Podcast of Lachie’s thoughts on the expedition from The ABC morning show last week with Miranda Tetlow.
Just a quick post before we head back to Melbourne (there will be updates along the way as we can.)
Last night we had a great pub meal and a total of about 2 beers each before we passed out. I myself have lost 4kg since flew in and Sean wins the Kimberley weight loss program totally 8kg in 20 days!
How was the paddle out?
6am
Raft packed on lower ledge, I abseiled down to the raft to load one last boat and launch the raft off the small cliff before we all abseiled down into the raft and started our 45km paddle of flat water and salt water crocs.
We have heard reports of a women being taken below the falls and the locals have spotted a 15ft croc in the area only days before.
Lowering the raft into the water at bottom of the falls it flipped as soon as it hit the water.
With no access points in the river until after the gorge (1-2km of harsh terrain and being so far away from help I watched out first aid, rations, raft, comunications everything! floating down into the gorge that marked salt water croc territory.
After a quick look at each other in realisation of out situation Anthony and I grabbed a paddle and jumped from the cliff into the water an swam like I have never swam before after the raft. We rescued all the equipment and picked up the others (after they were forced to swim as well).
With minimal wading through some strainers and Pandanus we made it into Kalumburu ahead of time.
We did not see much wild life yesterday, just allot of big splash’s in the water and a few big crocs following us around the pools.
So we are now back to the real world, and a long drive but keep on eye on this space for more photos and film.
Cheers
Lachie
Had a quick call from Lachie at around 3pm WA time to say that they’d reached Kalumburu. The team are all safe and well.
Flying back to Kununurra this afternoon and plan to update the blog themselves later tonight.
Sean Bozkewycz - This is our last call in from our time on the river. About to have something to eat and have an early night.
Spent the afternoon portaging our raft and all our gear. We’ve got a twin rope set up with about 40m of rope, and we used every last inch of it. Had a very hard time finding anchor points for the ropes.
We paddled all our gear around to the top of the falls and then walked it down to the last shelf. There was a 10m drop down to the river and then we lowered the raft down to a small shelf just 1m above the water. Lachie abseiled down and we then passed all the gear down to him to secure.
We’d sorted out all the gear so that have got everything in the raft apart from what we need tonight.
We’ve got a tarp set up now as it looks like there’s some rain coming in which is awesome as it’s coming into our catchment. The river has continued to rise over the past couple of days which we’re super stoked about as it should make it easier tomorrow.
Plan to get up at 4am. First light is about 4.30 and then hope to be on the river at 5. We should be able to get into Kalumburu at around 3pm. We’ll contact Slingair during the day to confirm when we should be in by. The last time they can fly out of Kalumburu is 6.30pm.
Unless we face any pandanus or tight spots we should be OK. We’re all fairly relaxed about the day tomorrow.
The crew is all happy and healthy. Looking forward to being out tomorrow, but that also means we are out of the wilderness and back into civilisation.
We’ve got some trepidation, some anticipation and a little disappointment that we have to finish all of this.
So, signing off from the King Edward Falls on the King Edward River and will be in touch tomorrow night.
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Lachie Carracher - Continuing to have a good look around and prepare ourselves for the mad dash downstream of the King Edward Falls.
Everyone is well and in good spirits.
The plan is that tomorrow we’ll portage the raft around the falls and carry our gear down. We’ll have to abseil down to the put in spot.
Thursday morning bright and early we kick off the mad 42km dash to the Indigenous community of Kalumburu. We’ve made arrangements for the plane to meet us at 7.30pm and then back to Kununurra.
We’ll all be in the raft on Thursday. In 2007 Sean said that it took him about 3 hours - but that was with big river flows, nothing like that now.
We spent the morning looking at the huge amazing panels of rock art.
Now we’re listening to the dingo’s howling around us.
= Don’t forget from the google map on the blog you can click the ’sat’ on the top right and zoom in to where they are. Can see the falls and great detail. =
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Jackie Hennessy - Everyone very tired after a big day yesterday so we all had a sleep in.
Spent a lot of the day planning and working out our next few days. King Edward Falls has a 120′ vertical drop so we have to work out how to safely portage around. May look at abseiling down to a rock ledge, disconnect and then abseil down further.
We’ve just enjoyed some bush tucker. Lemon tea. Green ants make a nest in a bush, we cut off the tips, immerse in water and squeeze them out and it makes a sort of paste that we use to make a tea. Apparently high in vitamin C and good for colds.
Planning to have a good look around this area tomorrow - seems like every flat surface has some sort of rock art on it. Just incredible.
Plan at this stage is to work our way down the falls over the next couple of days and head out on Thursday with a 4am start to paddle the last 42km after the falls. We really want to do this in one day.
We’re just about to be hit with what looks like a huge storm. There’s two big fronts racing towards us so fingers crossed for some big falls.
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Anthony Yap - We started the day off fairly dramatic with Jackie doing a number on her ankle - straining it pretty badly trying to work her way around a rapid.
Worked our way downstream about 5km and hit King Edward Falls. Did a major portage around some of the higher rapids.
Plan to spend the next days here exploring, investigating and playing. We have some discovered some incredible native painting in the area and will continue looking for more.
Not much more rain forecast for the the next few days but will wait and see.
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Sean Bozkewycz - Well we expected a hellish day today after what we went through yesterday, but it got a lot better.
We woke up exhausted this morning and took our time heading off. Spent about an hour and a half through similar conditions as yesterday with lots of pandanus but then it opened up to larger flat water pools interspersed with openly wooded rapids with hardwood thickets. The hardwood caused a few more problems than the pandanus as it didn’t move or bend when we ran the raft into it, just stopped us cold. But we didn’t really have to get out and drag the raft around obstacles.
Towards the end of the day we went past an island that signalled that we have about 5km to go before the big King Edward Falls. We are back to a bedrock river, rather than open flood plain.
We’re now at a small waterfall/feature and about to have dinner. We are all pretty stoked with the day and hoping that it bodes well for after the big falls.
When we get to the falls tomorrow we plan to camp at a spot overlooking a lagoon that hopefully has plenty of rapids (it did in 2007 at higher water levels). Maybe spend a couple of days there before the mad dash after the falls.
Taking some fantastic pics, unfortunately due to the weight restrictions on our flight in our only contact is via satphone so you’ll have to wait for them.
Everyone is fit and healthy and particularly after today in good spirits.
The river keeps throwing enough challenges every now and then to keep us on our toes and remind us of its power.
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Lachie Carracher - This morning we left paradise and got hell.
The river changed character again. Over the previous area we were kayaking and rafting on a level with the tops of gumtrees. The rains haven’t come and now the levels are so much lower that we’re finding it really hard to find moving water through the swampland and pandanus. Much slower water.
Pandanus, for anyone who hasn’t seen it, has palm like frond with serrated edges so when you try to push it out of the way it can cut you open. At this level the river is full of them and choking the river from bank to bank. We keep finding ourselves getting out to cut them out of the way with machete’s or dragging the raft through the mud on the banks to try to get around them. They’re like a big strainer covering the whole river.
Today I went ahead in the kayak to scout around and see if I could find a clear path. Hit trouble and managed to lose a new H2O paddle and two sets of Teva shoes. Started the carnage with the team then losing two of the raft paddles. Can muddle on with the kayak paddles but not happy.
We’ve now just set up a little camp in the swampland on a couple of rocks that we’ve found. The whole team has super low energy. Be good to get some outside nutrition apart from the stuff we brought with us.
We now have a couple of more days before we get to the King Edward Falls. Really hoping that the river changes character again before we reach the salties.
We’re all dreaming of having a big steak in a pub. Maybe in a week or so.
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Team | 
04 15th, 2009| 
