Intermediate Packrafting Course

Day 1

The course departs central Queenstown at 8am and together we'll make our way up to the river. Given that we'll be looking for some more challenging water, we might need to retain an element of flexibility in terms of the section of river we use in order to find one in the best condition for training. Day one we will spend on the more challenging section of the Rees, then day two we'll move onto the Matukituki.

The first day will be about warming up, understanding everyone's levels and practicing some of the perishable rescue skills. We'll make our way down stream working as a team, set up some drills and making some challenging moves to put into practice some more essential grade 3 skills. Things like cross current momentum, stroke timing and managing our impact with various river features. 

Day 2

We'll be using a rapid closer to road end so that more time is spent working on river skills, splitting the rapid into sections, using Eddys to control our decent, setting rolling cover and using cross current momentum on some more challenging water. This is all about team work and it's the practice of the dance we do with others on the river!

Typically we're off the water and back in Queenstown around 6pm on the second day. 

Equipment

We encourage people to bring as much of their own equipment as possible so that they get used to the gear they will use in the real world. However, we understand this is a "try before you buy" for many people and folks may not have gear yet. We are very happy to supply equipment for a nominal fee. The reason we charge a small fee is to encourage students to take ownership of the equipment used during the course and mitigate against the occasional loss and damage of our kit. This nominal fee ($40 per day) can be used as towards any equipment purchases made through us after the course.

Rescue Elements

It's worth noting that this course doesn't cover more intermediate rescue skills. Whilst we will certainly brush up on some foundational skills, the rescue skills needed to move into being a more competent grade 3 paddler are covered on our WRT-Rec courses. These can be arranged any date, provided we have a minimum of 4 people.