White water Nepal
by Peter Knowles
Second edition 1999 completely revised.
320 pages, size 210×134mm (8″ x 5″)
Printed in two colours (black and blue ink),
12 full pages of colour photos.
100 maps, hydrographs, river profiles, photos.
Drawings by local artists, cartoons by ‘Foxy’.
Published in the USA, by Menasha Ridge Press, ISBN: 0-89732-321-1.
In the U.K, by Rivers Publishing.
ISBN: 0-9519413-3-X.
Recommended retail price £18.95 or $28.95
Sample
Summary
One of the best class 4 kayaking rivers in the World - continuous, exhilarating whitewater with magnificent mountain backdrops. Recommended for expert kayakers and rafters. Note that a new dam is being built at Phaliya Sanghu - this will ruin the Marsyandi for kayaking and rafting - so run it whilst you can.
The River
The Marsyandi rises on the northern slopes of the Annapurna Himal, flows east through an arid valley around Manang, and then swings south to join the Trisuli river at Mugling. Marsyandi means “raging river” in local dialect, and this aptly describes it. Some of the river above Ngadi has been kayaked - The 1980 British Expedition started from Tilicho Lake at 4920m - but much of the upper river should probably be considered as unrunnable.
The scenery is magnificent, with every bend of the river opening up fresh vistas of some of the World’s highest mountains, but these are behind - as someone said “great views but you need rear view mirrors”. The Marsyandi is a photographer’s dream - the water is usually a clear turquoise blue, there’s these huge, fantastically sculptured boulders, some spectacular white water, green valley sides, and a magnificent backdrop of the World’s highest mountains. It’s worth mentioning that although the valley has a rough road up it, and is quite densely populated, you don’t see this when you are paddling because the river is incised about 100ft into the valley floor.
The lower Marsyandi gorges from Bimalnagar down to Mugling are an excellent river trip but a dam was built some ten years ago to generate electricity for Kathmandu and so the water flows on this lower river are unpredictable and now mainly limited to post monsoon. However, we include some short notes at the end of this description.
Rafting
This is a fantastic, exhilarating run for the expert crew.
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Kayaking
Get a group of deviant, smelly, international kayakers together in a bar and ask them “which is the ‘world’s best river?” - and right up there on most people’s list of classic rivers will be the Marsyandi. This is our favourite river and we’ve run it most years since 1983 and it never palls. Here’s a few typical quotes we’ve collected from other paddlers over the years: “A jewel of a river”, “A read-runnable playground”, “Liquid madness”, “Like good sex”
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Access and logistics
The road up the Marsyandi used to be` known as “the death ride from Hell” and notorious in the annals of Asian travellers - 26 people were killed in one week in 1996, in two separate accidents as a bus and a lorry slid off the road and crashed down the hillside. However all has changed as the road has been improved for the proposed dam so it now only takes 2-3 hours from Dumre to Besi Shahar.
Undoubtedly though, the pleasantest and safest way to travel to the river is to trek to Khudi over the ridge from Pokhara in 3 days. Guy Baker describes this as “Best trek I’ve done in Nepal - awesome views”. This trek crosses the Madi Khola (see description) at Karputar and so a really deviant idea is to do a two day paddle on this river as a warm up.
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Description
Ngadi to Besi Shahar 11km, Bhote Odar 13km, Chepe Khola 13km, Bimalnagar 15km.
Note that because the rapids are mainly boulder ones, you can expect these to change from year to year with new ones being created.
From Ngadi to Khudi is the hardest and most challenging section of the river - continuous class 4+, very pushy and there is almost no respite. There are no sections at less than class 4. In the words of Gerry Moffat “If you’ve got any doubts - then don’t even think about it” - enjoy the scenic trek up to Ngadi, leave something to look forward to on your next trip, and maybe take some photo’s of your mates getting trashed! The first rapid ‘Instant Kharma’ sets the standard for such rapids as ‘Mama’s Big Butt’ below the bridge at Bhul Bhule.
Khudi offers a welcome respite with a green campsite and pleasant riverside lodge. (If you’re
looking for more entertainment - the Khudi Khola has been run by several paddlers from a few km upstream.) The first rapid just below Khudi is appropriately named ‘Good Morning’. This can be fairly daunting and in some years may be class 5, but below here the river relents a little and is mainly class 4 with some evenly spaced, big bouldery rapids at a class 4+ level.