Okay, okay here it is... one of the sickest multi-day trips I have ever been on.... The Rio Cochamo with a section of the tributary Rio La Junta thrown in the mix. TC and Mariann had been planning this trip for a while, however, we couldn’t just rock up and put on this river. The geology and massive watershed involved in this valley required that we get the perfect weather allowing for a good flow. Too much rain - it floods, too hot and the glaciers melt - it floods. Thankfully before our time at Kayak FU started we got the opportunity to get on the Cochamo. The trip started by loading up and driving / catching a ferry from Futaleufu to the small town of Cochamo. Once in town we bought supplies and hired some cowboys and horses to help us get up to our base camp near the top of the valley. Getting an early start, we hiked the 8 or so km up to the camp. The hike it self is worth the trip. The trail is an ancient horse path used to get up and over the Southern Andes into Argentina. The vegetation is old and overgrown and in places the trail is only 2/3 of a meter wide and carved down 5 meters into the earth with the sides covered in moss. When you finally break free of the deep gorge you walk out into a series of open fields on a plateau that is encircled 360 degrees by towering granite domes rising a 1000 meters into the air. This is where you will find the “Refugio Cochamo” a sweet little camp ground mostly utilized by hardcore climbers who live up there setting routes up what is considered “The Yosemite of South America”. Thanks to the climbers, who have broke trail up into the adjoining valley of La Junta, we were able to make our way up into the Rio La Junta (The trails up into this valley are consistently being expanded, which means paddlers in the future will be able to get further up into the rivers headwaters). Putting in up as far as we could walk we paddled several boulder garden style rapids before the river started cutting into a large granite shelf. At first it started out as small smooth granite slides between giant boulders then the river itself dug deep into the bedrock on its final push out to the plateau. We found a really nice section, of drops, above a horrifying, log choked, pinched out, slot drop of death. Thankfully, we were able to run the section and eddy out above this monster. After portaging around this drop we were rewarded with a absolutely beautiful, smooth-as-a-babies-bottom slide into a crystal clear pool below and a short float back to camp. We got an early start the next day as we were trying to paddle from La Junta down and we knew we had lots of whitewater to cover. unfortunately, the first km or so of the river is a scenic float, and by scenic I mean ... the most breathtaking views I’ve seen. The river slowly meanders through jungly, bamboo forests while the 1000m tall granite domes dominate the skyline. Each river bend brings another “cover page” scenic, vista worthy of getting out to take a picture .... and this is the “unfortunately”, as it is easy to spend more time then you should on this flat section ... we may have done this (you’ll see why later). Eventually the river pics up and the rapids start building in size. Soon we came to a steep section of 5 or so rapids staked on top of each other with little room in-between (We would soon find out this was the characteristics of this river). We paddled some tight lines through the first three drops knowing the final drop was a mandatory portage. From a small eddy we decided that there just wasn’t enough room between the 4th and 5th drop to get out, so with a scary ferry we were able to get to the far shore and walk around the final drops. After seeing these drops we were partial stoked, on the ability to be able to scout and paddle these steep rapids but a little sketched out as well, on the rivers ability to just disappear into / under large slabs of granite. Everything changed in a few hundred meters. Turning around a bend we were astonished to see that the river had fallen of the face of the earth, or at-least that was how it appeared. Getting out to have a look our suspicions on the rivers character were confirmed ... it was stacked! Within a few hundred meter stretch ,the river probably dropped half as much (I am not sure of the names of stuff in this river but I am calling this section the Vertical Kilometer Gorge (VKG)). It was a series of 5 - 8 m drops (of all assortments) with several meters of flatter, strong current twisting around boulders into the next. To be honest, it looked and is absolutely do able. However, this entire gorged out stretch was formed by house sized boulders, stacked on top of each other all the way down the river. The problem with his is that the bigger the rocks, the bigger the gap is between chalked rocks, which is great place to find sieves and strainers. And that there were ... all over the place. Each drop generally had 2 or 3 flows of water going down them, however, there was only one route that would allow you to stay alive and two that would end in doom. On there own or put a few together this wouldn’t be so bad but after hitting your 8th must make move I think your brain might explode. We just didn’t have the time or the man power to tackle this stretch of white water. Instead we portaged through a mixture of the bamboo hell up above the river left bank and the maze of house and van sized, moss covered boulders at river level. The Final three drops of this section, which were comprised of the smooth granite bedrock (which was backing up all the boulders above) where picture perfect, with little consequences. It was a nice treat after feeling slightly beaten by the rapids above. Below the VKG the river opened up a bit and became a little less congested but managed to keep a consistently steep gradient. We paddled many great rapids through this section but made fairly slow time as most rapids required a quality scout. And scouting wasn’t always the easiest job. On one scout I was climbing up and over these large boulders to get a look at the bottom of a drop, and half way across this huge log (were talking a meter or so in diameter) spanning two van sized boulders it broke and I fell 4 meters to the ground with the log landing on it with my ass. Making our way down river we finally made it to the second steep-as gorge. Unfortunately, by this time we were hungry, exhausted, and running low on daylight, so after a quick scout we made the decision to portage. Once again portaging was hard work, made even harder by our low energy levels, but everyone pulled together and got the job done. At this point it was getting late, we paddled a few more class IV rapids and were contemplating setting up camp when the river finally let up. Feeling like we were close we mustered the rest of our energy and paddled as fast as our aching arms would allow us down the remain 2-4 km of continuous class II-III water to the take out, our camp, our beds and the dogs. I think they were as happy to see us as we were to see them. We ate a pack of country harvest expedition food each, drank a beer (I was wasted) and fell asleep with huge smiles on our faces, happy at what we had accomplished. Tyler Fox Photos: Mariann Saether, Tyler Curtis
Rio Cochamo
       Expedition
The Crew
Enjoying the hike in
Arriving at Base Camp
Getting Ready
Taking in all the Beauty
The Put-in for Rio La Junta
Dropping in, 1st rapid
La Junta
Right on Line
Smooth!
Smoother!
Another Beautiful Drop ...
on La Junta
Off the Lip
Sweet Section of Stacked Rapids
The Mother Slide
At the Top
At the Bottom
Early Morning in Camp
Refugio Cochamo
The Cleanest Water Ever...
with a View
Heading Down the
Rio Cochamo
No Room for Error
Over the Top
Classic Cochamo Giant Boulder Garden
A Brief Moment of Open Lines
Enjoying the Room...
Before it closes in again, VKG
Ready to Get Some
Sweet Boof, 3rd last drop in the VKG
Off the Launch Pad, 2nd last drop in the VKG
Last Drop in the Vertical Kilometer Gorge
Bottoms Up Kayaking < SLIDESHOW