Cotahuasi

View from the plane looking down on the Andes

The deepest Part of the Canyon

Looking down on the town of Cotahusi and the Cotahusi River

We have completed the Cotahusi canyon. The deepest Canyon in the Americas. It proved to be well worth the effort of traveling for several days nonstop. Highlights included mega ruins, endless sick rapids and massive canyon walls. It took us 3 days and our final push to the city of Iquipe yesterday was huge. We are all ok. Both Alexs suffered major stomach illness on seperate days in the canyon. Mike has hurt his wrist and John has been cruising along. This trip usually takes about five days but we boogied so that we will be better able to complete Colca canyon next in a timely fashion. The biting flies were horrendous and we all look like we are suffering from some sort of chicken pox plague. The rapids and canyons were outstanding including many sections of great continous rapids in an inexcapable Incan paradise. We stopped at a village that you can only access by mule and purchesed 2 liters of locally made wine and the 3 biggest avocados any of us had ever seen. The camping was all among terraced ruins of the Incan and pre Incan civilization as the Cotahuasi was the major trail between Cuzco and the ocean for the Incas. Our final day on the river we guess we paddled 15 miles of class four and five boulder pile rapids followed by 20 plus miles of class two and three. It was a non-stop day paddling from 7am to 6pm and we finished our trip hitchhiking into town exhausted. Our whole trip we have been able to arrange private transportation untill today when we caught our first bus. Right now we are in an ocean side town called Camana and staying in one of the best Hotels. Mike may have to leave the expedition early due to his wrist but right now we are plotting our next mission on the Colca.

Wolfgram

Team Waveski California

Once again by informing the nice people at American Airlines that our kayaks were in fact wave skis we have been able to get our boats on the plane. This has been a huge step in getting down to the Cotahuasi river. We're in Dallas right now at their free internet kiosk and have a 7 hour flight to Lima followed by a 12 hour bus ride down to Arequipa. All is good and our spirits are high. We walked all around terminal D and decided upon TGIFridays for lunch and will be boarding our next plane soon. The Alexs are getting into honeymoon mode and can't believe their choice of honeymoon destination involves no change of clothing except for kayaking gear.

Elam has successfully gotten his boat and gear on the plane headed for Lima. Tomorrow we will find out if the Alexs and Jon are able to get theirs on board as well. The suspense is building and the team is getting ready wrapping boats and preparing for a month long trip in which they will only be bringing the essentials for expeditionary kayaking. No changes of clothes, no backpacks just kayaks. This is the link to our Spot's tracking function courtesy of WET river trips. http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0pcpxPtKh2leleEan8XF4AYhJYoTFF1Cv

Peru Mission!

We're going to Peru! Alex Horangic, Alex Wolfgram, John Chin and the newest member of Mas Profundo Mike Elam, are going to kayak down some of the deepest canyons on Earth. The Cotahuasi. The Colca. Mega canyons over 10,000 feet deep in some of the most remote Andean landscapes. We're flying down the 8th of October 2013 and making it happen. With very few details planned stay tuned for one action packed aventura!

Trip Photos

Adios Chile.

Killing time in the airport

Dinner after our hike.

Another photo of our favorite volcano.

Herr drinking his booty.

So there I was.......

Leaving the land of the Futa on another ferry.

Some of the Alexs looking back at Patagonia

Walking out to look at the glaciers.

Enjoying the view see below

Fixing our only flat.

Heading Home

So after a few restful days of camping after Pucon, we have made it to the city of Santiago. Hopefully we return to lots of powder in the Sierras and real beer.  It is possible to spend months here and still not see it all, or paddle it all. There are more rivers waiting to be first D´ed then there are paddler's to first D them. The Patagonia area, which we just got a quick glimpse of looks amazing. Everyone is safe and healthy and some of us are even coming home with a little extra baggage. We will have lots of photos and more words from those better at throwing them out there. Coming soon Mas Profundo the movie. Chow

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Big Rapid on the Rio Trufultruful

Wolf helping Herr get back in his boat after a swim

Post Inferno Canyon just relaxing

El equipo, leaving to head to the airport

Crazy bag sculpture in the Santiago Airport

Dance workout in downtown Santiago

Giant fish market

Chile's finest

Donde esta el museo artea de precolumbio?

Happy New Year

We left the Futa with only one swim in the exit rapid to Inferno Canyon. Herr held on but was sucked out of his boat by the incredible force of the river. We felt very lucky to escape this high water descent and portaged the rapids called Zeta and Throne Room in order to make sure we made it to Argentina. Although, the next day we discovered that our paperwork for our rental vehichle had been sent back to Santiago, dashing our hopes of running the Rio Escondido near Bariloche. We booked another ferry to head back north and then set our sights on the Rio Michimahuida.

The Michimahuida is a 30km run that descends through 4 distinct gorges and required us to hire a shuttle driver. It was a classic river with insane views, tough whitewater and too much water. Our flows were high so we took our time making it down the first canyon through awesome boulder pile after boulder pile. In the second canyon the gradient got much steeper and Herr swam again, this time in a very bad spot. He was okay but his boat took off without him down some gnarly class five. Luckily he got out and we got his paddle but his boat was gone and we were deep in the Patagonia wilderness. The remainder of us made a slow descent down the canyon and found his boat in one piece a mile or so down stream. We went really slow the rest of the day and made it off the river on New Years eve to find that our shuttle driver had built a bonfire for us at take out. We camped and had a great dinner to celebrate the new year barely staying awake till midnight.

The next day we took the ferry back to Puerto Montt and had dinner again in Puerto Varas. While traveling and scouting rivers on our way back to Pucon, we were eating an early dinner on sunday evening when the earthquake hit. The whole place started rolling side to side and the shaking was pretty gentle but we watched our truck bounce up and down. We laughed at how surreal the whole event was. Later we learned that a 7.1 had struck a few hundred km away off the coast with little damage.

Today we made it to Pucon and are trying to sell our boats. We got our last lap on the Palguin and are planing on heading north to do some mountain climbing. It is raining really hard out right now and we want to let everyone know how much fun we are having.