Upper Watut - Society to Baiune

With our plan sorted the night before we tried to get a little ahead by getting up early and getting all our gear sorted. This was soon to be un-done by transportation issues, Okam "couldn't get his truck fixed" so we had to use Graham and Rex, which was quite a pricey option at 700Kina for a days hire. So while waiting for our transport we had a bit of fun with the locals and just chilled out, well Shannon did but Barny and I were taking a big longer to get used to PNG-time.

Balengs house at the community houes at Sambio (p. Barny)

Jerry cutting up the Paw-paw (p. Barny)

Bliss-Stick HQ-PNG!!! (p. Jordy)

Tug of War... those kids are actually strong (p. Jordy)

Once Graham arrived we made good time (Graham should be a rally driver) up to Bulolo and then down to Society. A small market heralded this small town and when we arrived at the river we were reminded of the importance of alluvial mining to these towns. At the put in we were worried that we might be putting onto a flat stretch of river but fortunately we were wrong, very wrong. We had been told this stretch of river was 1-2km long, but after being told that the stretch of the Watut we done the day before was 1km and ended up being about 4km we figured we had somewhere between 5-10km to paddle.

Welcome to Bulolo (p. Barny)

Shannon getting ready at Society (p. Jordy)

Me taking a roll, something we found the locals loved to see
(p. Barny)

Shannon in the class III, being watched (p. Barny)

After a couple of km of class III we were waved to the side of the river by some stressed locals. After talking and explaining to them what we were doing, I decided to would oblige them and get out and look at the rapid and 'decide' whether it was safe or not. And hearing the locals say, "You will die, impossible" and the like, it couldn't hurt anyway. To my suprise this rapid was actually class IV and when they said the rapids were more dangerous downstream, I was stoked! We were entering Mangke Gorge, we figured naming it after the closest village made sense, which had about 2km of class IV-V.

Me trying to explain that "we won't die, we want rough water"
(p. Barny)

Shannon scouting the first class V rapid (p. Jordy)

Barny charging (p. Jordy)

The locals telling Shannon about the changes to the river (p. Barny)

Me running the second big section (p. Barny)

Shannon styling it (p. Jordy)

Barny showing the locals that its all good (p. Jordy)

More goods (p. Barny)

More, more and more (p. Jordy)

Big hole, big boof! (p. Jordy)

Towards the end of the Mangke Gorge (p. Jordy)

After getting through the gorge we had a 4km paddle out through some amazing villages, with children running beside the river yelling, "white-man, white-man, white-man" and smiling villagers waving a we float by. After getting back to our transport, much to the delight of Reuben and the crew, we were quick to get on the road as we wanted to get paddle a section of the Snake River, a major tributary of the Watut. After ripping up a 4wd road for about 15km we got to a lower part of the river and made the call that the upper section would be too low. Not to be dismayed, we then rallied to the Lopogo River that runs parallel to the Lae-Bulolo Highway. Unfortunately there wasn't enough water for the upper section that would be 5 or more km of Otira like class V, but we were able to paddle the section below Timini Village. Putting on at 5.30pm was a bit dodgey as it is completely dark by 6.30pm, but we couldn't resist the chance of another first d. We didnt have time for many photos but the river was pretty sick with some cool class IV boulder gardens and a beautiful gorge.

Shannon at the put in of the Lopogo River (p. Jordy)

Typical Lopogo, only good photo sorry (p. Jordy)

After getting off the river we returned to Lae for a night of chatting to Murray about our couple of days in the Watut Valley. Our plan from here was a couple of rest days, one of which we were going to attend a forum held by the Union of Watut River Communities that's purpose was to bring together the villagers of the Watut and unify their cries about the degradation of their river.