The River Wild

Early wake-up. Ate breakfast, broke down tents, packed up. Headed to The River Company for 9:15am white water rafting trip. Going to be a good day. Fitted for life jackets, on the bus, up the Salmon River 20 mins to launching station. We are the only ones doing the kayaks. Chad and Mike are sitting about 2/3 the way to the back of the bus. But not far enough to escape the sounds of the guide snickering when one of the passengers asks if anyone is doing the kayaks. Interesting we thought…

Bus pulls into the launching station. Guide stands up, barks instructions, then directs the two kayakers to meet up with Talara, another guide for ‘extra instruction’…gulp. Talara is a strong woman. It is likely that she, after her rafting days wrap up, could travel with the circus going town to town displaying her skull crushing ability with her shoulders. This is a SLIGHT exaggeration. Those observations were made from afar. Turned out she was incredibly sweet, extremely knowledgeable and, you’ll see shortly, VERY helpful on the water.

Just after a quick trip to the potty to pass the chicken skewers, we were on our way. Group pics, more instruction, safety commands etc. This river run consists of mostly class 2 rapids with two class 3 rapids at the beginning and the end. The higher the class the more intense. You get the point. The class three rapids are called ‘piece of cake’ and ‘the narrows’. Please keep in mind that Chad and Michael have never maneuvered a white water kayak before and the ‘piece of cake’ is right, and I mean right out of the shoot. Little time to get comfortable. For safety the kayaks are to remain at all times between the other rafters. Also keep in mind that some of the larger rafts were controlled by the guides…the passengers just going along for the ride. For a visual, one raft had a man with one leg and a man who was no younger than 75.

Chad is slightly ahead of Mike approaching ‘piece of cake’. Here we go! 4 seconds into this venomous class 3 rapid Mike is tossed like a cork!! Total dunkage. Head comes up, mouth open swallowing white water, left hand mercifully hanging on to the kayak, right hand grasping for the pad at my knees, legs kicking like a dog for two reasons; one to get back in the kayak and second to brace for rock crushing boulders in the water. By the 3^rd attempt to get back into the kayak, Mike noticed the photographer on the shore smiling and snapping away… Finally back in the kayak to the cheers of the head raft!

A bunch of class 2 rapids follows then the whole group is pulled to shore for additional instruction. We are approaching a long class 3 rapid…’the narrows’. The guide says: “400 yards, stay LEFT at the Indian Head Rock” Chad went right! Chad now behind Mike as they approach ‘the narrows’. Mike looks back with great focus after his first debacle as Chad is seemingly twiddling his thumbs with confident ease…

Chad’s Account:

Rapids approach…pondering how warm it feels as the sun beats down on the dry kayak. Wave comes right, wave comes left, bow of boat dips down, then up suddenly over my head. Water cold. Genital screaming. Disorientation. I look left; the kayak is with me but upside down. Reach to flip it over as my mind screams ‘oh shit!’ Grabbed random strap, boat now right side up. I pull myself in. Dam that cold. I look around, sunglasses still on, looking upstream; I am sitting backwards in the boat! Quick pivot on my skinny ass. Now I’m good. Paddle? Here it comes on right but I can’t reach it. People on the bank above scream, ‘dude there goes your paddle’. After a 100 yards of free floating downstream. I doggy paddled to the side. Guide tells me to keep floating downstream and grab a spare paddle from the next raft. Raft number 3 hands me a paddle and bus driver lady says ‘thanks for the entertainment’. I tell Mike to stop laughing.

Mike’s Account of Chad’s dip:

Halfway through the rapid Mike looks over to see a Chad paddling mightily with his hands and a paddle floating at the same speed to his starboard! It appeared that Chad was sitting backwards. What the F$@K! I scream to Talara who quickly blows here horn, gets the ENTIRE rafting expedition to pull to shore and organize a paddle hand off.

Break for lunch.

Mike: How did you know you were going over?

Chad: When I saw the boat above my head I knew.

The lunch was great. The River Company staffs a full-time chef. Curried chicken, rice, salad and mixed vegetables. Chad and Mike appeared to be the only ones shivering. Back in the boats. 2 more miles of class 2 rapids, no problem. Back on the bus. Thanks Talara.

Bus ride home saw a pick-up truck on the road with no left front wheel! The one-legged man in the front of the bus was telling the guide he saw the wheel down the road. The guide shrugged. Could have been a major traffic jam, thank goodness we made it through. Got back to the base. Bought the pics. Unfortunately for all fans of this blog, the photographer only captured Mike’s dunk…