We were all up early the next morning for the rafting. We had to change rooms during the day so we had to pack up all our stuff again before we left. I (Priscilla) am becoming quite an expert at packing now...even with my gazillion zip lock bags, most of which are starting to fall apart.
We took a bus to the rafting place which was about 10 minutes away. The Kellogg guys were also on the rafting trip, but just for half a day trip. Once we got to the rafting place we paid and then had a pretty decent breakfast - good old sausages, eggs and toast. Then we had our "orientation" which was basically key things to do if you are in an unsafe situation...like if your boat gets capsized. We were pretty nervous afterwards. I hoped to only be a short swimmer and not a long swimmer. A short swimmer is when you slightly drift you but can still grab the safety rope, but a long swimmer is when you either get saved by a rope or the safety kayaks. I didn't want to be a long swimmer.
After the safety talk we all got kitted up with life vests, helmets and paddles and got back on the bus to head to the river. Once there we met our guide and fellow crew members. Our guide's name was babyface. He told us it was only his fourth day guiding but in reality he has been doing it for 9 years so we felt a bit reassured by that. Our other crew members were three English boys from Oxford University. Two of them row and the other is a cox, so we were lucky with our crew choice! We were all relatively light also, so we thought it was to our advantage.
We had to walk down to the river. I was only wearing my rubber flips which made this really hard as it was pretty slippery and very rocky. Fortunately I made it down ok and only slipped one time. It took about 20 minutes to walk down and we were glad we had chosen the full day trip as there is a cable car back up at the end; if you take the half day trip you have to walk up the mountain which wouldn't be much fun.
We all clambered in the raft together. Babyface sat at the very back and the three Oxford boys and Alan sat in the first four seats while Steph and I sat behind them.
We were all pretty nervous heading in to the first few rapids after the stories we had heard about capsizing and getting your clothes pulled off. Fortunately we managed to get through the first few rapids safe although we got pretty soaked for sure. Rapids were just crashing onto us, and I tried my hardest to stay brave and look into the eye of the rapids as they came crashing in.
We had three actions to remember - paddle, hold, and get down - where you sit in the raft and hold onto the safety rope. Well apparently you can only get down when we are told to by babyface. On our first rapid, one of the Oxford boys got down before we were told and baby face yelled "you keep on paddling until I say get down" at him. I knew then, I better follow directions or else...
Later on Steph and I realized that the boy, who was a cox, was more terrified than us on the rapids. He would sprawl eagle when he got down, banging his paddle on my hand and stepping on Steph. What a mess. We still have bruises from him.
After the first few rapids we were kind of wondering what all the fuss was about. We went through the rapids no problem, even the very technical class 5 rapid 7 which was called Gulliver's Travels.
After five or so rapids we reached a relatively quiet stretch and babyface said we could all jump in for a swim so we all did. It was pretty refreshing after all the paddling. After a while it was time to get back in the boat, but the current was really strong and I started to get dragged away. The same thing had happened to Alan and I saw him hanging on to some rocks for dear life so called out to him and he grabbed on to me.
As you can picture, we looked pretty pathetic - Alan and I were grabbing on a side bump of the rock as the river and rafts were floating by. One guide from another raft asked us if we wanted to hop on their raft...it's for free. We're like nah, we'll just hang on. When our raft came closer, babyface called for us to swim to the raft. Oh dear...swimming...so I swam against the current and got there but had no idea how to get back on the raft. So one of the Oxford boys grabbed my vest and said I'm going to dunk you then pull you up. Oh crap, dunk and pull got me a quarter of the way on top of the raft. Then I started to shimmy my way back on.
By this time, we still hadn't been capsized yet. Were we really that good...apparently not. On rapid 8 called Midnight Diner, we had an option to take it easy or hard. Of course we thought we were pros by then and said hard. We faced the rapid fiercely, thinking we might make it...then oh crap, the raft started flipping over from one side to the other. Somehow I and the two other boys on my side managed to grab onto the safety rope in the midst of capsizing. Babyface miraculously got on top of the raft and started doing head counts, and I saw he was about to throw the rope out (that means you are a long swimmer)...but not sure if he really did. He then leaned over the raft and screamed to our side "I am going to flip the boat, so dunk and start swimming." Oh crap, he is going to flip the raft on top of us and I need to make sure I swam onto one end of the raft for air. Reminder, I am terrify of drowning.
So the raft, as I expected flipped over my head and I lost all sense of orientation. In my mind, I was telling myself, don't panic or else you will die. Listen to Simba (our orientation guy) and don't be dumb and swim one direction or else you would be trapped under the raft and drown. So I did what I was told, but of course I picked the long direction of the raft, and popped back on the top end of the raft for air. I head Alan and Stephanie screaming "Priscilla! Where is Priscilla?" as I was still gasping for air, and replied "Here, I am here."
Then babyface screamed at me to swim to the other side of the raft. One arm grabbing the safety rope, the other holding the paddle, and still in shock...now I have to swim. I was moving very slowly, and he kept on yelling at me to hurry up. When I got on the other side, he dunked me and pulled me up on to the raft. We survived a capsized raft on a class 5 rapid - cool!
The same rapid from Alan's perspective:
After all the talk of capsizing we had been wondering what all the fuss was about, but we got to find out on rapid number 8. As we headed in to the rapid we saw a huge wall of water and babyface shouted get down. We all jumped down in to the raft and held on for dear life, but we could feel the raft starting to flip over. Suddenly I had parted ways with the raft and was in the water. It felt like I was in a washing machine and I lost all orientation. It was all pretty scary but I remembered what Simba had said about just waiting for the life vest to pull you back up. Sure enough after a scary few seconds I was back at the surface although the fun wasn't over yet. Seems like I was going to be riding the rest of the rapid without a raft. As the currents pulled me one way and another I looked around and saw Steph was beside me. We were a bit far from the raft. I grabbed hold of Steph and looked around for the safety kayak. It was a few meters away so Steph started to swim towards it, but the safety guy told us to swim towards the raft. By this stage we had come out the other side of the rapid and we could see babyface pulling the capsized raft over. Steph and I swam as hard as we could and grabbed hold of the side of the raft. Phew! We had survived. I looked all around the raft and could only count 6. One person was missing and oh crap it was Priscilla. I knew Priscilla wasn't that confident a swimmer so I immediately started to panic. I shouted out for Priscilla and was very relieved when a second later she popped up beside Steph. We were all accounted for now and one by one babyface helped pull us back on the raft. So now we knew what the fuss was about - capsizing was a pure adrenaline rush!
The same rapid from Stephanie's perspective:
So my goal was not to fall in ever despite all the stories from the Kellogg boys about how great it was to fall in. I figured if we tipped, I would just hang on hard to the safety line. Well, as we approached rapid 8, babyface gave no inkling that this was a "capsizeable rapid". Oh wow. All I remember was trying to grab the safety line and completely missing the rope cuz the water threw me so hard. So I'm in the depths of the rapid and all I see is bubbles and some light above me. I guess I could have struggled to reach the top of the rapid, but I remember just thinking what Simba said, "remember u have a life jacket. You will just pop back up". And so I waited and I did pop back up. For a second or so and then sucked in again. I was completely scared, but I remember not panicking and thinking this will all sort itself out. And so finally, my head came above water and I saw Alan who I then grabbed and we both floated down the rapid. Was def less scary with Alan there. I saw a safety kayak and started swimming towards him although he yelled at me to get on my boat. Boo! He made me swim hard to our freakin raft which I finally did. Babyface picked me out of the raft and all I could do was laugh at the experience. Phew!!
Back to Priscilla...
We continued through a few more rapids, handling it pretty well before we broke for lunch. Lunch was a simple egg or veggie sandwich with juice. The half day people had to climb up the mountain to get back on the bus. That alone made us thankful that we chose to do the full day. Also, its so much fun!
Right after we broke for lunch we went through a few rapids no problem before rapid 13 called the Mother. We hit a bump, or Steph and I are convinced our guide did it on purpose, and our raft almost capsized. Everyone started flying out, Alan even whacked me with his paddle (we have it on video) but I managed to hang on. The only ones left on the raft were babyface and edward (another guide we picked up at lunch) and me. After the initial shock, the sensible thing was to help everyone on that flipped out. I saw Stephanie grabbing on the safety rope, so I immediately grabbed onto her vest...and then I saw Alan from a distance floating away. I started screaming for him, then we saw his tevas float by...he was drifting away. Babyface first yanked Stephanie out, then tried to seek help from the safety kayak guy to pick up Alan.
Steph and I tried to help another guy up on the raft. Imagine this, two scrawny Asian girls trying to pull up another scrawny boy...we couldn't do it. I tried to dunk and pull him out as Steph was trying to pull him up by his leg...we were close to useless, while the guides were laughing at us, not offering any helping hands.
By this stage Alan had drifted far away from the raft. He had to be picked up by the safety kayak and was holding on with his legs wrapped around the front of the kayak. Luckily his tevas were floating in the same direction and he was able to grab them as they floated past. The safety kayak helped paddle him back to the raft and he clambered aboard.
The rest of the rapids were pretty uneventful, and lots of paddling. When we were done, we took the last cable car up to our bus. The cable car was pretty cool, it was two dimensional, it detaches to come down vertically, and reattaches before it moves horizontally. We were also happy that we didn't need to climb up the mountain.
Our bus ride back to the tour site for dinner was nice. We got some boozing while we chatted with our raft guides. Steph and I drank two mosi beers while everyone else just drank one. The ride felt like when you watch a war movie and the troops are heading home in a rugged jeep. It was a lot of fun, we felt one with the Zambezi river.
While we ate our spaghetti and meat sauce at the tour site, we watched our rafting video. We looked pretty undramatic compared to other rafts who flipped three or four times. We were not sure if it was because we were that good or babyface was just being kind to us. Oh wells, it was still very exciting.
We were completely pooped when we got back to jolly boys. Alan and I laid down and started napping, but the girls next door were so loud. We heard everything they were talking about. I got so annoyed I started saying things like, can they learn to use their inside voice, I can hear everything they are saying, I just want to nap, can they hear me as loud as I can hear them...no response, so I decided to forget the nap and showered...hang out for a bit then resume sleeping. What a tiring day.
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1 comment:
"We felt one with the Zambezi river"?? Great job guys!
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