Six guides, all of whom still go out on their days off
Two guides on every trip, which is expensive and is not negotiable.
Untamed started in 2008 with one guide and a borrowed minibus. There are six of us now, all wilderness first aid certified and re-certified every two years, and every trip goes out with two of us regardless of how many people booked.
Trips are capped at eight. Ten would be more profitable and we tried it for a season in 2014; the trips were worse and the guides hated it, so we stopped.
About one enquiry in five ends with us suggesting a different trip, usually an easier one. We would rather lose the booking than spend a day helping somebody off a ridge they should not have been on.
- 2008
- 6
- 8
- 2 yrs
The guides
Andre Blake
Started the company in 2008. Has been up the Peak more than four hundred times and still goes on his days off.
Simone Palmer
Runs the paddling trips and the swift water rescue training for the rest of us.
Wayne Douglas
Cockpit Country and everything with a camp in it. Carries the heaviest pack and never mentions it.
Kadine Rose
Makes the telephone call when somebody has booked the wrong grade. Has never once had it go badly.
What people say afterwards
Read all the reviewsThey rang me before confirming because I had booked a grade too high. Right call.
Two guides for six of us and one walked at the back the whole time.
Never paddled before. Nobody made me feel stupid about it.
Grade five is genuinely hard. Believe the page.
Tell us the hardest thing you have done and we will tell you the right trip