Werner team member Whitney Lonsdale has been on the road in Mexico for two months with World Class Kayak Academy. WCKA is a small, traveling high school for students who are excited about individualized education, whitewater kayaking, and cultural exploration. During each semester they travel one quarter in the US and Canada and one quarter abroad. For four months they call two vans and two trailers their home as they form a small traveling tribe on an educational whitewater odyssey. Thus far on the trip they have visited the Mexican states of Veracruz and Oaxaca, exploring the whitewater each has to offer. Here is a trip report from Whitney about her Mexican School/Paddling adventure....
JALCOMULCO, VERACRUZ
Our first main paddling stop in Mexico was the small town of Jalcomulco, Veracruz. It’s a small pueblo that has been transformed over the last ten years into one of the main whitewater hubs of Mexico. There are many rafting companies and 30-40 Mexican guides and kayakers live in the town and work on the Antigua River, which flows right through town and has two main day trip sections. The lower run, which carries the name of the river, starts right in town and is a great class II-III warm up for the upper section. The river runs through a wide but scenic valley, and birds and flowers abound. Upstream of town is the Pescados section, with class III+/IV- boulder garden rapids flowing through a beautiful valley. Canyon walls rise up vertically from the river at various points on the run, and lush green jungle flora hangs from the cliffsides and rise in tangles up the valley sides. There are endless small boofs and a number of catch-on-the-fly waves and holes to keep paddlers entertained for the entire stretch, and a few harder rapids make for a little extra excitement.
The Sordo River, a tributary of the Antigua, offers the next step up in paddling from the Pescados. It is a small river with pool-drop, boulder garden rapids, offering up continuous boat scoutable action. To get to the river we had to drive our vans and trailers down a steep and unlikely road into the depths of a densely planted coffee plantation. We dropped into thick jungle growth on the short hike to the river, dodging the huge banana spiders in their webs alongside and across the trail.
We spent 10 days living this friendly and tranquilo little town and loved our routine of early morning fútbol games, classes during the day, and then paddling in the afternoon. Jalcomulco provided everything we needed for school, kayaking and life in general: easy access to the river, good food, varied paddling, a strong river community, Internet, and good coffee. We got involved with a local preschool during our stay and spent a day helping them clean up their playground area and get it ready for planting grass. In the following week the Spanish classes visited the preschool - for language exchange and, of course, good playtime.
Check back here for more on the WCKA Travels in Oaxaca soon. For information on kayaking trips in Veracruz check out Esprit Rafting.
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