White Water Rapids of DEATH

Alysia and I have made it a tradition to go back to the bay for an annual river rafting trip every 4th of July weekend.  This year I was excited to bring Jimmy along!

2010 River Rafting.

We are lucky that Alysia's Dad co-owns a raft so that the only cost to us is gas.  It was perfect - Jimmy loves the out doors, we can take a little vacation away from Los Angeles, it was going to be a perfect weekend.

As we approached the rapids we soon realized that it was a little rockier than usual. With me as the captain we went head first into a huge rock throwing Jimmy and his friend overboard! 

While trying to get them back in, the rapids kept coming swallowing them whole.  We managed to save them, but lost a paddle.  This put a damper on the rest of the ride down the river.  To add to this, more rapids were coming.  The second rapid that tore through are raft manage to fill the entire boat with water.  Thankfully it was self-bailing.  We pulled over to catch our breath and witnessed two more rafts that had been completely flipped and a man drifting passed yelling "help!"  We didn't know what to do.

The waters seemed calm that day, but it was indeed rough.

Before all the crazy happened, we took a nice lunch break.  Check out my boyscout knot.

The water was cool.

Alysia admitted that the rapids were scarier than usual.  When we went home she discovered that the usual Class 3 rapids were classified at Class 4 that day meaning we should have worn helmets.  I'm thankful Jimmy didn't drown or hit his head or giant rocks.  Seriously.

The trip took a lot out of me.  I'm thinking of retiring this annual tradition, but we'll see what 2012 looks like.

River Rafting 2010

Alysia and I have been going river rafting practically every year since high school with a different group. We've gone so often that we joked about the safety procedures.

Alysia - what do you do if you find yourself under the raft?
Me - you spin in circles. the cyclone that you make will create a pocket of air
Alysia - what should you do if you fall out in general?
Me - stay quiet, you don't want to ruin everyone else's fun
Alysia - How about the paddles?
Me - You should test how sturdy they are by banging them on each other's heads.
Alysia - Very good.



Little did we know, the rapids were stronger than usual. The water was much higher and much faster. Faster than years before.



I didn't take too many pictures on the raft. Alysia was mad that I didn't leave her camera in the car so we put it in 16 zip lock bags to make sure it didn't get wet. These are pictures before the actual rafting.




On the river we got stuck on practically every rock as passerbyers looked on with their professional tour guide. But then we were unprepared.



As we approached bigger rapids everyone but 3 people were thrown off!! The newer person ended up under the raft as the river rushed against him. This has never happened before, but he managed to get out. I found myself in the water and grabbed paddles and water guns and threw them back on to the raft because we would be screwed without them. As I was pulled back on the raft, I saw Alysia's head go under the waves. I panicked, but saw that she was able to stop on a shore before getting to far down the river. We managed to get everyone back on the raft pulling them up by their life jackets.



We were laughing at the experience, but realized that the rapid that practically capsized the boat wasn't even mapped out. We were thankful that the newbie didn't follow my advice about spinning in circles under the raft. After things settled we pressured Smyr to be captain. Almost immediately. He was thrown off the raft with Alysia's dad.



Alysia's dad was sent down the river. And Smyr was stuck on rocks, hurting his knee. His sandal made it difficult to gain traction. He threw his hat and sunglasses into the river as they were invading his vision. The remaining crew became unorganized, no one knew what to do. I told Alysia, "we are still hitting rapids and heading toward rocks, let's worry about steering." Smyr and Alysia's dad were rescheduled by other rafts while we docked the raft. The first time we were thrown off, we were laughing. While we examined Smyr's bloody knee... our fun time got more stressful.



We were confused at the other rafters because they were occupied by children and even an old lady. How did that bitch stay on during the rapids?!? We definitely failed.

Here we are after the trip, tired. We lost two sunglasses, two hats, one paddle and one water gun. Excuse my plunging neck line.

Hairchive: The River Rafting 'hawk
I wear the same outfit every year.