FROM THE ARCHIVES: RIB VOL 1
Naiads Back To Nature The chance to be part of a team to explore hidden secrets of one of the North Island’s lesser known rivers, in an inflatable jetboat was something that Barry Thompson couldn’t pass up.
IN 1956, THE INVENTOR OF THE WATERJET,
C.W.F.Hamilton drove the first jetboat on the Kaituna River, from Okere Falls wharf downriver through the rapids below the bridge and back again. Forty plus years later it was my turn to tackle this awesomely beautiful river, albeit from the more sedate lower approach. Today those same rapids are a magnet for rafters and adrenaline seekers, who can experience the highest commercially rafted waterfall in the world. As jetboating through the rapids borders on the suicidal, our plans were to explore the Kaituna River from where it drains into the Bay of Plenty, at Te Tuna, to the first – or last, depending on which end of the river you start from – set of rapids in the Kaituna gorge. We had four 4.8m Naiad Sport Jet boats to negotiate the river, as well as a whole team of supporters, all keen to see what lay beyond the lush flat farm land around Maketu. The 47 km Kaituna River is the major outflow for Lakes Rotorua and Rotoiti and in rafting or kayaking terms the upper sections are graded at 5 plus. The first 15 km are narrow, strewn with rapids including the infamous 7m waterfall and plunge nearly 150m in altitude to where the last rapid falls into the fast flowing river. From there is about 12 km of native bush where Pungas, Rewa Rewa, Kea Kea and Manuka touch the very edges of the clear fast flowing and chilly Kaituna.
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RIB ANNUAL 2021
