Hey all, its about that time of year again when I do my annual tubing trip - who is keen? Actually might do two this year - a trial trip down the hutt gorge next Saturday (10 Dec), and another attempt at the Otaki from Waitewaewae in January (maybe even the Waiohine to Totara Flats if get really keen).

If you haven''t come across tubing before, its where we find a fun bit of river with lots of rapids in it and chuck ourselves down it on top of inflated truck tyre inner tubes. 

For next Saturday you will need to sort your own wetsuit (beg, borrow, buy a cheap one from the warehouse/trademe or hire from a dive shop). A wetsuit (of the long sleeved, legged variety) is pretty essential as you'll be in the river for 4-5 hours and depending on weather, hypothermia could be a real risk otherwise. I'll try and pick up some tubes from somewhere, but feel free to get your own. Beaurepairs Kaiwharawhara seems to be the best bet for this, they will give away their old ones for free - try for 16 inch truck tyre tubes.

We'll sort out transport and other details at the meeting next Tuesday, but please email me if you are interested at patonomatic@gmail.com so can get an idea of how many tubes we need. If the weather is shite on saturday we'll use Sunday as backup, otherwise postpone until another time. 

And we'll try not to get rescued like these guys http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/6045312/Drunk-teens-went-down-Hutt-River-on-lilos :) Obviously we'll need to drink more than they did... 

Cheers