By Todd Balf
It was once the final word whitewater event at the Mount Everest of rivers, and the largest problem in their lives....
October 1998 an American whitewater paddling workforce traveled deep into the Tsangpo Gorge in Tibet to run the Yarlung Tsangpo, recognized in paddling circles because the "Everest of rivers." On Day 12 of that journey, the team's ace paddler, one in all 4 kayakers at the river, introduced off an eight-foot waterfall and flipped. He and his overturned kayak spilled into the guts of the thunderous "freight training" river and have been swept downstream, by no means to be obvious again.
The final River: The Tragic Race for Shangri-la is a panoramic account of this ill-fated excursion, a desirable exploration of what propelled those kayakers to tackle the seething massive water and dangerous Himalayan terrain of the private gorge on this planet. This used to be the mystical Shangri-la of legend, a 140-mile-long canyon framed by means of 25,000-foot snowcapped peaks, a spot of unbelievable good looks known as Pemako in historic Buddhist texts that was once rumored to include vast waterfalls.
At the shut of the 20th century, an end-to-end descent of the gorge crammed the imaginations of a few of the easiest boaters on this planet, who observed within the foam and fury of the Tsangpo's rapids the last word whitewater problem. For Wick Walker and Tom McEwan, severe whitewater pioneers, top buddies, and journey leaders, the Tsangpo experience with Doug Gordon, Olympic medal-winning paddler Jamie McEwan (Tom's brother), and Roger Zbel was once the end result of a twenty-five-year quest. Fueled by means of narratives of early explorers, Walker and McEwan stored their dream alive and waited until eventually the chinese language govt opened the gorge to Westerners. With monetary backing from the nationwide Geographic Society, the crowd used to be eventually reliable to move in 1998.
Swollen to 3 instances the dimensions that they had anticipated due to list rains and heavy snowmelt, the Tsangpo lived as much as its fearsome recognition. On various events the group wondered even if to proceed, yet selected to press ahead. The final River probes past the intense activities clichés and appears on the advanced own and highbrow purposes for the possible impossible to resist draw of Tibet's nice River. For Walker, Gordon, Zbel, and the McEwans -- husbands, fathers, associates, and brothers -- the Tsangpo wasn't a run towards demise yet a party of existence, experience, and the item that tied them to each other -- awe-inspiring rivers. The final River can be a riveting trip to at least one of the world's wildest and so much captivating areas, an exhilarating publication that invitations us into the Himalayas of Jon Krakauer's vintage, Into skinny Air, yet from a wholly new standpoint -- on a historical river so distant that merely the main hardy and romantic souls try and liberate its mysteries.
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Additional resources for The Last River: The Tragic Race for Shangri-la
Example text
Rescue has become our only hope. But that hope too has now been dashed. The Siberian wind rifles through our exposed stance and we huddle together and wait. Blaise Agresti In the afternoon I met the families of the two climbers, along with Anne Sauvy, the mountain writer, and her husband, John Wilkinson. I explained to them that we held out little hope. I drew a diagram on the board in the PGHM meeting room explaining the position of the two men and the difficulties which we were having in rescuing them.
I muttered something about too much black pudding for breakfast and being not just spot on. We piled into the car once more. The morning was clear and, as we drove back to the outskirts of Fort William, somebody brought up jocularly 48 the amount of petrol that the car was gobbling. We turned off on the Glen Nevis road and drove up the single-track road to arrive at the car park at the head of the glen. Here the Water Slab, which cascades down the south side of the Ben, sparkled like liquid tinsel in the morning light.
The food is long gone, water only a memory. We are fatigued with cold and stiffened with inactivity. Rescue has become our only hope. But that hope too has now been dashed. The Siberian wind rifles through our exposed stance and we huddle together and wait. Blaise Agresti In the afternoon I met the families of the two climbers, along with Anne Sauvy, the mountain writer, and her husband, John Wilkinson. I explained to them that we held out little hope. I drew a diagram on the board in the PGHM meeting room explaining the position of the two men and the difficulties which we were having in rescuing them.