I wrote a blog reflecting on my paddling one year and it has now become an annual tradition for me to do so. I enjoy the process of reviewing the year from a personal perspective as well as from the perspective of the wider paddling community. I try to include the lows as well as the highs and so here is my final blog of 2024!
Our kayaking wedding elopement!
Of course I had to start my 2024 blog by reflecting on our kayaking wedding!! On Saturday 6th April myself and Tom got married by the river Etive in Scotland. In the middle of storm Kathleen and in the company of three of our closest friends, we became Mr and Mrs Clare. We then took of the opportunity that the rain had provided to get a perfect lap on the river Coe. You can read more about it in my blog here.
Since April, I’ve had a lot of time to reflect on our wedding and spoken about it with many people. Kayaking and non kayaking friends alike seemed amazed at our ‘adventurousness’ and there seemed to be a lot of awe that we had actually got married in this way. It was a crazy and wild day but I really do think it was the perfect wedding day for us. Tom was adamant the only think he’d wanted at our wedding was ‘no people’ and I had been adamant that the only think I had wanted was it to be ‘on or in a river!’. Somehow we found a day that no only met both of those wants but was perfect for us in every way. We did have a family lunch to celebrate a month later to keep our mums happy!
If you haven’t read my whole blog on our wedding, I want to share one perfect memory of the day with you….. The highlight of this lap came just before the gorge. I was at the front and as I came round the corner on a shallow flat section, a gigantic stag stood in the middle of the river. He locked eyes with me and stood his ground. I motioned to the others behind me to eddy out and we watched in awe. The stag was calm and stayed in the river for much longer than I would have expected before running away. I didn’t take a photo but simply watched and took in everything I could for what I knew would be a lifetime memory.
As I reflect 8 months later, I know there isn’t a single thing I would have changed. It was our perfect kayaking wedding.
Losing Bren
It feels like only yesterday I was writing my 2022 reflections blog and I had included a section on the sad loss of Robert Eggleston. His death in Norway of August that year had a huge impact on the global kayaking community. Someone once said to me that the hardest thing about kayaking was that the longer you had paddled for, the more people you would lose because of it. Every loss on the river is felt acutely by the loved ones of that person and by the communities they belong to. It is not often that that loss is felt by the global community but unfortunately it does happen. In 2022, we lost Rob. In 2024, we lost Bren.
I wrote a blog about my personal reflections at the time which you can read here. In the weeks and months that followed, it was clear that the impact of Bren’s loss was bigger than anyone could have ever imagined. Following writing that article, I had countless people message me to share their own feelings of grief. There was a strong feeling in the community that people wanted to celebrate him in some way.
At the end of August, the community came together on the river Dee in North Wales to celebrate Bren. The event was organised by Palm and Pyranha who invited people to share some ‘class joy’ on a river where Bren spent a lot of time in his younger years. The Dee is a class 2 river with a couple of easy class 3 rapids on it but it is a river that many of us UK paddlers are very familiar with. Bren was a champion of being able to find joy on any class of river and the organisers wanted to share this with the community.
Both myself and Tom ended up being involved with volunteering to help to organise the logistics on the day. A sunny bank holiday weekend in Llangollen is always busy and it was all hands on deck to ensure the day ran as smoothly as possible. By 5.30pm, hundreds of paddlers from across the UK and the world, as well as Bren’s close friends and family of course, gathered at Horseshoe Falls on the Dee. Words were shared by Bren’s mum, David from Pyranha and Bren’s friend Adrian before paddlers had the opportunity to write a note and share something that Bren had taught them. Everyone then got onto the water to share some class joy from Horseshoe to Mile End Mill. It was incredible to be a part of this event and honour a very special person. Bren’s impact will be felt for years to come and it was testament to the person he was that so many people came out to honour him.
30 rivers for my 30th birthday & finding my kayaking mojo again!
In June I turned 30! Eek – I still feel 20 at heart so I’m not sure where that decade has gone! I decided in January to try and aim to paddle 30 different rivers in the year I turned 30. I didn’t manage it but I did manage to get on 20 different white water rivers over the year as well as many repeated days on those rivers and more.
More importantly I found my kayaking mojo again! In 2023 I had been quite ill and needed to take some time off the river to recover. Getting my fitness back and getting back to my normal river running active self was quite a journey in itself but I got there! I wrote a blog about the journey which you can read here. Essentially I got my fitness back, I focused on experiencing joy days on the water and in doing so I found my happiness again. I didn’t manage 30 different rivers but I managed far more than 30 river days and that meant the world to me!
Kayaking the Great Glen Canoe Trail!
I do love a challenge and in August I completed a charity challenge kayaking the Great Glen Canoe Trail to raise money for Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team. This is a journey from Fort William to Inverness and involves paddling 60 miles of canal and lochs, including the famous Loch Ness. I paddled this challenge solo although I did have my lovely Tom supporting me by picking me up/dropping me off each day. We followed the challenge with a few days of walking adventures together in Scotland.
It was a real adventure and having done very little open water kayaking before, it was a good experience in that! I became an expert at portaging a laden sea kayak around locks and no better at estimating the time it would take me to cross open stretches of water. If you want to read more about this adventure, you can do so here.
Events, events and more events!
If lockdown Del could see how many events she would be attending and organising in 2024, she would be jumping for joy! In 2020 and 2021 it felt like we would never be able to return to normal life again but 4 years later my kayaking social life seems to be thriving. I love events and would encourage any paddlers who aren’t regularly attending events to do so if they are able to because they are brilliant. They are a way to connect with others in the community, to enjoy time on the water and often to get involved in fun competitions. For myself over the last couple of years, it’s also been a way to give back to the community.
I won’t go into details of each event here but you can read about most of them in the various blogs I’ve written. Dee Fest, Tryweryn Fest, European Open, She Paddles weekends at Plas y Brenin and the Tryweryn, the Youth Freestyle League events, the summer GB freestyle academy camp and of course the Park Jam series! It’s been a pleasure to attend events run by others as well as be a part of the organising team for others. What a year it has been! Video below is a seal encounter I had whilst attending the Plas y Brenin ShePaddles weekend! I was ecstatic!
Last words
2024 is now coming to a close. It’s been a memorable year full of highs and lows. Whatever your personal experiences of 2024 have been, I wish you a very happy New Year and the very best 2025 to come. Please do comment if you have any of your own 2024 reflections or 2025 goals to share.
See you on the water in 2025!