Shoalhaven - Greater Horsehoe bend to Badgeries lookout

International Australia / New Zealand
1

Hi All,
My mate and I did a 3 day trip last weekend on a very scenic stretch of the shoalhaven.
As luck would have it some good rain in the upper shoalhaven catchment let us combine fishing and whitewater making for a great trip!

The Hillview Guage dropped from 0.76 to 0.69 during the trip, their was plenty of water early on but it was getting a little low on the last day, still we managed to bump and dodge our way through with only the odd portage. The rapids I would judge as mostly great 2 and were no trouble for my friend who was packrafting for the first time. There was only a couple of grade 3 rapids which my friend portaged and single grade 4 called the washing machine due to a fierce suckback according to the canoeing guide, it didn’t look too bad at the low level but we portaged just to be safe.

Here a are a few pics from the trip, most of the whitewater and hike im/out was captured on the helmet cam, we hope to put a short video together in the next few weeks. The river is enclosed by the steep sides of the river valley, some great views as a reward for a challenging hike in and out.

Thanks to Duncan for some helpful tips on access!

Cheers,

Gus
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2

Hey Gus,

Great pics. Great to get a trip in before the long winter!

J.

3

Great work Gus, very jealous mate. Did you catch much?

4

Well done Gus. Looks good. Jealous as was hoping to get up that way last week but instead bailed due to lowish levels and went climbing at Araps instead. :slight_smile:

Would be keen to hear about how easy/difficult access was as have only accessed the Shoalhaven at Sewell’s Pt (very difficult due to private property gates) or Oallen Ford previously.

Cheers, Mark

5

Cheers, yes we caught some bass, saw a few large carp, it’s worth taking a rod along on this section of river.

Mark, access wasn’t difficult, but required some homework, the starting point was searching for some previous trip reports then Duncan helped with the trail in, a call to national parks to confirm as some gates on the topos are marked as locked when in actual fact they are not, Shoot us a pm and I can try and dig up the name of the trail we went in on.

Gus

6

Sent you a PM Gus,

Cheers,

Chris