From Viljandi to Tohvri

I had told Aivar and Jaan that I want someone with experience into my boat. Well, they had promptly forgot it and friendly guy who was finally forcefully separated from his wife and appointed to my boat looked at my feathered paddle (you know, blades at a different angle) and wondered how it is possible to use it. Ouch. Still, they were able to leave my sight without keeling over and I decided that worrying makes it only worse. There will be plenty of experienced people around to help them if something happens.

I sat into red Golf and drove out. Just after some 300 meters there was metal bang and motor sound told me I had lost silencer. Look under the car told me it had broken in the middle. Front half of the pipe was trailing on the road, back end was still holdig up somehow. I went back to hotel and got some wire and an empty beercan. Quick McGyver fix and I was moving again, but it was clear my fix would be only temporary - we were heading for Bad Road Territory now. It was Sunday so no workshop would be open. But then again, my brother-in-law Mati is expert welder and they also have a garage where I could do a better fix if he is not at home.

So the next stop was my in-laws house in Viljandi. Mati was not at home and his mobile was out. Those girls... Garage door was blocked by his huge and shiny chopper and it took a while till we together with my mother-in-law managed to maneuver this chromed wonder to a safe place without doing any damage. And then I was repairing the car with my mother-in-law - me under the car, she handling me tools and stuff. Finally the silencer and exhaust pipe were fixed with lots of tin and wire wrapped around them. I was pretty sure it won't fall off for at least few days - and I proved correct. Even though the Golf did sound now like the abovementioned chopper, my fix worked till the end of our adventure!

Quick visit to the drugstore (people on the street recognizing my shirt and waving) and I was on the way. I found Tohvri easily and called Viktor to pick me up. We had plenty of time so we decided to meet our travellers on a big highway bridge. We went there and found two ladies already waiting. They told that dugouts had just left Heimtali some 4 km upstream as crow flies. That would translate into some 7-8 km of actual paddling, so we had an hour of waiting. Finally they came, one by one. I was immediately worried as it was now clear that faster boats were not even attempting to wait for the others. In fact, during this short distance gap between first and last boat already grew to 45 minutes. Fortunately my boy was coming nicely in the middle and his partner had clearly come to grips with the tricks of a feathered paddle. Viktor had gathered some wild strawberries on the straw and I managed to threw them to the boat in a big plastic bottle.

We now drove to Sõpruse bridge where lots of people were already waiting. Our red T-shirts made us immediately a center of attention. Locals were very friendly and also warned us that river is heavily blocked downstream, even though number of teams have been trying to clean the path. Problem is, the upper reaches of Raudna river are very-very narrow, low-water during summer and there is no tourist canoeing here. Therefore normally nobody clears the river like it is done further downstream. Organizers had been doing hard work to make the stream somehow passable and last teams had been on the river just a day before - losing a chainsaw and lots of other equipment after they encountered some oaktrees in the river. But rains had passed and water level was declining fast. So nobody actually knew what we would see on the river.

Then they came, again one by one, only gaps between boat were even bigger. Some had keeled over on obstacles, everyone had had a hard time hauling boats over the trees or doing "limbo" - worming under the trees. My boat had done fine, Lauri was dry, tired and happy, his partner was wet (it is easier to go to water sometimes, rather that try to stay dry at any cost), tired and happy. But in private conversations with "chiefs" I was rather clear what I thought about such spreading-out. Jaan was doing hard work being last himself and helping the weakest. But an hour or more between the first and last is not just rude. It is plain dangerous and if I had my say on this it was not going to continue. After yet another uber-delicious lunch we were on the way again.

It was tough going. No problem of spreading out anymore. Every few hundred metres (and sometimes less) there was some obstacle, either forcing us to "limbo" or drag the boats over. Aivar and his friend were in front with two boats, sawing and hacking while the rest of us waited, Jaan also came in from behind and helped them. I would have wanted to be there, but was forced to just sit and watch. We were at least an hour late to Tohvri, were lots of people were againg greeting us, this time including a Norwegian tourist group. No doubt, we were rather special attraction. Here in Tohvri we were supposed to have Jaanipidu, solstice party and I expected it to be rather special experience.

It was not to be - the only major disappointment during this trip. Tohvri appeared to be classical "bombhole" - ex-single-company-town destined to die out after the factory ceased to exist. We carried the fire to the party place and there was some singing, but there seemed to be no band for dancing and dominating the place were local men who obviously had been "conditioning" for the event since the morning at least. Therefore we decided that staying there could be unhealthy and possibly dangerous. We would rather have our own party. So we went back to a house where we would stay overnight, had sauna, dinner and then we obviously sang again. Sometime after midnight we gathered a small group to bring our fire back from the village party and - oh blasphemy - there was nobody there. Solstice party in the village that ends by midnight, honestly, this I saw first time in my life. The good news of the day was that my ankle was doing way better than I had hoped.