Ouitchouion - Which one are we on?

Like any mission, it normally starts with an idea, an idea then grows into a plan, and a plan then grows into action. Now normally a Mission starts with a plan to do a river... But in our case it was, which river should we do as Quebec has a plethora of white water that has never been touched by kayak before. Now this mission was thought up by LP, Tyler with the expertise and help of the man Pat Levesque. Now from overhearing talk and what not it sounded like there was going to be a fair bit of water, and from pictures frankee had from a friend of his it looked like there might be some goods. So with a plan set and a wake up time we went to sleep, prepared but unaware of the day that lay ahead.

So a early start saw us set off to St Felicien where the Ouitchouion drained into lake St Jean, but with very little beta and a rather large crew for a first D we didn't get on the river until 12. After we set shuttle geared up and started on our venture we came to what was a very promising horizon line, and from what we saw it was going to be a good day, a class 4 rapid with a cool late boof over a chunky hole as the entrance move. After this it continued on around the corner we began to smile, uncontrollably, until we came to the end, where we were confronted by flat water.... alot of flat water. Now this brought about alot of nerves as we new that it dropped, and the more flat water there was, the more gradient it would drop... So after about an hour of flat water we came to a BIG horizon line which marked the start of the steep section with the 150 ft unrunnable death drop at the end. The first drop was stout.. with a tight line.. to the 2nd drop which was a roll of the dice, poke n hope drop. After this came two sweet little rapids with some cool boofs and moves and then came the scariest most beautiful horizonline I have ever seen in my life... and with light fading, it became quite scary as we new we had to get out of there, lucky it was a national park and there were stairs on the river right.. Needless to say this first D was a LOT of effort for nothing, but like the waikaia, we have to work for the good days.

Vincent - Gnarly C1 Paddler

Vincent checking out the 2nd drop... "I don't think you would come out of there"

What lays ahead?

Vincent going to check it out

Oh, thats what lays ahead.. we had to catch the last eddie 100 metres down on the right.. scary

Rapids!

Tyler Taking it in

The monster... 

Above this mother of a drop we had to ferry glide from left to right and catch the last eddie so we could walk out on a nice stairwell and walk way... scariest ferry glide in the world. So this First D was a lot of effort for very little, but it was an experience I am sure none of the team will ever forget.

Keep the flow