River Dee report. 13th June 2015

Our hopes were high as heavy rain had been forecast for Friday evening and the early hours of Saturday morning. Surely many of the mid Wales rivers would be running as we watched and heard the rain pouring down overnight. A quick check of the river levels on Saturday morning showed the gauges remained flat. John, Steve and myself were still optimistic that by the time we reached Dobbies to meet Sue & Nigel the rivers would surely have risen when we checked again, but no such luck. Loz, Andy and Paul had asked to tag along if the Conwy was running but having checked the gauges they decided to go straight for the Tryweryn. Colin ” Goose ” Medler and Keith Turner arrived en route to run the Lower T as “goose” was out for the first time in 5 months after nursing a shoulder injury. Our options were limited to the T or the Dee and after much deliberation we opted for the Dee as Sue fancied a first run of Serpent’s in her open boat. A few miles on from Shrewsbury and the roads were dry, giving an answer to why the rivers hadn’t risen ! So it was up to Horseshoe weir for the get in. The river was low probably around 2.5/3 on the gauge. Nigel and I dropped 2 cars off in Llangollen as a couple of guys from up north ( Bolton & Preston I think ! ) needed a shuttle, thankfully they were in more of a hurry than us and they left us behind ! We all had a couple of runs of Serpent’s whilst Nigel kindly provided safety. Sue ran 2 different lines both successfully and Steve rolled with great skill in the tail having almost lost his paddle ! We pondered as to whether we should run Town Falls and so continued on to the get out by the church, jumped out of our boats and went through the Corn Mill in our gear to stand on the balcony and view the lines ! After much discussion Steve and Sue both opted to run it which was a first for them both ! A beaming smile on Steve’s face said it all and Sue was unfortunate to just catch the “trip” rock at the bottom which ejected her from her boat. Kit quickly gathered up and boat drained and we were on to the get out 3 hours 40 minutes after putting on. So a thoroughly enjoyable day was had by all. And for those that like a happy ending :- the family of 2/3 day old Mallard ducklings that were swept down Serpent’s Tail and were frantically paddling around Sue’s boat in the eddy, desperately trying to get back upstream to their mom, were finally reunited, when she had the sense to fly down below the Serpent’s tail and start calling them downstream to her where she led them safely ashore.