this my body is at its physical limit, im tired, my legs ache, I have rope burn on my back, and staircases laugh at me at as I try to go up them. Was it worth it? Hell yeah!!! What a day, its up there with the sky diving!!!
We started off the day meeting at the High and Wild office where we signed the usual disclaimers and got ourselves kitted out with wetsuits, helmets, abseiling harnesses, gloves, and in my case trainers that could get wet
Me just before our first abseil
. We were all given bright yellow plastic back packs and a dry pack to keep our clothes in. We then hopped in the mini bus a went on our way to Wentworth Falls for a morning of practising our abseiling. There was 8 of us in all, 4 american girls who were lovely and hilarious, me and 3 australians.For the first part of the day we just had on our shorts/vests, harnesses hats and gloves. We were given a brief talk through of abseiling (luckily i had done a mini one the day before so was half prepared) and we started on our first rock. It was only about 5 meters high but when your at the top looking down it loks alot more and we had stunning views over the valley. Passing rock one with ease we headed to rock 2 which was about 15 meters and this time was down the side of the rocks overlooking the valley (the first rock ended on a road so was easy). When your on top of that rock all you can see is the vast valley below you and you can only see your destination when your about to abseil (for safety we couldnt look over the edge and you had to be harnessed to a rock just before you connected up to go) - so you can imagine the gasps of horror of what we were about to do. The second one was even more exciting and challenging and unknown to me my vest top had slid up and I had passed the rope over skin on the way down, nice bit of rope burn added to the list of bruises!!
The second rock!
The last rock was of a similar height to the waterfall abseil we had in store for us this afternoon. This time we did 30 meters down a sheer rock face onto a tiny path below over the valley. Yes it was pretty heady but you feel so safe you can actually enjoy it. The first part of the rock had an overhang so you had to practise stepping down gently into it and managing an almost sitting position with your feet flat on the rock. The rest of the rock was so far in that the abseil was a straight drop down (no footing) so you just lowered yourself down over this valley, it was immense!! To get back to the top we had a steep and bushy rock climb up through the bush, I totally loved the challenge of it. Little did I know about what was in store for us in the afternoon.
We finished up and headed to the are where we were to canyon. Here we stopped and the crew made us lunch, fresh rolls with a platter of fresh meats and veg, hummus and drinks, it was perfect. Luckily the weather had held out for us all morning with lovely clear skys and sun, but as we ate the thunder started to roll and it added to the dramatic build up to the afternoon.
Finishing up lunch we walked for about 15 minutes down one of the tracks into the falls, on the way they pointed out the waterfall we were going to abseil down, we all thought they were joking, from up at our lookout it looked gigantic. The walk was all downhill, but a long way down! At the bottom we all donned our wet suits (still wet from the previous day - Dee you know how nasty that is!!), with our wetsuits we had on sock and trainers, helmets, abseiling harnesses and hats and on our back we carried our yellow packs. I had no idea what was in store, the rain started to come down and the thunder rolled and we started off through a canyon, thickly grown with beautiful ferns and trees with rolling rock sides growing up either side of us
Me at the top of the second rock
. We walked through a small stream and everyone tried to keep their feet dry, but that didnt last for long before we were plunging waist high into the running canyon stream and wading our way through the sand and rocks downwards towards the waterfall. This was the easy bit and before you knew it we were at our first jump, as the stream flowed and pulled itself over a rock down into the next pool, our only way down was to jump backwards and land on our backs, off we went, giant splashes and screams as we all got soaked. Swimming to the other side of the stream we all pulled ourselves out, laughing and screaming, it was brilliant fun. And so on we went, swimming, climbing, wading and sliding through the canyon, the water was fresh and clean and we even stopped to observe a beautiful fresh water crayfish who had come out to see what was invading its stream. It was so much fun and the rain was pouring down with the thunder cracking in the background, it was a proper adventure. The whole thing was so fun it seemed to be over so quickly, and we were at our destination, the top of Wentworth Falls. It so happens I had managed to maneuver myself into pole position in the group so it was myself and one of the american girls who got harnessed up first to go down the giant waterfall.
Standing at the top of the fall, my adrenaline was pumping and all I could feel was total excitement for the abseil
The third rock!
. I got hooked up and safety checked and then we were off, we were to copy the route the guide had already taken down which was right through the middle of the waterfall. I stepped over the edge onto the rocky start and there was an immediate overhang, so stepping carefully I lowered myself onto the waterfall, and stepped carefully onto my first part. I managed to do really well down the waterfall and didnt slip once - the water pummels your face hard as you go down so you cant see much up or down but its beautiful and exciting. I got near the bottom and dunked myself into the pool below, it was over. I had abseiled down a 30m waterfall, immense! I unhooked in the water and swam out then watched the others come down, everybody was overwhelmed with excitement. We finished off the day by rock jumping off the edge of some rocks into the pool below. Excitement over, we changed out our wetsuits at the bottom of the fall and back into our dryish gear. Bags on backs we carried our stuff back up the way we came. The wetsuits started to drain out the bottom of our yellow bags so we were all soaked pretty quick just carrying the bag. Walking back was an absolute killer, way back up the stairs we had bounded down this morning. The walk was about 20-25 minutes uphill but we all made it, red faced and happy.
Canynoning is not to be missed if you like a bit of adventure, i would love to continue to do this (along with the caving!). After all this its going to be really hard to return to an office job, times ticking now (two weeks left!) and my adventure is nearly over. Can I find something active to do for a living in the UK?
