Skip to content
header image

Blog

Categories

Santo domingo river

Posted: 04.09.2013 by Aniol Serrasolses

It has been a long time since I saw some of the first photos of the Santo Domingo. Ben Stookesberry and Jesse Combs on their epic first descent of what is probably the steepest kayaking section of the world.

There’s nothing similar to see the photos of a place than to experience it by yourself, so when I heard that River Roots (Rush & Rafa) where planning a mission down there I was really excited to go with them and be part of it.

The crew posing with the Santo domingo valley behind! Such a wild and beautiful place!

Van from hell cleaning day!

We have done 3 rounds down the Sto. Domingo and they have been totally awesome. The put-in is under a bridge so you don’t even have to walk to get in, there’s a few class IV rapids before getting to the steep section starts. Then you got 2 options, you either run “Angel wings” or make a rappel down and start before the “Dome”.

The problem with those drops is that they’re so close one from each other that In case of getting injured or getting ejected on the first one you will probably end up swimming the next rapid wich will be insane and would hurt a lot…

GoPro shot of the Dome

all stoked at the bottom!!

love that view!

After that the river follows with a 20 foot slide. Then you have the “Tobogan” wich is a super steep and fun 60 footer slide where you always get mad speed!               

The final drop you can run it in 3 different places, straight and tight 40 footer on the right , or the main line in the middle wich has a really fun entrance into the drop, all of them are good to go but be aware of sticky holes at the bottom, might be a good place to hold on your paddle at high flows. After the last waterfall the river gets way bigger because of an affluent coming from the right.

Mattie B the boss slaying shots with his Red cam !! A 40 thousand dollars camera can you imagine losing that thing???