Alps White Water Holiday – France 2026 – Sunday, Day 09 Upper Guisane

2026 08 09 Upper Guisane

The kayak run from below the “S-Bends” at Les Guibertes down to the Rivières Évasion Rafting centre in Chantemerle covers roughly 5 kilometres of classic Class II–III Alpine whitewater. This segment is an incredibly popular, playful run on the Upper Guisane. It provides a steady, continuous alpine gradient with excellent eddy-hopping opportunities, standard wave trains, and beautiful mountain scenery

We all slid in from the stony beach at Les Guibertes and were accelerated by the fast-flowing and rocky stream. We all navigated well, but there were very few eddies on this roller coaster ride. We had been briefed about the two weirs. The first, a rocky weir on a left-hand bend, soon approached. We were sped over it one by one but Richard had to take last-minute avoiding action and ended up on a large boulder upside down. As he rolled, his paddle broke in half, and he had to bail. The team soon emptied his boat and constructed the split paddle.

After a couple of hundred metres, we came across the hidden diagonal weir that has caught many people out in the past. This time all made it through with no trouble.

On reaching Serre Chevalier 1400, the river slowed a little and wound its way through the picturesque ski town. The rest of the run was very technical in the lower water conditions and very continuous, with water running around and over numerous boulders and rocks. Once at Chantemerle, we took out at the bridge with flowers immediately after the rafting centre. Once we had retrieved the cars, we had a sunny lunch on the normal grassy patch at the car park. Our B team headed for the harder run down from Le Monêtier-les-Bains and S-bends. Mark B mountain biked downhill along the remainder of the valley to Briançon.

The group of 9 now headed to the Upper Durance to paddle down to Prelles.