Reliving the safari

One of our brave non-finishers is back in the boat and back on the San Marcos and its bringing back some serious memories. Conditions this year look horrific, fortunately they are using a sensible boat which hopefull portages somewhat better, as there is a lot more portaging to be done. All the crew from the GB Challenge effort want to send best wishes to James, his wife Charlie (team captain) and his fellow paddlers Jean-Marc & Simon. Its looking like they are going to be out for a full third night which is not something I would have fancied but I am sure they can do it. For more info you can see their blog at http://abudhabicamels.blogspot.com/

Estates Gazette

Mmmm, finally noticed in our own country in the form of the mighty Estates Gazette, the trade paper for the property industry.

The stars pay their dues...

Not a very big star in Texas but a legend in the world of Cricket, Australian spinner Shane Warne is seen here with team captain westy, and the 'engineroom' TC (Ok, we cornered him and asked for a pic).

Fundraising update

It looks as though we have finished up raising very close to £15,000 (US$30,000) combined for our two charities, this has exceeded our pre-event target so thanks a lot to all who sponsored.

Captains Log Part One

Tales of the Unexpected - A Captain’s blog

“We need a skipper. Someone we can rely on, trust profusely, is highly organised and has quite exceptional motivational chat.” This was the teaser I was faced with around closing time one Thursday night in the local by Will Sykes. Timing your moment is key and after consuming just a few light ales that evening Team GB had their skipper for the 2007 Texas Water Safari.

6 months later I was on a 10 hour flight to Houston, Texas. My brief simple; Provide logistical support to a team of 5 Englishmen (sorry AK – 4 Englishman and a Welshmen) by rendez-vouzing at up to 13 different meeting points down the San Marcos and Guadelope rivers over the course of 4 days. The next few paragraphs are an overview of the Captains role at various check points in the wacky races of canoeing…..

Day 1

Starting grid – Team GB are in the zone and sure as hell look the part. The Yanks are clearly a little apprehensive. Has to be the kit! I walk through the parade of spectators chin held very high…. I then had a moment of panic and uttered a short prayer. Please don’t capsize on the starting grid and get mown down by 100 canoes (I had seen two quite spectacular efforts in practise)! Did they – no! It was sheer professionalism so much so I didn’t even have time to finish my latte before the team had rounded the bend and were on their way to navigating 262 miles.

Cottonseed rapids – A big crowd gathered for this one. Word of Team GB has spread amongst the Texans as I arrive (after a fine breakfast I may add) and people started to approach me. I’m asked for the first of 1000 times why we’re here. “We’re here for a charity fund racer” I say. “That’s awesome man” says Brad. “And you’ve come all the way from England?” says Kara. “Yes” I answer. I then hear my first “whoaaaaaaa” as Brad high fives me. I was disappointed it wasn’t a “yeeeha” but I wasn’t going to mention that. Cottonseed rapids were indeed treacherous and had caused chaos for dozens of boats including the Cowboys 6 man canoe to get ripped in half! I waited patiently reassuring the crowd that Team GB would conquer these rapids no problem being total experts in the art of white water rafting. It was then I saw them. The moment I had been waiting but alas Team GB had portaged 100 yards away and had opted not to navigate them. I was very disappointed.

Luling Dam – Luckily I’d met the boys here during training or else I would have struggled, having first gone a little out the way to visit Walmart and buy 150 gallons of water and a few kilograms of ice. It was then I realised that I was nothing short of a mule as I power lifted a crate of water and ice 150 metres to the waters edge. “Are you the Team Captain for the British Team” asked Rory. Not wanting to state the obvious that I was hardly a groupie I politely informed him I was. “Man you’ve got the hardest job in the world. Make sure you’re always there cos in this heat (it was 33 degrees and 90 % humidity) those boys will need y’all to be there or they’ll never finish. Don’t miss a check point!” I was now worried as well as exceptionally pissed off that he didn’t offer to help.

After a 30 mins wait and being quizzed again as to how we heard of the race, where we’d come from and what we were doing there Team GB finally turned up! Boy was I relieved. 7.5 hours in and they were in remarkably good spirits. It was time for the exchange as I provided ice blankets and water. See you at the next check point they yelled! It was in 5 hours time. Not being in a rush I then had a beer with Sandy, Betty, Smitty and Ronny. I needed it! This was shaping up to be a very surreal yet very amusing trip!

Gonzles Dam – It was by now dusk and the huge crowds had gone. It was clearly now time for the professionals. Deck chair out I was again camped out waiting patiently and consuming a “cold one” when the boys arrived. I had been there 3 minutes. No rest for the wicked as I transferred over more water and ice.

Again, there spirits were up and their was no doubt they would conquer the World’s toughest canoeing event. I re-assured them that they were the peoples choice and they were indeed canoeing for England and the Queen. The crowd looked perplexed but I was touched when a group of kids said we love Team GB.

Palmetta State Park – It was now dark and the whole race was now buzzing. This was awesome largely because it was dangerous. With the water at the highest levels for years the bridge was now a few feet underwater where in previous years a 4 feet gap would allow canoes to pass under. First up a tandem attempted to portage in the middle. This was not the way to do it as one guy got sucked under by the current and was taken under the bridge before resurfacing 20 metres downstream. Whooooooooooaaaaaaaaa he went. I didn’t blame him. Although life-threatening that was a true crowd pleaser.

Team GB arrived. They looked startled. Definite fear in their eyes and it was hardly surprising having heard the other experienced crews explain how the river was tougher than usual with more log jams and other debris in the water. One chap even said he saw a roof top! They took a well deserved a rest and asked about trouble ahead. Monkey island I told them. Avoid monkey island.

Luling Highway 80 – 4am – How I got here I have no idea. I must have gone up and down a deserted pitch black road for an hour until I saw a solitary flashlight by a bridge and made for it. Having then traipsed through the undergrowth encountering poison ivy and swarms of mosquitoes I realised why this checkpoint had been avoided by the other more experienced captains. 1.5 hours later and several beers later with my new found friend and co-drinker (James C Jefferson – who informed me in Texan how he was actually English) Team GB came round the corner. The surprise of seeing me in the middle of no-where did not go unnoticed.

About this Blog

Hi - given that the event has been and gone, we are probably not going to be adding much more to this blog but want it to remain to remind ourselves what we did, and why we did it. For the what we did, this blog works best by starting at the bottom and working your way up. For the "why we did it", we turn it over to Will, as he was the driving force in the planning stages. He recalls:

Over a few pints in early December a couple of us touted the idea of undertaking an endurance event to raise money for charity, the following criteria was set to help decide on the chosen event

1. Uniqueness - needs to be random and preferably pointless
2. Teamwork - or else I'm giving up at the first hurdle.
3. Difficulty - needs to be very challenging and dangerous (somewhat)
4. Travel - needs to be far enough away so friends and family can't come and watch us fail miserably
5. Charity - has to be different from your usual fund raising events and needs a WOW factor with a bonus of improving AK's bar chat.

We spent a few weeks scouring the web and adventure magazines for an event that met the above criteria until came upon this article in Forbes magazine and our challenge was found:

"Texas Water Safari, a three-day, team canoeing adventure that runs 262 miles non-stop along the San Marcos and Guadalupe Rivers from San Marcos to the Gulf of Mexico near Corpus Christi. Founded in 1963, the palm-blistering race has its share of wet and wild challenges, including steep drop-offs, swirling dam currents, treacherous water moccasins and occasional canoe-crunching log jams.
Legend has it that back around 1962 Frank Brown and Bill “Big Willie” George decided to take their “V” bottom boat, without a motor, from San Marcos to Corpus Christi. They accomplished their mission in about 30 days and decided that other people should have the opportunity to experience the same journey. So in 1963 they set up the first Texas Water Safari. The Safari is a long, tough non-stop, marathon canoe racing adventure, which traverses 260 miles of challenging rivers and bays. Although the rate varies from year to year depending on water conditions, in previous Safaris as few as two teams out of sixty starters managed to reach the finish line. Many participants enter the Safari with no intention of winning, but with aspirations of joining the elite group of finishers and earning the coveted Texas Water Safari patch. Entrants must have all provisions, equipment, and items of repair in their possession at the start of the race. Nothing may be purchased by or delivered to a team during the race except water and/or ice. During the Safari, teams may not receive any assistance of any kind except verbal (or water). Teams must be prepared to travel day and night, non-stop to be competitive, but teams who occasionally stop for sleep have been able to reach mandatory checkpoint cut-off times and cross the finish line by the 100 hour deadline. The drop out ratio can be as high as 95%." - Forbes March 2005

Further research dug up similar articles, including a 1999 Houston article which led with " The Safari tests brains, strength, endurance and the willpower to persevere when you're puking out of your boat. And pissing in it." I hope this blog provides some amusement and tells a good story.

Rare picture from day one!

Our collective thanks go out to Fain Zimmerman of Victoria, Texas for capturing and forwarding this picture. We are going to be following up with Fain to see where it was taken - our guess is that it must have been near the start because our clothes are dry...

Workin' nights

The best and worst parts of the course were definitely the nights, best because it’s a different feeling, its not 95F, and the stars are beautiful. I say worst because we were not all that comfortable being on the river and yes, we were a touch nervy. We did two nights and its hard to say which was worse, probably for me it was the second because I was so tired. There were five times that whilst pausing between strokes I momentarily fell asleep and would pitch to one side, waking with a jolt that would nearly tip the boat. By the first night when we were still five man crew we made some good time relative to other boats, it was fun to see another light in the distance and slowly reel it in stroke by stroke. There was a horrendous checkpoint on night one which was incredibly dangerous. It’s a broken road bridge that always would have been low to the water but has now all but collapsed, the water actually flows over to top of it in the middle section – how it has not been completely washed away is a mystery to me. Anyhow, we got there after doing some of our best paddling, as we pulled up there was an aluminum boat trapped sideways against the middle section, we came in on the right where the current was less intense and Sykes, being our stroke (the guy at the front) jumped out onto the bridge. My memory is hazy but somehow we ended up with Millsy holding onto the bridge with his legs getting pulled by the current under the bridge, good for us that we had picked the slower current but it was still pretty strong. We got through it, a combination of him pulling himself and Sykes dragging his shoulders was enough but it was definitely a scary 30 seconds and did not look good at all from my vantage point (remember that we are allowed no help from outside, there were plenty of people on and around that bridge watching - to accept help would be the same as quitting). We were told that two canoeists had gone under the bridge and come out the other side okay which is great, but you certainly could not take that for granted. There were plenty of bits of wood and of course the bridge itself that you could knock yourself out on. Once the boat was on the bridge it had to be turned 90 degrees and then dragged up a hill just so we could have a 5 minute break, replenish our water and take in more protein powder. The re-entry to the river was done from the other side of the same river and that too was hairy, just because the current was so strong. This section definitely added to the unease in the boat and to compound this, almost immediately after the bridge, around the first corner we had the first of two capsizes that were completely avoidable and self inflicted, just bad decision-making (it really did not take much to tip the boat with five in it). The problem with the capsizes is not so much the time lost, it was that in the wrong place it was just bloody hard work to get the boat righted and drained. Wrong places were basically anywhere with too much mud or current (both present in the tip after the bridge), or in the second case too shallow so that you have to lean down and twist a 35 ft boat that's full of water and lift it above your head to clear the bilges. In the right conditions, say four feet of water with a solid river bed you could get started again very quickly after a tip, just bend down, put the boat on our shoulders and lift it just a foot. Regardless, this was energy that should have been used to get us down stream but instead was going on pointless tasks and I think it was this section more than any that led to millsy & james starting day two with not much left in the tank, either physically or mentally.

The Finish Line Charge

What a feeling, Team Captain Westy, Mills & James gave us huge support as we came through the final stages of the river run but the quirk of this race is that it is so darn long! It definitely helps to have that support and we put a big effort in as we went under the bridge, the last time we would our teammates and the other crews until we got across the line. The other thing adding to our momentum was that we wanted to be able to see the bay before it went completely dark, in the end something we failed to do. This led to a slightly fraught run across the bay (which when viewed by day is MASSIVE) but we had a GPS and I was paddling with the whistle and distress flares tied to my vest… It also occured to us that it might be an idea to practice fitting the spray sheet beforehand too, we ended up doing it for the first time & in the dark as our headlamps had gone walkabout. The final section, 6 miles or so before the bay was one of our favorite sections, the sun was setting and it wound through a flood plain where people were going about their lives, having barbecues and most of them gave us shouts of encouragement as well. In truth, the scenery for a lot of the race is pretty linited, the power of the river in recent years has cut away huge chunks of the river bank leaving a sheer channel most of the way down – we would often think what might be on the other side but we could never tell. Anyhow, job done and it was a wonderful feeling getting to the finish.

The Finish Line

Just to let all of you know that they have finished as of about 40 minutes ago. Am expecting a final update from one of them soon. Congratulations!

Saltwater

We have met the guys at Saltwater and they were doing really well and we have some footage of the guys which really reflects the TWS and our trip (I will reformat to mpg to circulate). We planned to meet them at a footbridge and suprise them and play The Final Countdown. Fortunately we had the wrong boat and refrained from jumping out from the bushes as I don't think us making them capsize would have gone down well and the crowd may well have turned on us. We then met them on a footbridge 8 miles from the finish line and showed them the beers and promises of hot showers, bedding and cool doritos for Sykesy with 'Jerusalem' in the background. 'For the Queen.........and Wales' was the last thing we heard from the boat as they paddled off into the night and took on the final hurdle......

Final bulletin to follow........

Excuse for being late!

It could be the oddest and questionably funniest quote from a Texan so far. One of the team captains was explaining why he was late for a checkpoint and this was his excuse:

"I had some blueberry desert last night and was shi**ing like a tied coon''. The guy saw the bemused looks on our faces and kindly expalined that when a racoon is tied up it panics and tends to defecate upon itself. Not exactly sure why you would tie up a racoon but there you go...........

Cleaner updates to follow

Celebratory Curry

Brilliant quote from TC - He just got off the boat at the checkpoint and saw the steward who is Indian (the only Indian chap we've seen since arriving) and asked him if there was a curry house where we could have our celebratory meal. Although bemused given the situation, he was quite impressed that we'd celebrate with curry and beers!

2 checkpoints, 23 miles to go

Great news, the guys have reached the penultimate checkpoint before Seadrift. Words really can't describe how well they're doing-104 miles in 25 hours (53 hours since we started), 23 miles to go and it's 32 deg c. The 23 miles to go includes 4 log jams and the bay crossing to the traverse. The bay is waist height and they will need to put a splash cover on the boat to stop the waves entering the boat and weighing them down but they are very determined. We will be playing the national anthem and saluting them, singing with a tear in our eye as they get near to the finish line, spurring them on.

Tell Wallsy to have his chequebook at the ready........

The champagne is now officially 'on ice'.

Victoria

The guys have just reached Victoria and have had some rest and are in good shape. Sykesy has a blister but they sound well and completing the race is a very strong possibility. In fact,if I owned a house, I would bet it. They now have 60 miles to go but the current should help them out. We will see them in 27 miles and send another update then.

Fog

We are currently waiting for the guys at a stop before the checkpoint at Victoria. There has been heavy fog hence guys have stopped as visibility is poor. It's probably good that they have breather as the portage after the last checkpoint was difficult. We had to portage a massive log jam in the dark yesterday eve so think the guys will eat any futher log jams up for breakfast.

The locals have taken to our kit and there has been talk of us winning the unofficial best dressed category - not exactly as prestigious as the GQ award but better than a kick between the legs!

100 miles to go

Westy met the guys at Cuero 236 which is 160 miles in and their spirits were still high and TC's night time checkpoint entry Tarzan impression is still as funny as when he first did it and completely beguiles the locals! The deadline for that checkpoint is 10pm today so we are still maintaining great time and have under 100 miles to go. We have just received some invaluable information about the last hurdle,the Bay Crossing which we are going to update the guys on. Dauman, Westy and I are heading to the next checkpoint armed with water, ice and some cracking motivational banter. At the moment I'd say there is a good liklihood that the guys will finish the race but the next couple of hours are very important.

I don't think I explained why Dauman and I left the boat - Dauman suffered from heatstroke and my exit was planned - basically my role was to 'Beast it' until we had broken the back of the race and then leave. Dauman's heatstroke has left him somewhat jaded but after numerous litres of water he's now back to 46 percent and rising. More illliterate updates to come.

Update from Sunday evening

Millsy here. Just to let you know that Tim, Sykesy and Al are still flying the flag and doing everyone proud. We are currently in 61st place which is fantastic and the banter on the river has been great - although AK has been taken exception to us being an English team. There have been a hell of a lot of 'Helll yeahs, Yeah haws and good to see y'all' much to our amusement.

Dauman, Westy and I are waiting for the guys at the next checkpoint and reports from the people in front of them are very positive.

AWOL

We haven't had an update from the boys since yesterday morning but for any of you who may be concerned they were still alive and in progress at 6:50am this morning after what looks like a 2.5 hour nap! At the last checkpoint they were coming 51 out of 101 teams, though over a dozen teams have already dropped out. Hopefully will have news from them when they cross the finish line sometime tomorrow...


Sykes is quoted pre-race in the San Marcos Daily Record:

One crew that doesn’t have near that experience is the unlimited five-man British crew, who hadn’t seen much of the River past Palmetto State Park before the start of the race. In fact much of the race will be full of surprises for the British.“It might take us more than a year to finish,” crew member William Sykes said. The British raised 30,000 dollars for charity by doing the race and will compete in a boat that won the TWS in 1998, part of Bugge’s fleet. As for the Brits’ token attempt to convince Bugge to ride with them, it was short lived. “He took one look at us and said no way,” Sykes said.

Strange Fish

So its 6.30am on safari day, I woke up dreaming that we had completed the race before it even got dark - somewhat unlikely but it would be nice. Last night saw the guys enter the kitchen to focus on our food, although i use the term loosely. Each paddler has been divvied up a large stash of ziplock bags, each containing 500 cals of nourishing powder which gets mixed with water, yummy, we are to aim for around 350 cals an hour, something like that. Anyhow, on that riveting note I am going to hand over Westy, our team captain, to post a few further updates during the safari. I am told that should he fail, you can also track us on the main event website. The picture here is of an Alligator Gar, I am told we are going to know these fellas fairly well by Sunday morning - apparently they get dazzled by the lights and frequently jump into boats. Fantastic.