Mexican Bachelor Party

By Nick Troutman

Mexico has some of the most amazing creek boating I have ever done,
and being that I was getting married in Mexico, I though that a week
of creeking before the wedding would be a great little bachelor party.

Clay Wright, Eric and Dane Jackson, Trevor Clark and myself along
with our trusty guide Alex, and driver Jose travel around Mexico
hitting up some Mexican classics such as the Alsesseca and Agua Azul.

We started odd with an unexpected pick up from my little buddy Rafa.
It was a pleasant surprise being that we didn’t have anyone planned
to pick us up. We packed up our kayaks, paddles bags, and more people
than seatbelts, and headed out for some quick tacos before bed.

The next morning we got up at 6:00 and had Alex and Jose there
waiting for us with their Giant van. From Mexico City it took us 5
hours to get to the put in of the ‘Road Side section.’ We went pretty
sow our first run scouting and taking pictures. It was a great warm
up run, with a couple great rapids like the crack and S-turn.

Next we decided to run the newly famous ‘Big Banana section.’ This is
one of my favorite runs, being a pretty easy run, with some great
drops on it like the 40 footer silence falls and meat locker.

We ended up doing two days on the Roadside section doing some sprint
runs as fast as we could. We also did two days on the Big Banana. The
first time I ever did the Big Banana was for the first descent run,
which took us three days, by our second run of the trip we did it in
2 hours and 15 minutes, and we could have gone quicker. I also got to
run a couple personal first descents like the huck and jump off the
40 footer which was really fun, the right line on meat locker which
went really well being that it was low water and the log wasn’t as
much in play, and we also got to run the big ugly gnarly hole after
meat locker. The levels were extremely low, though it was fun because
it made the runs new again for me, and it opened up some lines that
are virtually impossible at higher water.

From there we headed down to the state of Chiapas, another Mexican
kayaking mecca. We drove for a days and a half and finally arrived at
the Agua Azul. The style of rock is pretty amazing. We were able to
run down some really fun slides, and actually walk straight back up
the river. The sediment filled river somehow made the edge of the
riverbanks extremely slick, though the riverbed itself was grippier
than any rock I have ever seen. My favorite rapid was 20/20 which is
two 20 footers in a row, that you could walk back up through the
water and run again.

In the end I had by far the coolest bachelor party week anyone could
ever ask for, I ran some super fun runs great rapids and a couple
good shots of tequila with great friends, not much more a guy could
ask for.

Nick Troutman