Rafting the Rapids on the Nile
While working in Kruger National Park I knew that there would be many dangers to deal with on this expedition. Whenever I'm working in Africa I always have to remind myself to not simply get caught up in the majestic beauty, but also keep a sharp eye for the many dangers all about, like lions, elephants, buffalo, crocs. I'm always prepared for these dangers and my Nat Geo film crew takes every precaution when working in the field. We are all well versed in working around dangerous animals and have decades of experience between us, yet on this expedition we all found ourselves grossly out of our element and in one of the most dangerous situations that I can remember.
Our mission on this expedition was to capture a number of Nile crocodiles and attach satellite transmitters to them enabling scientists to monitor their movements. We were working in a very remote part of the park, in an area called the Olifants Gorge, a massive canyon cut out by the raging Olifants River. The good news was that the Olifants was filled with big crocodiles affording us lots of opportunities for captures, the bad news was that it was extremely difficult to get down the canyon walls to the rivers edge. There was only one place to enter the canyon, and that involved scaling a very steep bank down to the river, therefore we had to pack everything on our backs making the descent a perilous journey. Owing to the difficulties of the situation the only boat that would be able to utilize in this remote area was an inflatable....never ideal when capturing sharp toothed crocodiles! This was our only option making us all a little uneasy. Adding to our anxiety was the fact no one had EVER floated this section of the river in a rubber raft, and there was only one way in and one way out.
Once we pushed off we were stranded on the river until we exited the canyon many miles down stream. If something went wrong there could be no rescue, and to make matters worse, this section of the River wasn't a lazy slow moving stretch, but rather a frothing whitewater flume cutting through sheer rock walls on either side. Man, this was serious whitewater!! As we stood around I asked who among the crew had whitewater rafting experience, and all I heard were crickets chirping!!! No one had any experience, and these were dangerous rapids filled with crocs and hippos.
To say that we were all a little uneasy is an understatement. Man you could cut the tension in the air with a knife. Nonetheless we piled into our small dingy and pushed off, letting the jaw like canyon walls quickly swallow us up. We hadn't been in the water a few minutes when the first set of rapids grabbed the boat and literally had its way with us, setting us into a dizzying power spin. We were out of control which was scary, but the situation became gravely dangerous when my producer yelled HIPPO! Directly in front of us was a mammoth of an angry hippo and we were whirly gigging right towards him. Everyone in the boat screamed as we desperately tried to back paddle against the swift current. Our efforts were futile and we were on top of the hippo in a flash. Thankfully this big boy submerged and let us pass. Hippos may be the most dangerous animal in Africa, especially when you invade their turf (like in a big rubber boat).
Surviving the hippo was a relief but I quickly realized that we had many miles ahead of us, no way to turn back, and most likely hundreds if not thousands of hippos we would have to survive. We were all scared but had no choice except to continue. The float may be best described as a comedy of errors as five groan men frantically tried to learn the ins and outs of whitewater rafting while being thrown into life and death situations literally around every bend. Talk about trial by fire. Man, this was a suicide mission.
Over the next many hours we battled countless sets of raging toothy rapids that threatened to swallow our boat again and again. We floated over, into, through, and around more giant angry hippos than I care to remember, and at the end of each and every set of rapids were dozens of massive crocodiles lined up across the river with their mouths agape. The crocs seemed to be waiting for us to fall overboard in the rollercoaster rapids, a hippo to capsize us, or the boat to simply sink at the hands of so many neophytes, resulting in a quick and easy lunch. Yet, somehow, someway, unbelievably, the miracle of all miracles occurred, for we survived the gauntlet of death, and made it through the canyon arriving at our take out spot!
The stars were obviously aligned to allow five rafting rookies to navigate an inflatable raft through countless dangers and successfully log the first ever descent of the raging Olifants gorge in a rubber dinghy!! Its not a feat we plan on duplicating anytime soon, and we collectively decided that we would all retire from the rafting world with this single title under our belts!
p.s. we didn't catch a single croc that day.....
p.p.s the crocs didn't catch a single one of us that day
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