- Strava
- River Leven level at Newby Bridge 0.8m (Low)
My aim today was to support the club trip. I was aware that it was just me and Paul supporting a larger group today and I was. Paul took the front of the group and I was to bring up the rear. When we reached the weir, we had to decide if it was possible to take the group below the weir. We had a discussion with Mark W & Rich, and decided it was feasible to climb out of boats and carry down. Although it was a little bit of a faff, it gave us access to a venue with a little moving water. Perhaps we should have communicated the plan with the group more clearly.
I was worried that I sometimes across as “strict teacher”. E.g telling Michelle and Dale “you can’t go there”, “get in that eddy”. I think that comes from me being fearful and not knowing “what is safe”
Keeping an eye on everyone at once was challenging. I found that sitting down river enabled me to keep most paddlers in frame, and be ready to pick anyone up if they dropped down-river.
I spent some 1:1 time with Eva. She started off quite tired so I chatted with her and encouraged her to practice some surfing. Lending her my paddle helped with her tiredness. When we wanted a rest, we watched other paddlers try the leap frogging and reviewed their progress together. We also broke up the journey back looked for things on the journey (like the snail).
Today’s paddle was (as always) AMAZING! We started off at Fell Foot and paddled down the River Leven until Newby Bridge. When we got there, we: surfed on a big wave, broke in and broke out and we played leep-frog going behind rocks. On the way back, I picked up a hitchhiker (a small snail) and I named him David Attenborough. We travelled back to the car, nobody worry, David was dropped off on a nice rock next to the lake. After, I practiced some rescues with Rhi’s boat, don’t panic she wasn’t in it, it was empty, and it was really fun and it helped me alot There was a nice mix of flat and moving water and it was good for the people not so confident on the white water…yeah… really smashing day! (Eva Kelly aged 11)