The Ramblings Of A Rapids Rider

Part Two: The Floatening

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Welcome to the second part of my white water rapids tale. Yesterday, during a quiet moment, I took myself backwards in time and narrated the tale from my point of view. Hope you all enjoy!

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My eyes popped open to the sound of synchronized snoring. Truly, a more organized cadence of exhaled breath has probably never been heard. My air mattress had deflated during the night, so I gave a most undignified grunt as I stretched out my form. I honestly was still in awe that I had slept on top of my army surplus sleeping bag for the entire night! The camping forays of my youth were always into high mountainous or coastal Alaskan regions, so sleeping inside the bag, even in the midst of summer was a must.

Smile on my warm face, I arose and slapped on my rafting clothes, for today I was going to partake in an activity that I had never yet engaged in, white water rafting! Most of my life has been spent watching people engage in fun activities as we drove by them in our truck. Today, however, I was going to be the person the folks flying down the highways and byways got a glance of!

Clothes applied, I waited around for the other seventeen members of our party to get dressed and the like. The older creatures made a cachaphony of grunts and groans as they arose, their aging joints protesting the night on the Earth that they had just endured. The younglings of the group were not burdened by such things and I soon found myself swept up in their excitement. The youngest was ten, the oldest sixteen, and there were ten of tweens and teens with us in all.

A few minutes and a lot of ripe blackberries eaten later, we wandered down to the beach of Spring Bar campground. Our rafting company had yet to arrive, so we all amused ourselves in what was to become the main feature of the day, water fighting. One of the adults had brought a TON of the big syringe like squirt guns, and before you could say "Pirates of the Salmon River", I more resembled a drowned rat instead of a smallish woman. Adventure by-product achieved you could say.

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At times, I honestly felt like I was getting shot with one of these babies. Heathens...

At one point I got so fed up with one of my friends that I vaguely remember flying into the water and pouncing on his over six foot form. The seventy degree water of the Salmon River felt so good as I tackled my friend. I think I got more wet than he did, as it probably was about like a chihuahua attacking an elephant. Sigh.

A bit behind and overbooked, our guides finally arrived a touch late and hurried to set up a big camp stove and table. They cooked our breakfast of pancakes, sausage, and hashbrowns as record speed, and after a safety briefing, life jacket fitting, and helmet adorning, we were ready to shove off on our journey.

Our rafting trip was to be a twenty mile float down the Salmon. We were to stop halfway in the town of Riggins, Idaho for lunch on the deck of our guide's rafting business location. Between where we were currently and our lunch time destination was a bunch of rapids, and my family had never done anything of the like before.

The van that arrived with our breakfast fixins also had a trailer that contained a big green raft and a smaller blue raft. One of my friends had told me that about seven people typically rode in a raft, so after a small amount of math in my cranium, I wondered where some of the rest of our group were going to ride. You can bet your last dollop of sour cream that I was going in raft!

It was then that one of the guides, a marvelous creature by the name of Morgan, called down the hill for a couple of helpers, and my floating apparatus question was answered. In a short span of time a couple of inflatable kayaks and standard yellow kayak were portaged down the hillside and onto the beach. I was more than impressed when my eleven year old son volunteered to captain the two person inflatable kayak with his buddy, and in no time were all floating sedately.

Each section of rapids that we traversed had a name. We went through Traps, Fiddle, and my son's personal favorite, Timezone. It's kind of a trip to change time zones when you are being thrown about like a rag doll through some awesome waves!

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On and on we floated, the sedate parts of the rafting were punctuated with river pirate battles. One thing is for certain, I wasn't hot the entire day, and am still infinitely grateful for family size cans of waterproof sunscreen. A few hours and sections of white water traversed later, we arrived in the town of Riggins. I love the little resort town! Full of rafting outfitters and restaurants, it is the epitome of an old-fashioned resort town. We hiked up the river bank to a big wooden deck that was attached the building that housed our guide's rafting business. While they grilled us hot dogs for lunch we all watched a big mule deer buck whose horns were still encased in velvet. The big guy was bedded down just over the bank for the deck, as it was more than a bit toasty outside!

With full bellies and strength again to paddle and water gun fight, we returned to our vessels and shoved off. Now I have to point out here that almost no one stayed in the same boat or kayak. We hopped boats like a bunch of fleas at a dog show. My daughter and her friend took possession of the two person kayak, and a short while later, during the most robust of the rapids that we rode that day, the best part of our adventure occurred.

In order to not hit the Banana Boat (yellow kayak), my girl and her friend CJ had to go through was we were told was at least a class four, if not five wave. They got launched and a rescue mission commenced, as all our kayakers got bucked off. I am still amazed at the smile on my girl's face as she floated through the rapids, paddles in hand. She didn't look at all afraid, and I am telling you guys, those rapids were large!

Earlier that day our guides demonstrated how to haul a person aboard the "proper" way by grabbing the shoulders of their life jackets and using your body weight to pull the person in. I can attest that I hurled my baby girl into the boat like She-Ra! And that child is a lot bigger than I am now, it was something.

Still in the rapids, a quick decision had to be made about the two person kayak that we were holding next to our blue raft. My friend M and I quickly hopped in it, as we felt our two recently tossed children needed to chill in the raft for a bit. Neither of us had really wanted to ride in the kayaks, but our kiddos definitely needed a breather, so into the inflatable kayak we went.

Did I mention that we got in backwards. I had the single paddle and should have been on the stern as the rudder as M had the kayak paddle, so our journey got out to a rough start as we had to figure out how to pilot the boat in an awkward manner, right in the middle of some rapids. We got situated and continued down the river to help pluck the other kayakers out of the drink. Something happened along the way, M and I decided we really liked riding in the kayak! It was my first time in a kayak, and her only experience was lake kayaking, which I have to say is apparently a lot different.

Our elation quickly became consternation as we approached Black Rock Rapid.

"We gotta keep our nose straight or we're going in!" I shouted at M.

"We got this!" she shouted in return.

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Just imagine a bug eyed Kat and this picture would be an accurate representation of me during my kayak rapids experience. Note the sideways orientation.

There wasn't any more talking, but there sure was a lot of squealing as we took those HUGE rapids sideways and somehow didn't roll our craft. Afterward the guides gave us plenty of high fives and back slaps. I honestly don't know if they were sympathy accolades or if they were impressed with us. All I know is that I was impressed with us and loved every minute of our journey.

And a short while later, after seven hours on the water in total, we arrived at Lucile and clambored out of the water. I have to say this, I LOVE whitewater rafting, and so do my kids. We hadn't even got to the car yet when they were asking me about coming back next year! To which I replied,

"Of course, it shall be a tradition!"

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And if you ever want to go white water rafting in a group on the Salmon River, I wholeheartedly recommend Adventure Idaho. They took such good care of us and you can totally tell that they love what they do:)

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And as not always, but sort of out of necessity, all of the images in this post were from Pixabay because my camera's not waterproof. However, there is some Go-Pro footage of our entire trip out there somewhere, and if I ever snag it, you'll see it, I promise:)

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