Having only tried paddle boarding for a total of three hours in the past, Stefan and a mate decided to dive right in (thought luckily not literally) and SUP the Thames source to London.. as you do! Here Stefan recounts his SUPing journey from Lechlade to Putney Bridge.
SUPing the Thames Source to London is quite random, what was the motivation behind this adventure?
My buddy is an experienced stand up paddle (SUP) boarder and had always wanted to do a multi-day trip on his inflatable board. I’d only just taken my first lesson on a SUP, but decided that this should be sufficient to prepare me for our trip(!)
SUPing is a fun way of doing long distances immersed in nature, usually without having to make a massive effort and exhausting yourself – or at least that’s what we thought!
How did you plan your experience? Did you do any specific preparation or research?
Research
We spent many hours searching official websites like the Environment Agency, Port of London Authority, as well as news sites, blogs, YouTube videos and sports associations, for literally any advice on how to travel the Thames from source to London in a way that is purely human-powered rather than engine-powered.
Topics ranged from: ‘Is it safe to use ankle leashes while SUPing on rivers’ (answer: no), ‘do you need insurance to paddleboard the Thames?’ (answer: yes), ‘do I need a permit to paddleboard the Thames?’ (answer: yes) and ‘SUP accidents and fatalities’ etc!
We also did more general research regarding a wide range of topics ranging from ‘fauna & flora along the Thames river’ (did you know there are seahorses, sea lampreys, 2-metre-long catfish, and the odd seal on the stretch of the river we were paddling?), ‘When does the sun set in London in October’, ‘Best waterproof headlamps’, ‘river lock etiquette’, ‘how do river locks work’, ‘river lock accidents UK’, ‘how strong are currents on the Thames?’, ‘how many people die each year on the river Thames’ (answer: 1 per week).
Fortunately I have a mate who’d done the trip the previous year with his inflatable SUP, so his advice was invaluable. He’s a distinguished athlete and experienced adventurer. My trip partner and I, not so much!
That being said, we decided to do our trip in 8.5 days and not the 6 days that he took for the trip. We also opted for B&Bs instead of wild camping.
We learned the relevant rules of the Tideway Code, which apply to the tidal section of the Thames and are more complicated than we had imagined, and learned the general traffic rules for the Thames.
Planning
We planned our trip meticulously about two weeks before the first segment started.
On a spreadsheet we listed all locks from Lechlade to Putney, showing the distance between them, the estimated time on the water with and without so-called portaging around the locks. We noted landmarks to look out for and dangers, like weirs, etc.
Source to sea or source to London usually means that you start at Lechlade, about 35km from the actual source of the river. This is because further upriver, it quickly becomes difficult to navigate even on a SUP as it’s just too shallow.
When it came to booking B&Bs, we tried to get them as close to the river as possible, in order to avoid having to carry the boards over longer distances on land. As there are not that many B&Bs close to the river, and many had already been booked out, our daily distances for the full days ended up varying dramatically, anything from 16.5 to 38.5km (10 hours of paddle boarding, not counting 2.5 hours of breaks).
On average it was going to be 24 km per day.
Sounds like some meticulous planning! Tell us about your journey:
To optimise our limited annual leave, we decided to split our trip into three segments: four days at the end of July, three days in September, and 1.5 days in October (all in 2021).
As mentioned, like almost everybody who does the Thames source to London, we decided to start our trip in Lechlade. From there, we followed the river for about 200 km all the way to Putney Bridge.
We began our journey on a Thursday evening, travelling by train from London to Lechlade with our gear. We had big drybags with all spare clothes, gear and everything required for four days on the water – and a few snacks.
Because I struggled so much to stand up on the board the first time around, I had bought a dozen kickboards and a luggage strap. Kick-boards are made of super light-weight Styrofoam and kids hold on to them when they learn how to swim. I would later on use the luggage strap to bind together the kickboards to form a provisional seat.
We spent the night at a tavern in Lechlade, then got up at sunrise.
Typically, an issue with the valve of one of our SUPs delayed us by an hour. Add to that the time it took to gobble down a huge breakfast, check out of the B&B, inflate the boards and strap all our gear safely to it, it was 8am when we actually lowered the boards onto the water and set off.
The weather forecast predicted the hottest day of the year so far, at 31°C. We made good progress for the first 20 km or so, but then the relentless sun and heat got to us. It seemed almost impossible to drink enough water to counteract the water we lost through perspiration.
There was no shade on the river. The water reflected the sun, so we got roasted from all sides. There was no escape. Neither of us had ever paddle-boarded for more than three hours before. So the longer we were on the water, the more tired we got.
Our muscles were sore and despite taking electrolyte powder with our water, we could feel our legs cramping.
We decided to continuously paddle for six hours, before taking a late lunch break at a pub which we found on Google Maps. After a big lunch and a few shandies, we noticed that the afternoon heat was even more ferocious than what we had experienced so far. In the end it took us ten hours on the water (not counting two hours of breaks) to reach our exit point.
We then deflated our boards, packed them up, and made our way more than 1 km uphill to the B&B we had booked.
If walking uphill with heavy gear wasn’t bad enough, my SUP backpack ripped open on two opposite sides, almost over the whole length! This meant getting out the spare elastic baggage straps and trying to do a temporary fix. Items kept falling out of the backpack, requiring frequent stops to pick them up. It took us almost an hour to cover the distance!
To top it all off, the B&B had stopped serving food by the time we arrived and the village shop had closed. Disaster. This meant we had a few of our muesli bars, then a couple of drinks at the bar, before an early night.
The next morning, we somewhat repaired the backpack and returned to the river for day two of our little adventure.
Throughout the seven days that followed, there were a few highs and lows, but we never regretted our decision to go on this trip.
On that note, tell me about your highs during your SUPing trip
For the first hour or two each day, we were usually the only people on or near the river. With very few exceptions near villages or bridges, it was perfectly quiet and still, apart from birdsong and the occasional splash from fish jumping out of the water.
Sometimes you don’t see any signs of civilisation for long periods of time. No houses, just trees, kingfishers dashing through the sky, red kites circling, giant dragonflies hunting.
Aside from the faulty valve and broken SUP backpack, did anything else go wrong?
There were a few minor equipment failures, however there was one epic disaster we encountered that I’ll never forget.
Looking for an easy way to get as close to Chertsey train station as we could, we made the ill-fated decision to leave the river Thames and do a ‘short-cut’ via the Abbey River from Penton Hook Lock.
At first everything looked quite doable. A rather small stream, but not too shallow. But the further we progressed, the shallower and narrower the stream got, until it was at times no wider than our paddleboards.
On some stretches it widened to several metres, becoming extremely shallow. Then it narrowed again and became deeper. There were trunks of fallen trees and branches of bushes blocking the way.
On one such occasion we had to get off our boards to try to lift them over a bunch of thick tree branches, and our hearts almost stopped. The mud below our feet felt more like quicksand, we immediately sank in. Luckily we both managed to hold on to our boards. We felt that we had progressed too far to paddle back to the Thames.
Unfortunately, we thought we were much closer to the train station than we actually were. After more than an hour of miniscule progress on the tiny Abbey River, we reached a section with a steep hill to our right.
We could hear the voices of other humans and some dogs barking. So despite the fact that the hill was covered densely in nettles and thorny bushes, we made our way up to the top and back down again on the other side to a walking path, and all with our heavy gear.
With both of us wearing t-shirts and shorts, our arms and legs looked like we had been extras on the set of a slasher horror movie! It took us forever to get to a road and to phone reception.
We called a taxi and it took the taxi a quarter of an hour to reach the train station. We had gone way off track!!
Wow, what an event packed journey! How did you feel upon completing it?
Arriving at our finish point, Putney Bridge, and celebrating with a few shandies at the local pub next to the river was a very memorable moment to us both, let’s say that!
What two items could you have not done without and why?
I’m very pleased I had my provisional seat with me. My knees gradually got better during the trip, but it was still a blessing to be able to switch between standing, sitting directly on the board with a backrest, and sitting on a seat. I think it definitely helped me in avoiding cramps and a sore back.
Also my 8L running backpack. It was a convenient way to always have my valuables on my person, plus some water and some snacks. So even in the unlikely event my buddy and I both would have been separated from our boards, we’d still have been able to get back home safely.
Looking back, is there anything you would have done differently?
It worked out surprisingly well, despite me having done a mere total of three hours on a board before the trip!
That being said, if I could choose again, then I’d practise paddle boarding properly before going on a multi-day trip.
What advice or tips would you give to someone looking at doing the same?
SUPing the Thames Source to London can be done by anyone with basic paddle boarding skills, a reasonable level of fitness, and solid swimming ability. The latter is important should fall into the water at a section with strong currents and underwater obstacles. Just make sure you know all the risks.
It’s also important to not overexert yourself in terms of the length of each day’s section. For example, we would have been better off not having any sections longer than 30 km during our trip.
We had initially been expecting to let the river do most of the work. It was a huge surprise when we learned that there is very little current in the Thames. In fact, we regularly observed leaves floating upriver pushed by the wind against the negligible current!
Even during extended rainy periods with a relatively fast flow, you’ll still have to do most of the work yourself.
Whenever the current would be fast enough to let you get away without paddling or with very little work, the river is officially being closed to either all boats (‘red boards’) or all un-motorised boats (‘yellow boards’). This happens surprisingly often and there were occasional red and yellow board warnings while we were on the rive, fortunately not the sections that we were paddling down at the time.
And make sure that you have plenty of food and drink for the day with you. Especially on the upper sections of the river. There are days when you might not pass by any open shops and the only five pubs you pass by are all closed (happened to us).
You can follow Stefan’s adventures on his Blog Berkeley Square Barbarian or on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook!
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What a fun time. Good prep work you did too, making for a more seamless experience. I walked up and down a decent chunk of the Thames daily in the Chiswick area; I saw rowers and quite a bit of rowing training going on during those Spring months. What a gorgeous area in general.
Ryan