Maximum Adventure 24 Hour Adventure Race Sydney
Deliverance
SleepMonsters Australia / 25.09.2005
My first glimpse of the river was from the top of Badgerys lookout, to which my response was “they have to bring the boats up there�, (effectively a 500m ascent over about 2 km carrying their inflated sevylors, the reason behind this being that it would make it easier for the organisers to identify damaged boats after the 16km paddle down the Shoalhaven river, of which there was sure to be few. It would also make them slower down the Trestles Track, which was to be an equally hair raising descent into the gorge)
In brief the race was to be comprised of a 7 km Trail run from Bungonia National Park HQ to TA1 and the track down into Shoalhaven Gorge via the Trestles Track.
Here the competitors collected and inflated their boats, (for their own peace of mind and to ensure they started with good kayaks) and then descended into The Shoalhaven Gorge and the river about 500m below, they then picked their way through a myriad of grade 1 and 2 rapids 6km to the access point to Bungonia Gorge
.
I had an insight into what would be involved since I had carried my sevylor in on the Friday and paddled the river, the scenery had me thinking about North America and of the salmon making their way upstream to spawn, alas they were just carp but of similar size and quantity, and thankfully there were no bears, just water dragons, soaring fish eagles and the occasional snake, oh yeah and feral goats.
SleepMonsters
