Onward we dash – down the rapids called Shabash.

After a full day of downtime given the incessant rain, the following morning, finally, we were able to get back on the Katun. Which we were reeeaaally keen to do since, turns out, without a steady stream of outside stimuli to jolt the nervous system, modern big-city office types like us get rather down.

Another effect of the rain: the Katun’s water level had risen a staggering 1.3 meters in just 24 hours – a massive change, and not a good one for tackling rapids…

But we had no choice – we needed to get going. We packed up, loaded up, piled onto the rafts, and off we set…

First off, we navigated the Kadrin Tube (rapids) (another lively section of the Katun) without much incident. All good. Then we saw the Shabash Rapids up ahead…

Wow… The water really was much higher. We’d walked to this rock before:

Here’s a photo from 2016:

And here’s what it looks like now:

The water was fierce and intense:

As per – reconnaissance mandatory:

These rapids have two stages. The first is trickier (you zigzag left and right and have to swerve quickly), while the second is more straightforward (you just ride out the waves). You can bypass it safely on the left, but we decided to go straight down the center, aiming for the biggest waves – after all, that’s what we came for! The first stage went fine, but on the second, the fifth wave turned out to be the last for us – it gave out a sudden “pulse” (a surge of water), and we flipped over! The rafting journal put it this way: “You go down in the fifth round” )…

But before that we did have some fun:

And here comes the pulse on the right:

Over we go!… Rookie mistakes made, apparently. We didn’t have time to react or lean the right way over the edge (our guide Anatoly at the stern was showing us how, but in the heat of the moment…)

Here’s a video of this thrilling moment:

A couple of minutes later we righted the raft, everyone got hauled back on one by one, paddles were redistributed – and we rowed on. There’s no point trying to dry out in these conditions: even if you don’t capsize, you’re soaked anyway from the spray and the huge waves you have to punch through.

It gets so beautiful here when the weather’s good! Under clouds it’s not bad either, but it’s better under blue skies. To see what I mean, check out my Altai tales from 2020 and 2016. Meanwhile in 2025 here’s what it looks like:

Here’s the unusual footbridge:

Looks like it’s due for repairs (is that a supporting buttress that’s fallen off?!), but there were folks walking across it)! ->

Familiar scenery: at the top of that hill you can catch a mobile signal (from experience in previous years) :-)

And another familiar camping clearing ->

The following day promised to be another tough one…

The days stats: we covered just 38 kilometers in four-and-a-half hours, and we dropped 80 meters in elevation (now down to 550 meters above sea-level); that means that since the start of the trip we’d already descended a kilometer along the vertical!

That’s all for today folks. Back soon!…