Ardennenkamp
Protected areas and Gravestones
Ardennenkamp day 1: Wenne
Today, the first day of Ardennen weekend 2023. We woke up early and almost managed to leave at the time we planned. We as Okawanians felt proud. As we arrived in Sauerland (Germany) we got told that the place where we would enter the water is actually a protected area. We would be fined if we would enter, but somehow this man gave us a free pass as we weren't able to find this online.
We all thought it would we very cold, but most of us actually felt quite comfortable. Nobody had to swim! We paddled over some weirs that were cool. Sometimes we (or some of us) had to walk alongside the river to get in after a big tree blocked the way or the passage was a bit to difficult.
The scout group also saw a lot of grave stones in the water. Elisa found this very exiting.
In the end we had to paddle quite fast, because it would get dark soon. We made it just ontime and ended up loading the truck using flashlights. We did this in front of a house. Those people kept on staring at us from out of their window. Interesting.
All in all, we had a good day on the water :)
- Esmée
A story about two rolls
Ardennenkamp day 2: Lenne
The second day of Ardennenkamp can be summarized with one word: snow, snow, snow, and even more snow. Skigoggles would’ve probably been more useful than a paddle this day, that’s how much snow we had! But the atmosphere was as good as always! It was cold, but everyone was happy and enthusiastic. Even after a few rolls, the enthusiasm level stayed high.
Those rolling situations are especially about one specific team: a ‘voorvaarder’ with her duckling. First, of course, came the ‘voorvaarders’ roll. The ‘voorvaarder’ was Elisa. Not even three minutes after we had stepped into our boats, she turned around to look back, but soon she turned around on the other axis. Her duckling, who was right in front of her, saw her go past, upside down in the river, but luckily, she got up quickly. Hmmmm, so, that first roll came very soon; looks promising.
The duckling then got one main instruction for the day: catch your eddy’s and don’t care who is already in there, just slam right into them. So, eventually, this duckling, somehow, appeared all the way in front, past her own group and another group, almost in the scout group. So, it was time to take an eddy! There was one with Mervyn in it, and it looked big enough, so the duckling slammed herself into it. But, the duckling quickly realized that slamming into eddy’s is not always successful if you almost pull other boats out with you; Sorry Mervyn 😊. So, then, right after that Eddy, suddenly came the tree. That tree. That big big tree. Now the question was: how do you go through the trees? The duckling’s guessed answer: make yourself big, let go of your paddle, stretch your arms out, grab a hold of the tree and just pray. Apparently the answer was incorrect, because the duckling landed upside down in the river just like her voorvaarder did earlier that day. Luckily, despite the coldness and pretty much being numb from the hips down, that adrenaline helped with a successful hand roll! The first successful roll on white water! And of course, Mervyn, in that Eddy right behind it, was there to help in case the roll failed; that you definitely can always trust him for! Lesson learned: do not just mindlessly slam into Eddy’s. And, so, that was the story of the rolling team, Elisa and Lynn.
- Lynn
Spin and Grin
Ardennenkamp day 3: Möhne
To summarize the day, trees trees trees trees and much more trees! At least I knew now how to get through them; paddle down, duck, and make yourself small! Would’ve been useful to know that a day earlier when I sat up as straight as I could, spread out my arms as much as possible and full on hugged the tree, which threw my boat upside down in the water on a day of freezing cold snow, where ski-goggles would’ve almost been more useful than a paddle! But then came my first successful (hand)roll ever on white water!!! It was about time after all that roll practice in the pool. Anyways, that simple lesson saved me a bunch of rolling today, considering we paddled the Möhne with trees every inch you looked. There were two types of trees; those we had to walk around, but never ended up walking around because Martijn somehow always found a way to get everyone under, over or through it, as long as we just didn’t have to get out of the water. And the forest of trees; at one point, a little ahead we hear Chiel from the scout group shouting “where are you guys”, “I think I went the wrong way”. We had entered a maze of trees… a forest in the water!
The absolute highlight of the day, though, and the whole trip even, was the moment when we caught up with Hugo from the scout group who came to say: “I have good and bad news; the good news is that there’s a very fun part now, and the bad news is that, Lynn, you’re not kayaking it.” But Martijn went ahead and quickly signaled for me to come anyways. So, there I am right in front of passage which I wasn’t allowed to paddle, and Martijn says “Okay, Lynn, we’re going down. You ready?”. The plan, was, Mervyn goes on the right of me, Martijn on the left, we hold on to each other and just go down. So there we go… all I did was scream “Is this really a good idea???”, but there wasn’t much time to think before we were already right in front of the passage. Before we even got to the rapid, though, Mervyn let go, about to crash into the rocks. So, there I was, holding tightly onto Martijn’s boat, him holding tightly onto mine, and we just smile and crash down. The best part was Chiel’s face when we reached the bottom; mouth dropped open, and ultimate shock. So, that’s the New-Zealand “Spin and Grin” tactic! It was absolutely great! So I paddled the super fun passage I wasn’t allowed to paddle, and in the absolute best way possible!
- Lynn
A duckling and a packraft
Ardennenkamp day 3: Möhne
As communication is apparently not the strong suit of Okawanians, here you can read the story about the Möhne again, only now from Mervyn’s perspective.
Once upon a time there was a duckling. This duckling was called Lynn. 'Lynn the packraft' to be more specific. Lynn might have been the best duckling in the history of ducklings. Lynn was not scared of the cold, nor of a wet long john. Lynn wasn't even scared of trees. So not scared that she decided to hug one the day before. "Let's not hug any trees today" I said to Lynn, whilst looking at a duckling with the biggest smile on her face. Lynn loves adventure, and she could smell one. Ofcourse this was the case, because Martijn was with us. And boy o boy can that man talk about adventure. Some crazy kayak stories dating all the way back to the 90's were told that day. And Lynn could not get enough of them. "IS THAT REALLY TRUE?! THAT SOUNDS IMPOSSIBLE" I hear Lynn screaming in the background. Must have been one of those Disneyland waterfall stories, I think to myself, whilst making sure we avoid some trees. Although we could not avoid all of them. We had to do some yoga to get under some of them, or boof to get over others. Here and there we even had to walk. But that was no problem for our tough duckling. Challenge seemed to be lacking for her this day. But that would be solved in no time. At the end of the river we encountered a nice passage. "What to do?" I was thinking. But at that moment I see a twinkle in Martijn's eyes. "LET'S FORM A PACKRAFT" Martijn says whilst grabbing one side of the boat of our duckling. Without hesitation I grab the other side of Lynn's boat and surely our raft has formed. Guess it wouldn't take long for me to abandon ship. I see myself going off course and decide to leave the crew in hopes that they would find a better route down. They did. And what a smile I see on the face of Lynn at the end of the passage. I think that on this day Lynn's passion for kayaking reached a new high. Hope she can ride this high for a while whilst enjoying good water levels!
P.S. Shall we packraft again at summer camp?
- Mervyn
Ruhr with a side of rocks
Ardennenkamp day 4: Ruhr
(81 ⬇ cm @ Meschede or 87 ⬇ cm @Olsberg)
Last year we paddled the full section of the Ruhr on a Saturday, but this was too long back then.
So this year we decided to shorten it to be able to get back to Eindhoven early. For this we decided to not paddle the dam which Martijn paddled last year. But end before that at a place which was well accessible by road.
The start was as fun as last year since a Himalaya start was possible for everyone with their own kayaks (see here how Jeroen does it). But for the people not in their own boats the first part of the Ruhr contains lots of small play spots which are fun to start practicing your surfing skills on. And only if it remained that way…
This year the Ruhr was a lot lower than last year so when we got to the final part of this year. There was a lot of water getting diverted for a power work. This meant that the remainder of water was not enough to have fun while paddling down it. And the weir which last year was fun to paddle down of, now was a big pain for your feet and boat as Jeroen, Ron and I can tell.
When arriving at the take out the water gets back into the river so maybe the water is enough for the rest of the river…
In summary at this water level I would not recommend paddling this section of the Ruhr due to a lot of scraping in some parts.
But the camp itself was very fun and hopefully next year the rains gods will bless us with more water. 🤞
- Thomas