I can thoroughly recommend the Tryweryn Fest to anyone considering the event for next year. Loads of events, reliable whitewater, shuttles, showers, food, and party time. What more could anyone want?

I was proud to come in second place in the Extreme Boater X event, and to thoroughly lose the even more extreme cardboard boat race.

Super thanks to Wave Sport, AT Paddles, Canoe and Kayak Store, and Paddlers First for keeping me floating, propelled, warm, dry and merry throughout. Roll on next year!

Thank you to David Steen and Iain McConnell for photos.

It’s not exactly the most glamorous of kayaking locations and you’re never going to win any gnar awards at Cardiff International Whitewater Centre (CIWW), but over the years I have grown to love it. Here are three simple reasons why it’s the place to be:

Dirtbagging from time to time will have its own attractions, but in the end, sometimes you just want to relax with a conveyor belt to carry you back to the top of the course, a lovely hot shower, a cup of coffee, and a bowl of hot soup in the café. I’m all for enjoying the wilderness, but if you’re going to paddle in a concrete river in the first place, then you may as well make the most of your urban location. 

So CIWW will never have the attraction and the cult following of the sacred Dart or the Fairly Glen, but it still has a lot to offer, irrespective of your paddling ability. Why not give it a go sometime, even if only for the Ronnie Time!

Again, this isn’t for everyone, but I have found it really rewarding using my website as a paddling diary this year. I am constantly reminded of what an amazing year I have had, and how fortunate I am to have spent it doing incredible things in incredible places with incredible people.


So there you are, a range of New Year’s Paddleutions for you. When you choose your own, make sure you personalize it, truly care about it, and want to put the time and effort into achieving it. I may well have lost weight since January 2014 but I don’t know, and frankly, I couldn’t care less. Don't let your Paddleutions follow this all-too-common pattern.

Finally, don’t get disheartened if you fail. I always enjoyed Samuel Beckett’s quote, “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail Again. Fail Better.” Perhaps you miss your time frame or your resolution is unrealistic, keep working at it. In the meantime, look back at all of the other amazing adventures you have had that year. You’ll probably find that you haven’t really failed, you’ve just been too busy fulfilling your other dreams.  

It's been a great 2014. Wishing you all a happy and paddle-filled New Year!

Thank you so much to Wave Sport Kayaks, Adventure Technology Paddles, Canoe and Kayak Store, Paddlers First, and Surf Plugs for your support this year.

So if you love the gnar and you haven’t been to Gnarway, you had better get planning. It is, without a doubt, the most beautiful country I have ever visited and is home to some of the most varied, continuous, exhilarating and scary rivers on earth. I will eagerly await my invitation.

Italian paddling is famed for that perfect combination of food, drink, sunshine and whitewater, so when I got the chance to spend a week in Valsesia at the beginning of June, I couldn’t resist.

Fortunately, over the next few days, the paddling went much more smoothly with clean runs down the Lower Sesia, Gronda, Sorba Slides, Mastelone, Alpine Sprint, Egua, Sermenza and the Landwasser Waterfall. It quickly became apparent however, that the River Gods were replacing our boat-based carnage with a bit of bank-based and kit-based carnage. 

I put in a strong entry for the carnage award by climbing down a bank that I would never be able to climb back up in an attempt to rescue the Shewee I had dropped. Not in the history of mankind has anyone managed to waste quite so much time using a labour-saving device.

Overall, my trip to Italy was exactly what I wanted it to be: a holiday; a warm-up for Norway; and most importantly, a right laugh. Thanks to everyone involved for showing me such a good time and to Wave Sport and Canoe and Kayak Store for all of their support.

"It was a blue sky Chilean day for the 2013 Palguin events... Chile’s Rio Palguin is South America’s most run steep creek for good reason. The Middle and Salto Palguin sections attract top pro-kayakers and wannabe huckers to fantastic clean drops at all-you-can eat heights. A series of class V rapids keep the huckstars challenged."

"The events began with the Giant Slalom Women’s division. Great Britain’s and PKH guest Natty Cordon with broken foot crutched her way down the canyon as fellow Brit Tony Becker carried her kayak. Natty would notch a clean first heat run while her United States competition Jessie Rice would miss the hard to make second gate taking a 50 second penalty. After Cordon crutched her way out of the canyon exhausted she decided to stick with her clean first run and the pressure would be on Rice to clean her lines. Rice did clean her lines to win the giant slalom and Cordon would finish her day with a silver and later the 70 foot drop of her life....

...Congrats Natty for being a badass and having great lines."

The following morning, the 'jet lag' was so bad that many of us were very tired, had sore heads and couldn't seem to walk in a straight line. Thankfully, we managed to get all (or most) of the larger out of our systems relatively quickly and were ready to hit some stouts!

We spent the next couple of weeks boofing big on some epic rivers, going deep on the 70 footer on the Middle Palguin, rubbing shoulders with the big boys, consuming many beverages and preparing ourselves for the carnage of the Pucon River Fest.

Following the start of the fest, a big night at 'Beanies and Bikinis', and some questionable behaviour by some of the group, it was time to race!

The pressure was on as I was out of the gates first, but I placed a time of 2 minutes 20 seconds which put me second place in the ladies competition, and more importantly, second place in the British competition!

This was my first attempt at slalom, but won't be my last... as long as I can find other races with waterfalls in the middle.

After the race it was time to head for home but I know I will be back. Thank you so much to Team Chile for all of your boat carrying (or boat bitching as it's affectionately know) and to Pucon Kayak Hostel for an epic adventure... I will be back...