Trip, Kyle and I are hard at work right now planning our adventures for 2008. Recent success with National Geographic has opened a lot of doors and we are gradually increasing our production capabilities and moving beyond the world of kayak porn. We’ll still do porn, but our main focus is now producing documentary-style television content. Think kayaking with an ecological, scientific twist.

For ’08 so far, we’re planning to head to China and paddle 260 miles of the Salween River through some of the most technical and isolated big-water Class V on the planet. The expedition will begin at 11,000 feet above seal level on an unexplored section of the Upper Salween. We’ll then team up with the non-profit China River’s Project, Chinese officials, local raft guides and environmentalists to paddle and teach rafting on a section of the lower Salween planned to be flooded by an ambitious 12 dam project. The goal is to, through exploration and collaboration with local officials, show the value of freeflowing rivers.

We’ve got two more projects lined up, that we’re keeping under wraps until all the grant applications and logistics are worked out.

Should be a fun year!
Andy

Fresh out of the jungle of Papua New Guinea, Epicocity paddler Trip Jennings was interviewed via sat phone by National Geographic… have a listen:

http://www.worldkayakblogs.com/kayakertripjennings.mp3

Things are going well for the Epicocity Project these days. This week, they were informed by the National Geographic Society that, for the second time in a row, their application for a Young Explorers Grant had been approved.

The grant will help fund an expedition to China, where the Epicocity team will paddle the last unexplored section of river flowing off the Tibetan Plateau, a 150-mile class V section of unknown rapids on the Salween River. The team will then expand to include Chinese officials and environmentalists as they paddle a section of whitewater threatened by an ambitious 12 dam project. EP will be working with the China Rivers Project, a non-profit, to raise awareness to the value of free-flowing rivers in China. This two-month project is slated to begin in March.

Jennings’ first Young Explorers Grant was awarded in the spring of last year for a proposed two-month kayaking and caving expedition to New Britain, Papua New Guinea. The mission was a complete success, with the crew first descending two rivers, a fifty-foot waterfall, and exploring six miles of the Southern Hemisphere’s largest cave system. The team also collaborated with a group of California-based scientists to begin the process of developing a conservation plan for the region.

These missions are part of a three-stage project called Rivers in Demand. The aim is to promote environmental stewardship and healthy watersheds by connecting adventure, exploration and conservation. The third stage will take the team to Gabon, West Africa, where a National Geographic team is already working in collaboration with The Wildlife Conservation Society and the country’s government to establish a 10,000 square mile national park. The goal of the project is to protect wildlife by establishing an ecotourism industry to replace the current logging, mining and poaching industries that currently utilize the land. The Epicocity Project team will document and assist this project and also become the first team of paddlers to explore the Ivindo River, which flows through the newly protected land.

Coverage of the Rivers in Demand Project will air on National Geographic’s domestic and international TV channels, National Geographic radio, National Geographic Adventure Magazine, Canoe and Kayak Magazine and online at www.epicocity.com.

We were very fortunate that while in Papua New Guinea, our team remained very healthy. We had some bouts with trenchfoot and other minor ailments, but we largely stayed in pretty good shape.

Upon returning to the States however, things started to change. About two weeks after we got back, Brian started feeling sick. After a few days, he recognized the classic symptoms of malaria, saw a doctor to confirm his suspicion and began treatment. After a couple of very uncomfortable weeks, Brian started feeling better. Doctors told him that the strain of malaria that he had contracted was nonrecurring and that after he completed the round of meds, he should be pretty much in the clear.

Two weeks after he finished his meds, as he was returning home to Portland from Thanksgiving with his family in Maine, Brian once again began feeling the classic symptoms of malaria. Back in Portland, he relapsed into a state of misery and once again spent his days sweating, shivering and shaking on his couch. He once again went to the doctor, got back on meds and is now doing much better.

This past Thursday, Kyle and I were working on sponsorship proposals while Trip, feeling sick, laid low. He had been dealing with a nagging illness that wasn’t terrible, but wouldn’t go away either. As I left for Portland that afternoon, Trip decided to go to the doctor to get checked out and hopefully get a diagnosis. About halfway to Portland I got a call from Kyle saying that Trip was in the hospital, diagnosed with malaria.

While we were in PNG, all of us were on anti-malarial medication. Unfortunately though, the medications are only about 80% effective in warding off the disease, so the risk is impossible to eliminate. The news of two of the six members of the team contracting malaria was shocking to us, as mosquitoes didn’t seem to have bothered us much and locals didn’t seem to contract the disease frequently.

Trip and Brian are both feeling better. Trip is still suffering from cycles of debilitating cold sweats, but these cycles are getting more minor and less frequent. Brian is looking much better and is starting to venture away from the couch for longer periods of time.

It’s pouring in Oregon right now and these boys are jonzing to get out and paddle. Send some healing energy their way so that they can get well and charge hard again!

As we prepared for our Papua New Guinea expedition, we imagined all the equipment we might need to execute exactly what we had planned. The areas we planned to explore are extremely remote and access to supplies very limited. We also needed to be prepared to live in and navigate through the dense, steep landscape of the PNG rainforest, an area that receives 18 feet of rainfall annually. Essentially, we had to pack our bags in Portland prepared to live off of only what we brought with, could buy in poorly stocked markets or could find in the jungle.

Trip and I sat down and came up with a list of necessary equipment that we needed, and we thank the following sponsors for providing the equipment that made the expedition possible.

We would like to extend a very special thanks to NRS for providing us the multitude of kayaking gear and smaller items that made the expedition possible. I carried my Pro Kayak throw rope with me absolutely everywhere I went, from jungle hikes to caving missions to paddling first descents. My Hydrosilk longsleeve shirt quickly became my single favorite piece of clothing and our 2008 Guide Shirts were comfortable, functional and looked great. The contribution NRS made the expedition was extensive and we very much appreciate their continual support.
An essential nutritional source we relied on during our expedition was Clif Bars. We were, at times, hiking eight hours a day through the rugged rainforest with very limited food supplies. I personally found myself eating three or four Clif Bars a day simply to generate the necessary energy to make it from village to village. When I packed my bags in Portland I filled up my largest checked bag halfway with Clif Bars and by the end of our two months in PNG had eaten almost all of them. We’d like to give Clif Bar a huge thanks for keeping us fueled! My favorites are the peanut butter Builders Bar and the Mountain Mix Mojo Bar. A hint for other expeditioners out there: smother your Clif Bar in peanut butter for additional protein and calorie support.

Kokatat provided the paddling gear to keep Scott Feindel, Kyle Dickman, Brian Eustis and Matt Fields-Johnson comfortable during the expedition. Favorite on-water apparel was the Paclite Knappster and Inner Core long sleeve. While the temperatures never got particularly cold, malaria carrying mosquitoes, flies and rain necessitated long pants and raingear. The Destination Paddling pants and Paclite Anoraks kept these guys warm, dry and insect free while at camp.

The staple foods of the PNG jungle are taro, caucau and singapoe, root-vegetables that are extremely bland and offer very limited nutritional value. The main protein source, wild and semi-domesticated pig, unfortunately was unsafe for us to eat because of a risk of trichinosis infection. Alpine Aire foods provided us a supply of lightweight, compact and nutritious freeze dried meals. These meals were essential for the times we had inadequate local food or were living out of out kayaks. Taro wasn’t bad, but it definitely wasn’t what you wanted to pack in your kayak for multi-day adventures! My personal favorite meals were Western Tamale Pie, Chicken Salad Lunch with Crackers and Chocolate Mudslide Pie.

A constant struggle that the expedition faced was a battle against infection. Everyone on the trip was on antibiotics from the time we landed to the time we took off, and we still had trouble managing wounds. The Adventure Medical Kits we took with us were utilized every single day from things as simple as wound cleaning to trenchfoot treatment to sprains and strains. In an area with no medical facilities, we were totally on our own, but confident in our abilities to deal with minor injury or sickness.
Imagine this scenario: You’re on a National Geographic sponsored expedition to an area with no electricity and you need to constantly have power-hungry HD video cameras running and still cameras firing. Luckily, Jackson Hole based Brunton came to the rescue and provided us two lightweight, fold up solar panels so that we could keep our batteries charged and our expedition on track. During our subterranean adventures we were stoked to have extremely bright and water resistant L3 headlamps to light the way and keep us from falling off of underground cliffs.

The island of New Britain off of mainland Papua New Guinea is very minimally developed. Infrastructure development is driven by the demand for natural resource removal and is carried out primarily by the corporations profiting off of the land. The Australian government has inaccurate topographic maps of the area, but our primary tools for navigation were local guides, Google Earth and our Magellan eXplorist GPS units. Before entering the jungle, we would scout our planned route on Google Earth and plug GPS coordinates into our eXplorist units. In the field, we would then mark additional waypoints based on landmarks we scouted ahead of time online and information from local tribe members. Without these GPS units, we would have been wandering through uncharted jungle with only local people (who we had an extremely difficult time communicating with) guiding our way.

Our adventure in PNG was a difficult one to outfit. We were backpacking, caving and kayaking in very wet, rugged terrain and thus needed lightweight, durable equipment that was also compact. We needed to be able to be able to live out of a kayak for a week at a time, if necessary and be comfortable sleeping in wet, humid environments. Luckily, at the Outdoor Retailer Show in SLC, Trip and I were referred to a company called Nemo tents by our contact at Jet Boil. Nemo makes a line of tents that instead of being supported by poles, is supported by an internal frame of air bladders. They are so compact and light that I easily stored the tent that Scott and I shared in the bow of my Dagger Nomad 8.5.

Due to the multitude of situations we needed to be prepared for and the amount of camera gear we needed, little space was available for clothing. We did however, need to be prepared for heat, cold, sun, rain and malaria carrying mosquitoes. We needed to hike through the sweltering (or very rainy) jungle all day and be able to dry and rewear the same clothes the next day for weeks at a time. The synthetic shorts, t-shirts, buttondowns and raingear supplied by The North Face fit this bill perfectly and held up well enough for us to still wear even after the expedition ended.

In August, Trip and I met in Salt Lake City to finalize our equipment list for the expedition. We stopped by a proven leader in the outdoor footwear industry, Five.Ten, and found exactly the shoes we needed for our PNG mission. The newly released Five.Ten Canyoneer 2 Boots allowed us to do everything we had lined up: multiday backpacking, caving and whitewater kayaking. The shoes performed wonderfully in all situations and were an absolutely indispensable item. I like them so much that they remain my primary paddling shoe. Tip: wear a pair of midweight Smartwools with them for best performance.

Setting out on this expedition without certain safety measures in place would have made for a very sketchy situation. The activities we were doing were dangerous and the location one of the most remote on earth, making access to medical care marginal at best. Two precautions we took were to purchase high quality travel insurance and carry two ACR Microfix units with us at all times. In case of an emergency, you raise the antenna and activate the unit, sending out a signal to NOAA with GPS coordinates. Before the trip we logged onto the NOAA website and provided a detailed description of where we would be and what we would be doing so that if we activated the beacons, rescuers would have as much information as possible to expedite the search and rescue process. Best of all, the search and rescue is FREE. I will definitely not be going on any major expeditions in the future without one of these units.

For the expedition, four out of six members of the team chose Wavesport Habitats. The team needed to be prepared for multi-day missions in conditions ranging from perfectly flat to class five gorges and waterfalls, and the Habitat fit the bill perfectly. They are fast, stable and capable of carrying the gear we needed to live in the jungle for days at a time.

In difficult, remote gorges, your paddle is critical – without it you can quickly find yourself at the mercy of the river. We trust AT paddles because we know, from experience, that they durable and provide the necessary power to run pushy class five whitewater. Our paddle of choice was the AT2 Standard for all applications – from ocean crossings to 50 foot waterfalls.

At EP, we take helmet choice very seriously. You only have one brain, and we believe that protecting it should be a top priority. For this expedition, we chose the Sweet Rocker Halfcut for it’s durable carbon fiber shell and over-the-ears cut that kept us cool in Papua New Guinea’s equatorial heat. When things get a bit hairy, we strap on the Rocker Fullface for extra protection.

Sprayskirts, along with paddles, are a piece of gear that you depend on not to fail. In PNG, we constantly found ourselves clawing through thick jungle and plugging into monster holes, two very trying situations for any sprayskirt. The White Water EXP Armortex Reinforced skirt laughed at sharp vines and sticks and resisted implosion with the help of a plastic reinforcing bar that bridges the gap between your thighbraces.

It’s strange how very expensive electronic equipment and water don’t mix. We however, decided to embark on a kayak mission to a country that receives 18 FEET of rainfall a year with a bunch of expensive cameras and an expensive laptop. Pelican made it work out though by providing us the waterproof boxes we used to keep our gear from getting wet or crushed. After two months in the jungle, we made it back to the States with all of our electronics in full working order (albeit a little dirty from shooting a volcano as it erupted next to us…)

With special thanks to James McBeath, Colin Kemp and the lads at World Kayak, Epicocity gets to play with the latest theme for the World Kayak Blogs.  Users of Worldkayakblogs.com will now be able to choose from a growing list of themes to personalize their own blogs.  On top of that, all the blogs are widget ready… meaning that you are able to drop in cool photo galleries (as many as you want), post up  feeds from your favorite Youtube account, set up podcasts and much more.  It also lets you set up static pages of content… ie… you can set up a full web site here!

 Way cool, thanks World Kayak!