The Last 10 Days

By this time we had really settled into a routine.  We all kind of knew how to set up and take down everything and could do it quite quickly and without even discussing it.  This caused us to put in quite a few miles on the river on those days that we spent the whole day out.  This enabled us to have some incredible layover days as well, which took on the feel of a weekend for the most part.  These layover days were especially nice for me because they usually meant being warm for the majority of the day!!

Highlights of the final 10 days- The last 120 miles or so...

We inflated both pack rafts for many of the days on the river, which meant that all 4 of us were on our own boat.  This meant a lot of fun time on the pack rafts for Kate and I and also keeping warm because we were all rowing!

The Staircase Hike:  This hike ended up being a really fun one that we all did... ending up at a rock climb that only Kate was comfortable free-climbing out of (she is kind of a badass rock climber).  So we then turned around at that point because we had not brought along harnesses or ropes, but it was still a very pretty hike.




Playing more games, including Munchkin, Settlers of Catan, and a couple more Cranium Games (which we finally gave up because Aaron and I, green boat, just couldn't win).  Luckily the spread was a little better with the other 2 games!

We were treated to a gorgeous sunset
that night at camp!!

LAVA DAY:  This was one of the more intense days on the river for me.  We had about 8 miles before reaching Lava Falls, the only rapid to earn a 9 out of 10 rating on the river.  We went and scouted it, Kate set up to take video, we both watched Aaron run it, then I went back to attempt it in a pack raft.  There was  a cheat route but I decided to try to go through the big part. Long story short, I failed!!  I ended up getting worked pretty good, rode pretty much the whole rapid under water.  Realistically it was probably about 12 seconds that I spent under, but I was completely out of control and glad that I had got a good breath in.  Thankfully, I was the only one to screw up the rapid, both of the gear boats made it through beautifully and after watching me Kate took the cheat route, which I do not blame her for at all, even though she did get flipped by the little riffle afterwards which was just funny.  After making it through we were all quite relieved and had quite an enjoyable rest of the day!

Getting rained on:  I am sure this is only a highlight because we only got a couple of hours of rain the entire trip but it was pretty fun when we were all in our drysuits just cruising along the river with everything nice and water proof!

Creative Meals:  As we neared the end of the trip we began to mix and match things in an interesting way.  One night we made falafel-sausage burgers, which I know sounds sacrilege to any vegetarian, but for us, it was amazing!!  I think one of the group favorites was actually the dinner that we made on lava day, we named it Thaiwanese chicken, this was chicken fried up with a crust of peanuts and Hoisin sauce.  It does blend two different cuisines... but it does it beautifully!  There was another night that we made 'enchilada burrito's', which turned into cooking every perishable item that we had left, adding enchilada sauce, and putting it in a tortilla, this one probably won't be repeated, but it fed us:)

For the four of us, our river trip lasted 25 days and left all of us looking forward to the next time that we could make it happen!  I feel lucky to have had the opportunity to have spent such a significant amount of time in such a beautiful place with seriously fun people!!  Although rafting is much different than most of my activities it is now something that I long to do more of and I will take every opportunity that comes along for me to tag along on a rafting or kayaking trip in my future!!