White Water Rafting !

After skydiving, it was time to try something different and equally adventurous ! Last visit to falls hadnt allowed us to go close enough to the nature ... so we decided to get into the water and feel it ourselves ... :) ... yes ! We - 9 of us ( 8 guys and 1 brave girl) - thoroughly enjoyed white water rafting yesterday on (Class V) Skykomish river considered the most challenging river in Washington ! This was the right time to go for river rafting ... there was just the right amount of water in the river as a very little snow melts around this time (beginning of summer) ... Basically u cant go for rafting late in summer as there is too much water (then all the rocks will go under the water) nor can u go too early .. (u dont want too less water as well for obvious reasons ..) It was an amazing experience with just one glitch ... heres how it went.

June 18, 2006. Zeus gracefully accepted my requests and gave us a nice bright & sunny day ! Everything was very well planned, thanks to Akshay ! We had driving directions, food (pohe & pav bhaji which swapna had made !) .. We drove for about an hour and reached the rafting place at around 9.35am as we had hoped for. Since this was the first time for most of us, everything was pretty new .. the wet suits, helmets .. but we got past the awkward feeling of the helmet as soon as we reached the river shore ... heart was pounding really fast ... everything felt perfect to start this new adventure ..

We were about 40 - 45 ppl (including trainers) which were divided into 7 groups with maximum of 7 ppl in one group .. 9 of us got divided into 3 separate boats as 2(I was in this group), 6 and 1. They gave us safety instructions ... DOs and DON'Ts .. Then our trainer told us the commands he was going to use to help us maneuver the boat ... 3 on each side of the boat .. Each of us was given a paddle and the motions were simple, foward, back .. and combinations of that - as in "All Foward", "All Backward", "Left F, Right B" and "left B, Right F" depending on the purpose to go in front/ back or for turning in either directions ... I was in the front of the boat and on the left ..
The trainer sat in the back end of the boat and steered the boat in the right direction ...

It was easy stuff to start with .. water was calm in the beginning and there were only class 3 rapids to start with ... It felt great !! soon we were close to the very infamous "Boulder Drop" .. Before we raft thru' the boulder drop, we were taken to scout the drop ... The guide told us exactly how he wanted us to steer the boat thru' the drop and at what point do we have to turn etc .. the water was really fast around that area and there were 3 stages of that drop where water would fall down to a lower level meaning that boat would not remain horizontal !!

We spent about 10 minutes scouting it and then got back on the boat ... as you can see in the pics, it was a tough one ..

Start of the Boulder Drop

Into the Boulder Drop - Stage 1

Almost Vertical Raft !

Done with Stage 1 but now have to keep maneuvering the raft

But due to the flow of the water, raft turned in the wrong direction.
Now we have to turn it back before we get to level 2

Still no luck .. keep pushing hard .. keep working .. times running out ..

Ok. Looks like we are gonna make it .. and yeah thats me ... rightmost in the pic
sincerely paddling :)

Oops !

Oh ! I am rightmost in the snap ! Totally in air & water !! :)

Still in air :)

Back to the water level :) almost done with stage 2 of Boulder drop

Just going thru the motions .. Thrust of water is so much that what can those little paddles do !

Preparing for stage 3

Push Push Push !


Relxing time finally !

We thought we're done .. almost !

But the boat turned the other way ..

well .. nothing can be done now .. we continued to flow backwards ..

End of stage 3 !

There were times when boat was so high in air that my paddle would not reach water !! But it was fun !! Right behind us was the boat with the group of 6 of my friends ... when they went thru; the boulder drop, I think they hit a rock on the way and one of guy "Alyque" was thrown out of the boat into the water and travelled downstream pretty fast ... A single rescue team guy in a kayak and another boat pulled him over but the damage had been done by then .. he had disclocated his left shoulder ... noone knew exactly what had happened but the guess was that he hit a big rock on his way in water ... he was conscious but in lot of pain .. He was transferred to the same boat again and they started rafting first to the destination to get him some medical help ... but it was still about an hour's rafting remaining ... Alyque did a good job to just sit thru the pain during that time ...

Alyque in water ...

Hello ? Anyone there ? Please help !

Help on the way !

Boulder drop was followed by a number of class 4 rapids including Fisherman's hole, MarbleShoot, Lunch Hole etc. which splashed so much water on us that by the end of it we were completely drenched ... Our guide had been rafting for last 20 years and he had a number of stories to share ... Also the river was so scenic .. We could not capture that beauty as none of us had (dared to take ) a camera ... But overall it was great great fun !

We rafted for abour 8+ miles for about 2 - 3 hours ... Once we reached to the shore, we rushed to the nearby hospital and took Alyque to emergency (since it was sunday, no docs were available in general sections !) ... they fixed his shoulder in no time and he was fine after that ... so that was the glitch I talked about ... Hez doing fine now ... I got to know something important during this time .. A patient which needs medical attention esp a surgery etc should not be given anything to eat as that delays the effect of anaesthatia ... The doctor at the emergency section almost shouted at us for giving aluque lott of food to eat ... we thought food will help him get the energy etc .. but :( !

Anyway, so an amazing experience & a must do at least once ! I would have said that even if I were in the place of Alyque ... mishaps can happen anytime ... and I have a big history of mishaps .. so I am not worried about them at all ... If you are afraid then you should try a class 2 or class 3 river which gives you all the fun you need without anything extreme ... But if you wanna be adventurous, then class 4 / 5 is what you need ! Its great fun & pretty cheap .. this thing cost us around 60 - 70 bucks including lunch ! so not bad I say ... right ?

Do let me know your rafting experiences as well !