French Alps 2018 paddling trip
Day 3 The Upper Gyronde by Hannah Bellamy
We had a leisurely start this morning, and after a good breakfast of fresh baguette and a few loads of washing we headed off to the Upper Gyronde about 10am. We stopped at the bridge at Les Vigneaux to have a look at the level and confirm our plan for the day and decided that rather than do a 500m portage to continue down to the campsite we would paddle the Upper Gyronde on the morning, get out at the bridge and the Upper Durance in the afternoon.
The river is quite fast moving and technical with lots of rock ‘gardens’, a perfect warm up for the Ubaye planned for tomorrow. We split into smaller groups of 3s and 4s to give each other lots of space and off we went. We paddled our own lines around the rocks, watching out for each other and eddy hopping to keep the groups either side in sight. A few sneaky rocks caught a few of us out but all in all it was a great section of river, very different to the bouncy wave trains of yesterday, and enjoyed by everyone.