Tucked away just outside the village of Dent this Class 4/5 gorge section runs fairly regularly with significant rain although there may be occasions when there can definitely be too much! It can become a very challenging undertaking at high flows with undercut walls and ‘boiling’ eddies. At perfect, mid-level, flows it is my Yorkshire favourite. A sensible decision can be made at the put-in: if it’s floatable and navigable it’s going to be good; however, if there’s a raging torrent, it will be full-on and the gorge will almost certainly be un-runnable. The river starts road-side around 5km outside Dent and the road follows the river for most of the run. In fact it’s only the last km that feels remote. A series of small slides and boulder rapids lead to a slightly bigger slide that right-angle’s to the left. This signifies the end of your warm up.


From here the river starts to get a little tighter and steeper with some quite significant pour-overs; nothing too pushy but a confident boof is definitely required.

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