I’ve never eaten so much in my life, the chefs on board the Princess of Scandinavia ferry are definitely a force to be reckoned with, their smorgasbord utterly defeated us.

We were on our way to Norway, our team of twelve included 10 student’s of Exeter school; Harry, Joe, Will, Ben, Nick, Adam, Ben, Bear, another Ben and Rob, ranging in ages from 18 to Rob, the baby of the group at 16. And white water veterans Pete Scott (our physics teacher) and Dan Owen of Outside Edge.

After 36 hours of travel we arrived in the Sjoa region – 6 hours drive north of Oslo – To a warm welcome in the form of Ed Cornfield who was to be our guide and mentor for the duration of our stay. We were living in three log cabins on the bank of the Lägen, just 5 minutes from our Kayaking base, the “Sjoa Adventure” centre or as we liked to call it, “Ed’s place”.

Our warm up to the week was the Sjoa play run, a popular choice among rafting companies due to it’s large volume and continuous class 2 and 3 rapids. It’s called the play run as it includes many notable play spots, Microsurf and the Jorgan wave to name but a few. We would return to the play run twice more during our stay as the water level went up considerably on day 5. On our final visit to the Jurgen wave it was firing, the level was perfect and according to Ed it was probably the best wave in Europe at the time. Shame we were all completely knackered by then!

We ran a number of different rivers, practicing our leadership skills on some of the smaller, technical sections. Ed was a fantastic guide, allowing us to do most of the work for ourselves and stepping in now and then with useful suggestions. We ran the upper section of the Ulla, what seemed merely a stream would often and suddenly give way to incredible rockslides or photogenic waterfalls. Most of which had an easy line which we largely were able to pick out by ourselves on inspection. We ran almost every drop, portaging only a grade 5 rockslide with a 7 metre waterfall to finish it off.Only 4 days in we were deemed ready to face our biggest challenge yet, the mighty Åmot gorge. A canyon below the Sjoa play run of continuous grade 4 and 4+ rapids. Each was tackled expertly by the group, first scouting from the bank, a quick prayer to the river gods and then running the river with protection in place. Nearly all of us ran everything, Bear and Adam portaged one drop only to have the even greater struggle of fighting through the forest. Ben Gough was the only bailer on the descent, despite a valiant effort. Maybe next time he’ll get the right line!

The rivers in Norway were incredible, the crystal clear water provides a whole host of rivers ranging from those suitable for mere beginners to those for the insane river boater. Each adrenaline fuelled day was expertly tailored to our needs by Ed and certainly gave us the most exceptional paddling that any of us has ever experienced.

It seems that Trews weir will struggle to compete with such world class boating and I for one am sure that I’ll wind up back in Norway some day in the future!

Ben Straughan

Norway 2005