Before it gets too late into the week, I have to tell you about the adventure fill day I had on Saturday!! As you might know, I like to try things and don't often pass up unique opportunities. I cleaned a sheep's intestines for heaven's sake so I am not adverse to adventure. But let's face it. I'm just not the true outdoorsy type person. I much prefer watching Lifetime movies in the air-conditioning than most activities that require effort and sweat. But when my friend Dana asked me to go white water rafting with her last Saturday, I said sure! (BTW, Dana is a most excellent blogger and her blog in general cracks me up. I'm sure her version of the day's events are much more humorous than mine!)
Neither Dana nor I had ever been white water rafting before so we really didn't know what we were getting ourselves into. The met up with some other people (who we didn't know) from the National Press Club and rode a small bus to Harper's Ferry, West Virginia. The first potential red flag was the waiver we had to sign. Basically it said we couldn't hold the rafting company liable if we were to have any injury, fracture, brain trauma, partial or total paralysis, death, or anything else bad happen to us. I also knew this was serious rafting when we had to wear a helmet.
Besides our little group from the NPC, approximately 400 girl scouts also joined us. Ok, maybe that is a slight exaggeration but I got mixed up with Troop 43 and for a short period of time, was counted as a girl scout when getting off the bus. I was worried because I suddenly couldn't remember the Girl Scout pledge!! It's been a long time! (We could tell which boats had Girl Scouts in them due to the high pitch screams that came at each rapid!)
We had four people and a guide in our raft (that is the technical term... Dana and I were calling it a boat but we quickly learned the terminology and fit right in to the rafting crowd.) We decided it would be a good idea to have at least one person in the raft that had actually be white water rafting before so he could save us if we needed him to. And then there was Tanya, a pretty big girl as our guide. She was an excellent guide. And strong. At one point, in a matter of a nanosecond, she plucked me out of the water, back into the raft with literally two fingers!!
You might ask where the pictures are of our adventure but that's because we didn't have a waterproof camera and we were in line to buy one when someone came to get us to tell us the bus was leaving. We thought there would be no point in waiting in line for a camera to then not be anywhere near the water when we missed the bus. So we took pictures in our heads. I told Dana that I have a lifetime of practice in that since my family took very few pictures of outings growing up.
It was way fun! And we survived! I'm really proud of us for three reasons. I thought I would wake up on Sunday not able to move since I had used muscles I didn't know existed. But no soreness whatsoever!!! I also thought I would have ended up as red as a recalled tomato but no sunburn whatsoever either! And I was in the direct sunlight in 100 degree temperatures with extremely pasty white skin!! Wooo hooo me!!
But I'm most proud of us because we rafted seven miles, through three states and three classes of rapids. Each of the rapids had specific names. The only one I really remember is Mad Dog. I'll go ahead and say it. That is really impressive. I think we're ready for class 5 rapids! Actually, maybe we should wait. That might be a little too outdoorsy for such a short period of time for me!!! I'd better pace myself!!
Neither Dana nor I had ever been white water rafting before so we really didn't know what we were getting ourselves into. The met up with some other people (who we didn't know) from the National Press Club and rode a small bus to Harper's Ferry, West Virginia. The first potential red flag was the waiver we had to sign. Basically it said we couldn't hold the rafting company liable if we were to have any injury, fracture, brain trauma, partial or total paralysis, death, or anything else bad happen to us. I also knew this was serious rafting when we had to wear a helmet.
Besides our little group from the NPC, approximately 400 girl scouts also joined us. Ok, maybe that is a slight exaggeration but I got mixed up with Troop 43 and for a short period of time, was counted as a girl scout when getting off the bus. I was worried because I suddenly couldn't remember the Girl Scout pledge!! It's been a long time! (We could tell which boats had Girl Scouts in them due to the high pitch screams that came at each rapid!)
We had four people and a guide in our raft (that is the technical term... Dana and I were calling it a boat but we quickly learned the terminology and fit right in to the rafting crowd.) We decided it would be a good idea to have at least one person in the raft that had actually be white water rafting before so he could save us if we needed him to. And then there was Tanya, a pretty big girl as our guide. She was an excellent guide. And strong. At one point, in a matter of a nanosecond, she plucked me out of the water, back into the raft with literally two fingers!!
You might ask where the pictures are of our adventure but that's because we didn't have a waterproof camera and we were in line to buy one when someone came to get us to tell us the bus was leaving. We thought there would be no point in waiting in line for a camera to then not be anywhere near the water when we missed the bus. So we took pictures in our heads. I told Dana that I have a lifetime of practice in that since my family took very few pictures of outings growing up.
It was way fun! And we survived! I'm really proud of us for three reasons. I thought I would wake up on Sunday not able to move since I had used muscles I didn't know existed. But no soreness whatsoever!!! I also thought I would have ended up as red as a recalled tomato but no sunburn whatsoever either! And I was in the direct sunlight in 100 degree temperatures with extremely pasty white skin!! Wooo hooo me!!
But I'm most proud of us because we rafted seven miles, through three states and three classes of rapids. Each of the rapids had specific names. The only one I really remember is Mad Dog. I'll go ahead and say it. That is really impressive. I think we're ready for class 5 rapids! Actually, maybe we should wait. That might be a little too outdoorsy for such a short period of time for me!!! I'd better pace myself!!
2 comments:
Your blog is WAY BETTER AND FUNNIER!! I had a good one, but it died and I was too tired to relive it - my favorite line from this post is "red as a recalled tomato," LOL!
Thanks so much for going - and for teaching me how to take pictures in my head! It was a lot of fun and I was surprisingly not sore either.
I think we are so ready for our next adventure - even if we have to sign a waiver and wear a helmet!
Yay! Rafting is fun! Don't worry about a class 5 though... we went with Jeff's parents and I think there were a couple fives on that one! There are great places to go rafting where we are staying in GA, but I'm not sure Elizabeth and Little Becky would enjoy it! =)
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