Outdoor Enthusiast, Feature

FEATURE PACKRAFTING

BECOMING

AMPHIBIAN David Lintern EXPERIENCES PACKRAFTING IN THE FAR NORTH-WEST.

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few years ago, I began to hear about a method of human-powered travel being used in the wilds of Alaska by super long-distance hikers and ‘backcountry’ adventurers. It was wildly exciting and allowed access to places that could not be

reached solely on foot. Videos circulated on YouTube of brave and foolhardy people doing crazy things in beautiful places, and then early adopters in the watery north of Europe began to pick up a paddle and reach places other backpackers couldn’t. To say I was intrigued would be something of an understatement.

A packraft is essentially an inflatable rubber dinghy, literally: a raft that can be packed, in a backpack and carried when not needed. Prototypes of the packraft were first used by the Jefferson Arctic Expedition in 1901, and occasionally crop up in Special Forces histories, a CV that testifies to their durability. These little polyurethane boats offer a unique experience – highly-specialised, with shallow hulls perfect for negotiating stony river beds, tough enough to withstand weeks of continuous use, light enough to be carried and small enough not to need portaging in the traditional manner, they open up independent travel in a way never before possible.

No longer is the user forced to divert to roads and towns, or to find bridges to cross water. Maps are seen afresh, as water travel becomes an option for exploring new places or moving faster and more efficiently.

Packrafting is also more fun than a barrel of monkeys.

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FEATURE PACKRAFTING

What do I need?

1. A packraft.

2. A PFD – a Personal Floatation Device (aka life jacket).

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3. A split paddle – a four or five piece kayak paddle (it needs to I’d arranged to meet David and Rob at Aviemore, whereupon we drove up beyond Ullapool to the iconic far north-west, to spend a weekend paddling in the lochs around Suilven and Cul Mor. David Hine (@gridnorth), is one of the UK’s few active packrafters, and Rob, a white water

be packable, hence the ‘split’).

4. An inflation bag.

5. Straps (to tie your backpack onto the bow).

6. A ‘spray deck’ (optional in calm water, but essential for rivers, bigger lochs and white water).

canoe instructor, mountain bike and mountain leader (BCU,

7. Full hill walking waterproofs.

MBL, ML). Together with colleague Andy, Rob runs

8. Your wits about you!

Backcountry Biking, a training and adventure programme offering a truly unruly fusion of biking and rafting – everything from ‘dinghy’s for dummies’ and ‘combat boating’ (for the uninitiated, in this context that’s graded white water, not playing model warships, but let’s not fly before we can swim), to ‘bikerafting’ (and yes, that’s mountain bikes with packrafts, together). It’s a niche business just getting started, but just crazy enough to take off in a huge way. We were joined by Annie and Tanya, also first-timers to packrafting, for BCB’s ‘Introduction to’ course.

The weekend was the perfect teaching cocktail of joyful stupidity, calm reflection and skills development. These boats really are so much fun – sitting in the water lightly with a blunt bow and shallow hull, manoeuvrability is at a maximum – you really can turn on a head of a pin! Even inflating these things is like something from Wacky Races

Over the next 30 hours or so, Rob takes us through

– using a silnylon bag to ‘catch’ air and squeeze into a hole in

methods of conserving our strength – using body rotation, a

the side. ‘Tempering’, or cooling the air inside, by sitting the

technique developed by canoeists employing core muscles

boat in the water, then topping up with extra, improves its

rather than our puny biceps, and finding shelter in the lee of

performance. With an off-shore wind behind us, moving is

the shore, the eddies where water is calm. This is reminiscent

easy, if a little damp – full waterproofs are advised, but

of winter skills training, where fledgling mountaineers are

against a headwind, paddling becomes hard work quickly. A

taught to seek out ‘islands of safety’. Our instructor is keen

packraft is not a sea kayak, or even an open canoe. What

to address the safety aspect of waterborne travel, made

they gain in packability, they lose in trackability. It only takes

more complex by the fact that packrafting is a new and

a force 3 or 4 to slow us down and drain our energy fast.

exciting sport without a governing body or a ‘rulebook’:

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FEATURE PACKRAFTING

instead of two hours, and a fraction of the energy.

It’s a rainy night’s camp, but made a lot more palatable by the canned gin and tonic that our host had secretly packed in. The sun peeps through the clouds the following morning, as we head out down a shallow river, embedding those skills attempted for the first time the previous day. The mark of a good course, this – returning to previous lessons in bite-sized pieces, or in different contexts to explore how the skill set can be developed further. We scuff our rugged little boats over the shallows, ferry diagonally across the current into calm eddies and past quiet reed beds, into deeper water alongside Suilven.

I’m entranced by the difference in perspective that this method of travel engenders; spying the birdlife along the water, noticing the effect of the ‘fetch’ – the power of the wind as it gains momentum over larger bodies of water, and the difference between on-shore and off-shore breezes. I really enjoyed the difference in exercise too – often as a walker I feel I have no upper body strength at all – regular packrafting would change that. All in all, it’s a majestic, even sensual way to travel.

But the romance doesn’t last forever. Rob has forgotten to instruct the weather to do as it’s supposed to, and the prevailing wind is north-westerly, not the more usual south-westerly. A rest at the shore side is welcome, and not only because we need to empty our bladders. We land and take lunch, walking over to a now very blustery Loch Sionasgaig before putting in for the last time. Battling against the headwind we make slow but steady progress, finding ‘’With kayaking, the training is more formalised; it takes many

inlets to rest in, before moving round each headland and

hours to work towards a grade 3 rapid. In a packraft,

sticking close to shore to arrive at Boat Bay at last.

somebody might get lucky and bounce down on a calm water

I doubt I’ll ever see my outdoor pursuits in the same way

day, and then jump ahead to a grade 5, with none of the

again. Through the use of a simple, packable boat, this new

knowledge or experience needed. That’s where serious

sport offers a completely new experience of the remote and

mistakes can happen. It’s all about being aware of, and

untamed places that we love. Packrafting is also easily the

mitigating the risks involved, and then getting out there to

most fun you can have with your waterproofs on. oe

enjoy it.’’ Packrafting, it turns out, is like a lot of good things worth doing well – a minute to learn, a lifetime to master.

But this is half training course, and half adventure travel – an engaging mix. We move slowly across the exposed but quite stunning Loch Sionasgaig, replete with native woodland topping its islands. It is the land that time forgot. Now we are afloat, we could choose to camp on those islands if we wanted, and hide from the dinosaurs! Freedom is ours.

Instead we land near a derelict sheiling, and take on calories before packing the boats away Transformer-like, becoming land creatures once again, and head towards the sheltered bay of Loch a Mhadail. Suilven looms under heavy cloud.

Without a boat the previous September, I walked for hours under this mountain to reach the path, when walking was my only option. With a packraft, we can head out in a straight

More resources

www.alpackaraft.com Accept no imitations. They aren’t cheap, but the ultimate rubber dinghy is built by Alpacka, designed to be the ‘mud trucks’ of the boating world. Fun, tough, kooky Alaskan family-run business. www.songofthepaddle.co.uk The UK forum for open top canoeing – great place to start for a beginner online. www.ukriversguidebook.co.uk Ultimate rivers guide. www.canoescotland.org Access, training and rivers advice. www.easytide.ukho.gov.uk/EasyTide/EasyTide/index.aspx Packrafts are not designed to withstand sea crossings, but for sea lochs, you will need to check tide times. www.xcweather.co.uk Accurate guide to windspeeds. www.packrafting.blogspot.co.uk Roman Dial is probably the leading authority on all things packraft, his self-published book is a must-have. www.eddiepalmer.org/index.htm UK paddling legend and author of the growing canoe classic series. www.backcountrybiking.co.uk Packrafting and Mountain Biking officiandos Andy and Rob.

line for camp at the head of a river – it takes 30 minutes

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