The Most Intense Ever, The Nevis, NZ

I heard about this river from Kawaru Rafts in one of many brochures I received from outfitters throughout New Zealand .  It stated “without a doubt New Zealand ’s most challenging run”, but then again every outfitter’s brochure said this about their run.  So why not put it on the itinerary?

Throughout our travels about New Zealand no one had ever heard of the Nevis until I reached the home of Kawaru Rafts in Queenstown.  In Queenstown the comments were “its crazy”, and “many trips have been helicoptered out”.  Even the owner of Kawaru Rafts, Robert Eymann said laughing with 15 stitches in his head from his latest attempt, “you can’t do it.  My first run down I flipped my raft 7 times and had to sleep in my wet suit in 40 degree weather.  My second try I flipped my raft 15 times.”  He blew off the possibility of commercial runs on this river after his first try.  Inquiring a little more we found out that the run was feasible in a full long day with several portages.  There were 5 previous runs on the Nevis including a kayak descent where the paddlers portaged everything and swore they would never try anything like that again.  Two trips were helicoptered out and Robert’s two complete runs with many flips.

On December 3, 1986 , we drove to the put-in at Nevis Crossing and camped.  All we had to determine the water level was from an old photograph from Robert.  It showed a rock slightly submerged which was what he considered on the low side.  Today it was about 2 inches above the level taken in the photo.  At 6:50 a.m. on December 4^th , four of us, Dave Lindsay and Clif Bobinski in one raft and Brad Howarth and myself in the other, headed down the Nevis River to its confluence with the Kawaru ten miles downstream.

After two miles of mellow Class II-III we came upon a ten foot vertical drop and recognized it to be the rapid on the cover of the brochure.  We had no problem with this straight drop.  Next was our first portage.  With vertical walls at the bottom of the rapid, we had to line our boat through.  Using a rope, one person held the raft in place, while the other jumped 15 feet into the boat.  Below this the river, estimated at 1600 cfs, narrowed down between two vertical walls to a width of only three feet.  In this 15 foot stretch we had to slide our boats sideways while pressing our bodies against the left wall.  The gorge opened up some after this and started with a long Class V rapid.  What was unusual about this rapid was that it tried to flip the rafts toward the downstream side, both boats had to high-side upstream in order to save it from flipping.

After a few class IV’s Dave and Clif, who were leading at the time, had gone into a blind dead end chute river left and were signaling us to go to the right.  It was too late to eddy out on the right, so Brad and I ran the seven foot drop blind.  We were temporarily surfed at the base of the drop, enough to fill our raft 3/4 full of water (this was before self-bailers) and this put us totally out of control.  Brad and I were cussing at each other as we frivolously tried to catch an eddy, but to no avail.  We continued out of control over 6 and 8 foot drops before we caught a small eddy on the right where I was able to jump to shore.  Before we could start bailing, the raft took off downstream.  With quick thoughts I jumped for the boat to ride it out with Brad instead of leaving him to R-1 the unknown drops ahead.  Our worst fear was knowing that somewhere ahead was a 30 foot waterfall that must be portaged.  But the next drop turned out to be a mere 10 foot falls, enough for us to keep the harsh words flying as we continued our attempt to catch an eddy.  We finally parked the raft on a rock long enough to bail water out and then paddle over to an eddy on the left.  Ten minutes later, Dave and Clif arrived.  They had hurriedly scouted each of the four drops that we ran blind, before continuing their pursuit of us.

The next drop was a technical Class V which we called Lost Paddle, as we had lost one of our spares during the out of control run.  It turned out to be the last drop of the continuous stretch.

The river continued in this character for several miles with many vertical ledges ranging from 3 feet to 10 feet vertical and intermittent long Class IV rapids.  One Class V of note was a small Sweet’s Falls type drop followed by a huge block rock and a narrow slot to the left in front of an undercut rock.  The only way to run this rapid this rapid we called Billboard was to run the falls straight, slam the Billboard Rock nose first, bouncing off it to slide in front of the undercut.

Next was a Class V Brad and I portaged, while Dave and Clif ran successfully.  We then stopped for lunch at an awesome Class V with big holes ending in a 12 foot waterfall.  At this point it was 12:30 p.m. , we started feeling cocky having done so much impressive whitewater successfully with 9 hours of daylight still ahead of us.  From the topos it looked like we were 2/3rds through, cruising in record time, so we took a half hour nap before negotiating the Class V successfully.

Feeling good we rounded the next bend to see the world drop out.  Scouting we saw five rapids in a row, mostly Class VI-ish, including one totally unrunnable “death falls”, so we decide to portage and line the entire stretch.  Our great cruisin’ time was shot all to hell as the portage took 4 hours.  It was about 5:30 p.m. , we were beat and now worried about making the take-out by dark.

A few more Class III’s and IV’s preceded the 30 foot waterfall which we portaged in only 20 minutes.  For the first time in my life I was wishing for Class II water as the gorge and steep gradient appeared to continue on.  At a Class IV narrow slot that Brad and I tried to run, we wedged the raft, jolting me into the water.   I had to swim for about 15 yards through the boulders before Brad worked the raft loose and I was able to climb back in.  Dave and Clif after watching my swim decided to carry that one.

To our disappointment the next bend showed us more vertical falls and continuous steep gradient.  The next rapid a Class IV on the left, was runnable via a “riffle barrel” chute on the right before dragging the raft over 10 feet of shallow then running the last 10 foot drop in the main channel.  Immediately downstream was another Class VI that led into and 18 foot vertical falls.  Another difficult portage and it was approaching 8 o’clock .  We moved quickly on this portage putting in below the falls above yet another long Class IV+ rapid around the right side of an island.  Left of the island was another Class VI.

Around the bend it appeared to be mellowing out some but once again we came upon a 12 foot vertical falls that slammed into a rock just submerged at the base of the drop.  It was runnable at the precise line along the right bank but it was also an easy portage, so as tired as we were we opted for portage number 5.  It was now a few minutes after 9 p.m. as the gorge really appeared to be opening up.  We bolted non-stop through 3 miles of continuous and welcome Class II-III water.  Using the float and bail method, we finally came to the Kawaru and the rest of our paddling gang were waiting for us at the take out.  It was 9:50 , just dark.

Certain times on the river were discouraging, portaging and worrying about the possibility of sleeping in our wet suits.  It was now a great feeling of accomplishment.  We were only the second to do the entire Nevis in a day and the first to do successfully without a flip or major problem.  The four of us have an incredible amount of paddling experience and none of us had ever seen a stretch so difficult and challenging.  Luck was on our side.  If we had one more raft with us (two others had debated going the night before) or if there was just one more portage, we would not have made it by dark.

Pictures were taken of us in front of “the fire that was never lit” before we proceeded to Queenstown to celebrate and tell the local outfitters of our great day on the river.  Robert Eymann was right about one thing, “after paddling the Nevis , you won’t want to paddle for days”.  We didn’t.