This was one of those weekends you can do two things: try to keep up with study or get out there to paddle some rivers! So when the national news showed big rain and flooded rivers in France, the decision was easily made. A phonecall away our team of 5 was driving to the Cevennes in the south of France. The Cevennes is part of the  ’Central Massif’  and is rarely visited by kayakers as only a few times a year mother nature gives us enough rain to make the rivers runnable. It’s home to rivers as the Haute-Tarn, Dourbie, Jonte, tarnon and many more of which some are probably yet to be discovered.

For I just made my drivers license two weeks ago driving there all the way from Holland was already a big step ahead. Entering the area early in the morning we were welcomed by these beautiful autumn colored highlands which we were sure was home to Asterix and Obelix times ago. To confirm this a wild bore crossed our road and hunters were seen often, sweet!

Arriving in Pont-de-Mont-Verde we noticed the water wasn’t gone and it would actually take a few days to make the upper sections runnable. So first two days we spend paddling the lower Tarn and the Tarnon to get used to our creekboats again and get ready for the famous Haute Tarn. The lower Tarn is a beautiful volume rivers and some say it’s california style which I can not confirm as I have not yet been there..;-) The Tarnon felt like the Belgium Ardennes which means it was shallow and every 2 meters a rock would change you direction and actually just a few rapids where worth the run.

So after this two days the Haute Tarn dropped enough for us to do where we came for, explore this famous river! It’s a perfect run with many little drops, slides and beautiful whitewater not much found. Unlucky it rained at the start so we left the camera behind, and then after an hour the sun showed up! It was a beautiful day and we were stoked to do another river the next day, so we decided to extend our trip for one day and paddle the Dourbie.

The Dourbie is in the middle of nowhere and a low volume creek with both gnarly drops as clean lines. The road there was in dense fog with only a view of 10 meters but once in the boat it was all good with clear views and even a little sun. This area still has a lot to offer so we’ll be checking to waterlevels to get back to the Cevennes and explore more rivers! Now back to some ocean paddling of which I’ll try to report some day as well;)