Way Way in JAPAN!: Canoe Camp

So, we met at the Tokaido line platform at Tokyo station at 9am for a 915am train and head for Fujikawa, passing though Yugawara on the way. We get to Fujikawa station at quarter to 11 to be picked up by one of the guys from the activities centre, there are already two girls in the car and we are driving to pick up another guy so that he can follow us in his car to the centre.

We drive through some amazing scenery and when we get to the centre we greeted by a little black Labrador called San, we trek down the hill through a maze of wooden walkways down to large shelter, where we have our orientation. Which mainly consists of name games... then we get ready for a little excursion on to a calmer part of the river...

Very close to where we are going to be canoeing there is a big climbing frame with a little zipline...which we all have a go on before choosing a canoe to play in.

There are 2 single canoes, a double canoe, and a Canadian canoe...which we all have a go at...mainly we try to paddle our boats up over a rocky patch where the water flow is much faster. Our paddle-powered attempts were pretty lame, and ended up with some of our instructors standing on the large rock to the left of the imp-sized waterfall we were trying to scale... and trying to pull us up with a rope.

The first people to accend was a multi-manned attempt with the benifit of Charukii powering through. By the end of the afternoon, everyone had managed to get up to the other side at least once, had tried all the boats, and jumped in to the freezing cold river water swinging on a rope and jumping from the rocks on the other side. I on the other hand was the ONLY one to capsize that day... well done wayway! yes, the water was freezing.

Da, Iulia and Nachi trying to scale the rocky part of the river...

People watching me trying to right myself after tipping into the river.

Camp fire dinner, where I had a special dinner after I asked whether or not the large pot of creamy looking stew had milk in and they said yes! Charukii ran to the instructors kitchen to ask if they had any non-cow food...whence I was provided with some really cool gyoza, potato stuff and veggies... which was very very nice of them...then we proceeded to drink and toast marshmallows on the fire that we made...THEN several drinking games ensued including 'Go, Back, Jump', 'Dooby-Dooby-Do' and 'Mafia'. Which everyone got really into and ended up staying up til 2 am playing it...

Next morning, breakfast is at 730am along with some more orientation with Fujikawa river and what we'll be doing that morning.

It started raining lightly as we were starting out....it got a bit worse...but the rain wasn't my main concern.. it was the raging TORRENTS! and the rocks that the water was raging over...anyway we set out and were told to follow where the lead guy was going...so, fine. I tried following...and unfortunately I was following a little too closely to Iulia; who managed to run into a rock and got turned sideways into the current because of it...and I crashed into her (it was all rather slow motion... and hence rather a disappointing 'crash' more of a bump then both of us capsizing...) anyway we both ended up in the water. Which was Definitely not as cold as the day before! but where as Iulia managed to do a proper capsizing...while she was busy with all that... i was busy looking like a pillock and managed to fall over my own rock and slowly rolled over to my right, with the river pounding me from the right... Slowly, I could feel the river filling my little canoe and that there was NO chance of me righting myself...I meeped a pathetic....'errr help?!' and one of the instructors glided upstream (this is quite a feat...but she made it look so easy!) towards me and looked at me in a quizzical manner, wondering what on earth I was doing sideways...I tried to explain to her that I (well my boat and hence ME) was completely stuck ...I got out of my boat and tried to free it. Which failed dismally...on the account of it being 1.) wedged in between two rocks...and 2.) being wedged by the water flow. The combination of which made it pretty buggered. so Nachi told me to let go of the boat....I checked that she meant what she said... and asked... 'let go, and float WHERE?!?!'...

'oh just float downstream....'

yeah...that's helpful...

as I looked towards the rocky torrents which were looking Very hungry for wayway type food. I thought.... well what the hell...why not... so let go of my nice boat...(which was definitely easier than letting go of the stalactite) and headed for the river of DOOM! I did what they told me in orientation, and kept my feet up in the water...to defend me against the large rocks...but the rocks were quite insistent on hitting me and completely missed my feet and hit my arse instead. thank you very much. I was busy being swept away wondering how to stop myself from being drowned everytime I went over a big rock and was drawn into the whirlpool on the other side... as well as being swept into the faster and faster flowing part of the river itself.

Fast = BAD! so I thought I'd try and get my body over to the calmer, less rocky looking areas of the river, by paddling to the left, where I could. It obviously wasn't as futile as it felt while I was in the water because I managed to get my self close enough to the bank for one of the guys to throw me a rope to try and save me; by this time all the other people had been made to stop at the side of the river to watch me fail around in the river. The rope throwing was rather comic. For a start the guy who was trying to save me....ran right past me on the bank as I floated by, and was pointed in the right (down stream!) direction by the other people in our group...and it was quite amusing (even from my position of certain watery death) to watch him make a sudden changed of direction and hot-foot it back downstream from whence he came. THEN, he tried to throw the rope and missed me by about a meter too far from my reach (towards the bank and BEHIND ME!) SO, he pulled the rope back in and tried again... and again the rope landed behind me....by that time the feeling of doom had gone, and mild amusement of the situation had set in. and i thought:

'Sod it I'll just go get the rope myself shall I?!'

at which point I started to stand up...and then i realised that 1) the water was actually rather slow where I was now...the manic paddling had obviously worked to some extent as I was out of the torrents of doom and 2) the water was also shallow. I damn well didn't need saving NOW....and walked over to the bank. Short of a boat and a paddle.

It took the guys a good half an hour to get my boat back...in the mean time we all had a nice rest and biscuits.

which is what we are doing below.

Iulia had managed to float a LOT further downstream...but she was all good...and raring to go! So once we got the boat back we were all good (although I was feeling FAR more feeble!) to go.

I survived the next torrent...and paddled like crazy through them all...

on our next rest, we pulled our boats up on some rock and had a 'jumping into Fujikawa contest' which I just watched... lame, I know. I have no shame. I'd already had enough falling, from the game of 'trust' we played 'getting to know one another' falling into other peoples arms from a height....hmmmm nice.

However, the Granite here is Amazing. It's really grippy even when wet! and so some climbing of wet rock ensued...we also had a chat to one of the guides who runs the climbing bits of the camp too... who was recommending the climbing nearby...