Cardiff International White Water (Welsh: D?r Gwyn Rhyngwladol Caerdydd) is an Olympic standard white water rafting centre based at the Cardiff International Sports Village in Cardiff Bay.
The centre opened on 26 March 2010, after taking two years to build the ?13.3m venue, which is the first on-demand white water centre in the UK. The facility was designed by the French company, HydroStadium, who designed similar courses for the Sydney, Athens and Beijing Olympics.
The centre offers on-demand white water rafting and canoeing and a flat-water pond for warm-up and initial training. Off-site activities include gorge walking and surfing.
Prior to the 1999 completion of the Cardiff Bay Barrage, Cardiff Bay and the tidewater sections of the Rivers Ely and Taff were a saltwater estuary which filled and emptied twice daily with tides as high as 12 metres (39 ft). At low tide, moored boats were stranded on mud flats. The barrage converted the estuary into a permanent freshwater lake, maintained at the level of the former high tide. The shoreline of this new lake is the location of the CIWW.