Tara Gorge, Montenegro - June 2016 - Trip Report
Leanne and I headed out to Montenegro with the intention of paddling Tara Gorge. It is rarely paddled but it is an absolute jewel of a river that is set in remote, unspoilt and beautiful scenery. It is one of the best paddling trips I have done and is a great introduction to expedition paddling for intermediate paddlers.
The drive to the ‘resort’ near the put in was long and the hot weather was bothering me. I’m not good in the heat and was struggling! The put-in is near Djurdjevic bridge and the views from the bridge are stunning – hundreds of metres below you the crystal clear waters of the river carve their way through a wooded gorge. And if you peer closely you can just about make out the beginning of the first grade 3 rapid on the downstream bend where the river begins to disappear out of sight.
The put-is no less impressive - calm and warm azure waters tempt you in. That said Leanne was a little apprehensive, the grand total of her kayaking experience previously consisted of half a day at Symonds Yat (a popular grade 1 training ground on the English Welsh border) and a few hours on the Tamar (grade 2 at most) – not really the usually prior experience between a three day grade 3 self-supported gorge trip! The fact that a local raft guide had told us the river was actually grade 4 (I didn’t believe him and turned out to be correct) and that there was a couple sending their son’s ashes down the river when we got on (he had tragically died kayaking but not on this river) probably didn’t do much to reassure her though!
The first grade 3 rapid was easily shot taken a ‘chicken line’ (where you avoid the main guts of the rapid) down the right. The rest of the day was fairly mellow with a few grade 2 features to keep us on our toes. As we paddled on the river continued to delight us with its views and remoteness – we saw no-one the whole day. We had no set itinerary but didn’t want to go too far and then have run out of river for the next two days so we took it easy, taking our time to explore the river and banks. Shortly after passing under a wooden bridge we saw a grassy bank on river right – we’d paddled about the right distance for the day and so got out to investigate. We were rewarded with a flat and luscious grassy plain. We were still in the national park at this point (where you’re not technically allowed to camp) and as it was still early we decide to stash our kayaks behind some nearby bushes on the off-chance there were any rangers about. We then wandered back down to the bridge for a spot of (8m?) bridge jumping – although we thought the water was deep enough it was so clear that it was difficult to tell…it was a nerve wracking moment jumping in!
A little late we were back at our kayaks to set up camp for the night. During the evening we were treated to hundreds of fireflies lighting up the landscape – it was breath-taking and we sat there watching them for ages.
Leanne was a little out of sync at the start of the second day and capsized a few times on eddy lines. We carried on with our training and practice and by lunch she was back mastering the river again. We’d heard about a cave hidden up a waterfall on this day and so when we came across the waterfall we decide to break for lunch and have an explore.
We started off exploring up the loose earthy slope to the right of the waterfall. After about an hour of dragging ourselves up this (luckily we’d brought the throw lines with us as some of it was a little precarious) we decided that we’d either missed it or it wasn’t worth the effort. Back down at the river I thought I’d climb up the actual waterfall quickly (which was easy) and I very soon found the path to the cave – just like me to turn something easy into a massive slog. The cave could only be accessed via a small lake so we hauled up my boat so that we could paddle in – it wasn’t really worth it as the lake soon stopped and we would have needed to climb and crawl to explore the cave any further. To be honest I’m not sure why we stopped where we did as I’m a keen caver and so should have been motivated to go further! To save carrying the boat I thought I’d try paddling down the small exit stream from the boat, it was a little shallow and not particularly successful…
I wanted to end the day having done at least one of the grade 3 rapids so that Leanne would have some confidence and not been thrown straight into them first thing in the morning. We ended up having to run 2 or 3 before we found a suitable campsite but it was gorgeous – a small sandy beach with a little swimming pool and a shingle area for making a fire (which we cleared up afterwards).
The final day contained a number of grade 3 rapids but all were easy to boat scout (and all could be portaged if necessary). Leanne capsized a couple of times in the rapids and did a great job staying in her boat until I was able to effect a rescue (she was probably upside-down for 20 seconds on the longest occasion) – no swims for her this trip! We took out on river left just before the border (under the border guard’s watchful eye!) where there was an obvious ramp and café. The café seemed very surprised that we wanted food and then had no change – we told them they could keep the money but we ended up with another 4 beers instead. As we’d already had one each the long, hot and windy journey minibus journey back turned into a bit of a desperate bladder holding exercise!
