Paddling the Rio Micos - Monday

The group included paddlers from the Eastern USA and one from France. I had paddled with several in the past. There was one young women who was a newer paddler, who may only paddle the easy sections.

 

They took it very slow on this short section of continuous waterfalls that ranged from 7’ to 30‘. There were really no rapids only a big drops and then a pool. Some of the drops were easy slides, while others required sliding, maneuvering and boofing the last part of the falls. Tom explained the boof stroke and the landing position which was different from what I was accustomed to. He made sure all the paddlers could do a few rolls on each side before we began.

The water level was much lower than last year. The first run took over 2 hours. The group took a short break, loaded up again and the second run took only about one hour. We broke for lunch and I decided to rest since after lunch some of them ran the river 2 more times. It is a spectacular river visually, Turquoise waterfalls and dense jungle vegetation.

After all the big falls there is a private park where the locals or tourists swim or canoe in the pool below the falls. There are many food vendors and paths to see various views of the falls upstream.

The rest of the way back to camp the river breaks into multiple channels and series of small drops and for another 1-1/2 mi.