To my surprise I found myself welcoming in this new year less than a mile away from where I started paddling over 10 years ago. At this party I surrounded by 1 part familiar faces, 2 parts people that I had met but couldn’t remember and 7 parts complete strangers. This, coincidentally, was roughly the recipe for the strange vodka, martini and rum ‘cocktail’ that I found myself to be drinking. It was here quite tired (after 3 days on the dart) and moderately tipsy that I found myself being introduced to the  7 parts complete strangers as “Nick: The guy who’s house always has a distinct river stench”.

While this is not a great way to be introduced to anyone (thanks Anna) is undeniable my small student house in Nottingham does have a permeating  rivery aroma to it. Most of this can be attributed to the thermals, kags and BAs that constantly drape the radiators in the vague hope of drying despite our stubbornness to turn on the heating. The rest could be attributed to personal hygiene (but totally isn’t). Some might say that this is to be expected for a house of kayakers, that this is the norm. The sad truth however is that out of the four residents I am the only paddler. But I always do my best to make up for the others by paddling at least once or twice most days.

Now one would think that after such regular paddling for many a year I should have some good stories to tell. Crazy and wacky adventures. Tales of such courage and heart that they could be the stuff of legends! I don’t. But I have gotten pretty good at embellishing the minor melodramas I have experienced which is lucky as otherwise the 7 parts complete strangers would probably know me as ‘River Stench’ rather than ‘that guy who tried to drown himself attempting to recover a go pro’.

I hope you enjoy these accounts of my misadventures and remember to remove your buoyancy aid before attempting to dive to the bottom of a lake.

p.s. Big thanks to my housemates who were all really chill when they discovered I had replaced our sofas with yet more kayaks.