Trou Blanc
We started the day with the usual struggle of deciphering our
translated instructions for the canyon entry.. mental note: Learn
more French
What should have been a 20min approach turned out to be more like an
hour.. but after a little head-scratching and much discussion, we
made it.
As we were preparing the ropes for the entry rappels, 10m to the
cliff edge then 40m into the canyon bottom, a commercial group
appeared behind us.
One of the group leaders approached and enthusiastically greeted us
in French.
"Umm, Je ne comprends pas le Franais" Our standard response,
indicating we don't understand French.
"English?"
"Yes, we are from Australia, and he is from America" Tony and I said
as we pointed to Rob who was fast disappearing over the edge of the
cliff.
"You have done this Canyon before?" the guide politely asked.
"No, this will be the first time for us"
"I think it would be better for you if you wait at the bottom and
join our group for the canyon" the guide kindly offered.
At first I was hesitant, but upon noticing that their group
consisted mainly of young French ladies how could we say no.
"No worries, we will wait for you down the bottom"
"Very good" said the guide as he hurried off to prepare his group
for the rappels.

Soon there was a small crowd of us in the depths of the ravine. The
commercial group was nine clients and two guides, plus us, made it a
party of 14 canyoneers.. a nice change from just the three of us.

..And so we set off downstream. The canyon was waterslide (toboggan)
after waterslide.
The guide's intimate knowledge of the canyon meant we didn't spend
anytime checking the depths of pools and discussing between the
three of us if this was in fact a toboggan or a rappel.. The guides,
noticing that we were video taping, would motion for us to stand
here for the best views, and send one of us down the slide first to
get the action from the bottom..

Occasionally the canyon would throw a jump or small rappel our way
but for the most part it was slide, swim, walk, repeat.. This
pattern continued all day.

After a break for some late lunch the guide informed us their was
just one rappel remaining.. Bummer, despite the fact we had been in
the water for many hours now, we were all having a blast and none of
us wanted it to finish.

We left the main group basking in the sun and followed one of the
guides over to the waterfalls to watch as he setup the last rappel.
I noticed that he had set the rope waaay to long, but before I could
question this, he had already rappelled and was swimming away at the
bottom of the drop dragging the excess rope with him.. Wasting no
time Tony jumped on the rope and quickly joined the guide in the
pool beneath the falls. I was just about to do the same when the
guide motioned me to wait
"Fair enough" I thought, figuring he must have some sort of plan.
The guide took the long rope and began fixing it for a guided
rappel.. Soon we were joined by the second guide who set another,
much shorter rope from the anchor, for us to rappel on.. It didn't
take me long to notice that the rappel rope was waaay to short,
ending less then half way down the drop. The guide who was with us
at the top of the falls motioned for me to rappel on the short rope
and hook my lanyard onto the guide line..
"ahhh, I see what's happening here" I realized their plan as I began
the descent on the very short rope. Just as my lanyard took my
weight onto the guide line and pulled me away from the cliff, the
end of the short rope shot through my descender sending me on a free
fall swing across the length of the pool. Due to the set up of the
guide-line (that went across the top of a log at the far end of the
pool) the second guide, who was attached to the guide-line, allowed
some slack into the system and I made a smooth splash down into the
water.. "Nice one!!" I said to the guide.. He just smiled back,
probably not quite understanding me, but I'm sure the huge smile on
my face pretty much said it all anyway.
(this set up is hard to explain so here's a short animation-
http://tinyurl.com/yfkoaa )


Huge thanks goes to the guides of ALPANES who were kind enough to
offer us the chance to `tag-along' with their paying clients.
Undoubtedly the three of us would have battled through without the
guides, but with their presence, things went a lot smoother and the
day was filled with nothing but good times and smiles all round. The
guides had the canyon dialed, they knew exactly which drops were
easy slides, which drops needed to be rappelled and which drops to
avoid completely. I'm 100% sure the Canyon would have been a
completely different experience if the three of us were left to
descend it on our own, as some of those slides looked very
intimidating and would have taken much investigation before we
committed ourselves to the mercy of the water.
I recall one slide in particular that looked totally mellow.. when
we arrived at this spot one guide crawled around the side and got
into position at the base of the falls, throw bag in hand. As we
each completed the slide we discovered why. At the base of the falls
there was a savage hydraulic that sucked you back in toward the
waterfall, dragged you back underwater then momentarily spat you
back out, only to repeat the process. If it wasn't for the throw bag
there would be little chance of an easy escape.

As it turned out, it was a super fun day and an unforgettable
experience. Trou Blanc was an awesome canyon.. I give it a ten out
of ten, two thumbs up, and would highly recommend it to anyone who
loves aquatic canyoning. It was possibly the most fun I have ever
had in a canyon.

==
And of course the video links (or the SPAM links as they have been
called) -
Trou Blanc Movie
Small (8Mb) http://tinyurl.com/ycu32w
Medium (60Mb) http://tinyurl.com/yf9grc
Trou Blanc Slide 1 (1Mb) http://tinyurl.com/yfktvg
Trou Blanc Slide 2 (1Mb) http://tinyurl.com/yb925k
Rappel Animation (as above) (1Mb) http://tinyurl.com/yfkoaa

Cheers,
Joe Bugden