Waikawa Stream

Last weekend I got offered a free ride back to Levin, so I left freezing cold Rotorua in search of a warm fire and some nice hot meals.

Stupid me didnt take my kit, thinking nothing would flow while I was down there. And although we got more hail than rain we still got a fair dumping and Jason, who was super keen to go run something, managed to sort me out some kit and a Bliss-stick Smoothie from Colin Mac.

After we drove all the way to palmy to find that Kutas wasnt flowing we headed back south and jumped on a extremely low Waikawa. I had run this creek once before in flood and thought it was pretty sweet, but wasnt quite sure about the flows today (they were only slightly higher than normal flows).

After you put on you get about 500m or so of grade III boogie water before you get to this rapid:

This drop has a fairly strait forward lead in into a tight squeeze down a slide and a small drop at the end which you fly off.

Jason on the slide.

Me hitting the hole at the bottom of the slide.

The car rapid: A 250m boulder garden containing some pretty tricky moves and a great big nasty log which requires sliding down a bony chute to avoid.

Scouting the car rapid.

After the car rapid you come around the corner to a sweet rapid called Boof City. This rapid has about four sweet small boof drops ending in Boof Falls, a small but awesome waterfall which gives sweet pop off the lip.

Me boofing in boof city.

Jason on the first drop in Boof City

Me - Boof Falls

Jason airing it off Boof Falls

Boof Falls from below - This picture does not do this drop any justice whatsoever!

Typical small Waikawa drop, the river is filled with continuous drops like this.

We portaged this rapid because there is a tree stump stuck in the left side which looked a bit sketchy, right side is full of rocks.
The drop is much steeper than it looks in the photo.

Sliding in after the portage.

Mini slide.

Pretty rooted on the walk/run for the shuttle.

Boulder garden from the shuttle road.

Looking good!

Now this is the real way to climb fences.
I should know, I grew up near farms...

Stoked to see the car.

We put on where the green cross is. As you can see its not a hell of a lot higher than low flow, so it can be run quite alot of the time. And only 10mins away from Levin!