Monday on the Picton (on river)

It’s Monday - god I can’t do another day of honours, Ben is about to hit Japan and josh can’t pretend he likes oar boats anymore. We have all agreed the picton at 0.8 is the perfect activity. 

Boys in kayaks and Ruth in the packraft we are keen to hit it. Turns out the rain did appear to be in the Picton catchment and so she was at a great level. 

After a message in the guide group chat, a quick post on Facebook, we were ready to get up the the sheds, bike and kayaks ready for the one car mission. 

Turns out Gabe (a true committed kayaker) was ready to drop out of uni and get his ass to the sheds. We decided we would meet him at banjos to save time and get our mega efficiency going. 

Grano was incredibly excited to get out in the packrafts on the perfect level picton. Josh informed him, that with a ACL still in recovery (although no longer in the brace) it would probably be best if he packed a book, 17 cans of solo, 2 beers, and did a bit of scrub bashing to meet us at the gorge while he drove the shuttle for us. (Roughly based on true events). 

5 in joshes car +gear+3 kayaks on top is actually mega comfy and very nice, except for me, who got all the paddles into the chest winning with the middle seat. We learnt that my femurs are longer than Ben’s by a significant amount. Very freaky - no wonder Ben fits into all the tiny kayaks. 

Gab scared up, rocking up to banjos with no kayak on the roof, but informed us he has got a packraft (very exciting!!!). 

We got to the get in and did a very efficient get dressed and on river. Took us about 45 minutes from arrival to being on water with no car shuffle completed. Although - perhaps some time was lost to my mega efficiency in my packraft pumping. 

On river highlights: 

Gabe donated his (brand new) cash converters special price Werner to the river gods on the second surf wave below the bridge heading down to tahune. 

Early on Gabe had a mega swim, which involved reentry to his packraft 4 times as he fell over the top of It over and over again and only managed to finally get in with two helpful kayakers holding it down. 

Liam at the get in telling us his neck has started to give up. Didn’t stop him from practicing his rolls, and getting moderately wet thought the neck seal. 

Ben made the most of his osmo action 3 getting epic shots of the gang and brilliant cinematography. 

Ruth attempted many surf holes, blasting through them without much success. Eventually at before mentioned river god section, Ruth spent a lot of time scared and side surfing (somewhat intentional) but felt very supported getting cheered on by the whole crew. 

WILLS day: (better detailed in seperate report)

Will got a flat tyre on the Mazda 2, noticed as he pulled up to walk down to the gorge - slow leak. He walked away keen to meet us. He came down to the gorge about 50 meters too high, and got to scrub bash in tiny shorts down the bank to meet us. He did carry in the 12 Woolies cinnamon donuts that I had got earlier which were a real hit. 

When we met him at the get out he informed us he had run back to joshes car, unable to put the spare on gabes with the tools available in the Mazda 2. 

He read 0 book, was late to climbing but did have an 8/10 day! Winner!!! 

At the get out we sent off Gabe, Josh and will to go sort out puttting the spare on gabes car. When they returned, the spare turned out to be one of those tiny dicky 80k yellow spares, so we all decided that with daddy Josh on the job we really could probably patch the tyre up. 

Geez - what a gash! Josh plugged it up with 4 very sticky salami sticks and a good amount of glue. The compressor once again came in very handy and we were ready to hit the road once we all decided it was probably holding air and should be good to go. Gabe was given the drive a bit slower mate talk we we were off. Josh did two laps of the tahune carpark and we all agreed to meet in Huonville for hot chips.