March 10, 2004
Uncharted white water
Traverse City graduate paddles 125 miles on wild Lohit River in India
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
For six adventure kayakers, the Lohit River in India was a place where training transcended brute force and grace defied nature.
Bryan Smith, a 1993 graduate of Traverse City Senior High School, and five companions completed a six-day first descent of this remote, wild river in December. Paddling a 125-mile section originating in the Himalayan Mountains that had never been run before, Smith and his Welsh teammates negotiated soaring gorges, nuclear rapids and tricky boulder complexes.
Smith, a resident of Washington state, described his adventure to an audience of 30 people, mostly family and friends, Sunday afternoon at Crema downtown. He shared a digital slideshow of photos from the six-week expedition to India, including the six days on the Lohit, as well as a 15-minute video.
The self-supporting Lohit expedition brought along all their food and equipment, subsisting on precisely measured rations of oatmeal, rice and canned tuna fish for six days. Weight was a huge consideration for the kayakers, keeping equipment as well as food to a bare minimum. Too large a load would throw off their 125-pound white water kayaks, cutting edge boats that the team had brought with them to India
"It was really different to pack enough gear for seven days in the back of your kayak," said Smith, a self-described gearhead who said the trip's minimalism also challenged him. "It was a really interesting reality: our safety was each other and our paddling skills, rather than anything else."
A support team on land did their best to keep in twice-daily radio contact, but never provided food or direct help. The remoteness and primitive rescue and medical care facilities in the region could turned a misjudgment into a potential fatality.
"There were no mistakes, no mistakes on a river like this," Smith said. "There were some scary moments, but for the most part everything went pretty well."
The team, which included four men and two women, typically paddled four or five hours a day, a physically and mentally taxing pace considering the river's challenges.
The secret to triumphing over nature at its rawest:
"Being able to hold your breath and a bomb-proof Eskimo roll were two essential tools," said Smith, one of three owners of a kayaking school and adventure company called Body Boat Blade International, which is based on Orcas Island, Wash.
Smith joined the team after first kayaking with members last year in British Columbia. Their personalities clicked and he jumped at the chance to accompany them. A veteran adventure kayaker, Smith trained for the trip for six months, mostly cross training to build endurance.
"At some point I had to say I was ready to paddle," Smith said. "What I wasn't prepared for was the mental exhaustion at the end of every day."
During every day's paddling, staying sharp was difficult because of the river's mental and physical pummeling.
"Sometimes, it was hard to keep focused and not wonder if we were going to be able to do something," he noted. "It turned into a rapid by rapid, move by move approach, you couldn't look five miles ahead."
A company in India, Aquaterra Adventures, helped guide the expedition. They arranged the team's travel throughout the massive country, obtained governmental approval and scheduled a practice run for the team on a river near Delhi before heading to the Lohit.
Aquaterra Adventures members also scouted the Lohit River beforehand, performing their reconnaissance from land. It turns out their projections of a hard first few days followed by smoother sailing were dramatically wrong - the whole trip was full-tilt every day, straining team members to their limits. The challenges soon simplified team members' hand signals to either a thumbs up or a thumbs down at the beginning of a new rapid.
"The last couple of days, it was supposed to get easier," Smith noted. "It never did. Every time we thought we were through the hardest point, it was like, 'Oh, my God!'"
The Lohit River is a Class 4/5 waterway that begins in a remote Indian state, Arunachal Pradesh, that is the center of a politically charged region bordering Burma, Tibet, Bhutan and China. China and India had a military standoff over fishing rights just two days before the team's arrival. Their Aquaterra Adventures as well as the support of a government tourism minister helped smooth the way.
"We were very lucky to be there, the permit process was very long," Smith noted.
Smith is eager to return someday to India and the Lohit, planning next time to add more sightseeing time into the first part of the trip. This time, he and the other team members were too wiped to do anything but head home after their Lohit descent and return to Delhi.
"India is the most colorful, sensory place I've every been in my life: sights, sounds smells, it's all there," Smith said. "I would do it all again, for sure."