Jet Boating

As a kayaker I was never thinking about possibility to run the river with some boat with engine. Wild water is just too shallow and streams are narrow. Too many obstacles as trees, hidden stones, corners with limited visibility. Jet boat, the great machine with no screw under the water allows you to do crazy stuff even in the shallow water. The remote areas upstream are accessible at the moment and you can go further to the wild. However, it is not an easy job. It requires long time experience, skills in reading the water as well as controlling the boat as part of yourself. The principle of running the shallow water is in the flat bottom and fact, that the boat goes as higher as you are faster. That means you have to have full gas in most difficult places on the river. Trees are just few centimetres from you and you fly 50kmh upstream- the easier part. Running the river down usually takes much more skills, your speed is a sum of boat speed + speed of stream. You have to decide very fast. And right! Boulders and stones are coming and you don t have chance to stop and just wait for better moment. In the case you go out of power, jet boat is without control. Jet engine is your rudder and it needs gas. More gas, more sharp turns, more gas -more control. It is amazing experience, specially the first time. In following video there is a short part of the trip on 20mile river, Girdwood, Alaska guided by Andy Morrison, well experienced guide and for me a real pro in jet boating. Video doesn t demonstrate the real feelings but just for imagination - what is jet boating it s good.