Bashkaus River

The Bashkaus ( _ru. Башкаус) is a river in the Altai Republic in Siberia, Russia. It is a left tributary of the Chulyshman river, which flows into Lake Teletskoye (Ob basin). The length of the Bashkaus River is 219 km. The area of its basin is 7,770 km².

It is widely considered on of the most challenging river for white-water rafting in the former USSR. In Russia, it is known as a Class V river. This means that its technical difficulty, i.e. the difficulty in navigating it in a raft or canoe, is high (as compared to the International scale, which works in reverse) while its remoteness or distance from assistance in the event of things going wrong, is also a six (Russian Scale of one to six.) Hence, the Bashkaus is anecdotally ranked as the second most difficult river in the former USSR to raft or canoe, behind nearby Chulyshman River. The Bashkaus river was first kayaked in 1992, by a group from Ireland. There was an apparent attempt in the previous year which was unsuccessful.

External links

* [http://kayakussr.com/index.php?page=bashkaus Kayaking in Russian Siberia - photos, videos and river descriptions]
* [http://kayaking.ru/en/rivers/altai/bashkaus.htm Kayaking in Russia]