Adam Brucker Online

Wow - whitewater rafting is exhilarating and terrifying all at once. Jennie and I found out first hand on Sunday thanks to an invitation from our friend, and river guide, Jason.

(this wasn’t our boat but it’s the same stretch of river)

Some quick observations:

• Beautiful couple of days in a very scenic area - the Poudre (poo-der) River canyon stretches all the way from Rocky Mountain National Park to just short of Ft. Collins and is about a two hour drive North from Boulder.
• Our rental wetsuits, helmets, and other gear was some of the most unflattering equipment that I’ve ever had the pleasure of wearing. Our unique sense of style was further compounded by the fact that we were rafting with 3 former pro river guides who, in addition to owning their own boats, had the latest rafting gear and came off as somewhat fashionable and cool looking. This didn’t matter though as soon as we got into the 38 degree water and quickly became too scared to worry too much about how we looked.
• Rafting is hard work and the consequences of not giving it 100%, mainly falling out of the boat and getting thrashed by the rapids, are an excellent motivator. I paddled on the front left and was happy to be across from our friend Brian who is an experienced rafter. He saved me no less than 3 times by grabbing the back of my life-jacket as I was headed into the drink and I was happy to return the favor by saving him once at the very end of our 9 mile trip.
• Jason was a great guide and handled our group of friends in a professional, safety conscious way, while still keeping things fun. Hearing him scream “dig in, dig, in, all front, all front!” at the top of his lungs as we made our way through some of the tougher rapids was certainly a unique perspective on a friend.
• Sean, the owner and guide of the second boat that we rafted with, gave a very funny and very frightening”safety talk” that covered a number of important topics ranging from which hand to drink beer with while holding a paddle to how to get yourself out from underneath a capsized boat trapped in a rapid. Scary, but strangely reassuring - if you’ve ever seen the skydiving scene in the movie “Fandango,” you’ll know what I’m talking about. Good hard arches all around…
• I loved the rafting lingo and the names of some of the rapids. For instance, when someone falls out of the boat and needs to be rescued (or ends up fighting their way through the rapid to the shore) that’s somewhat euphemistically referred to as “taking a swim.” The one rapid name that stuck in my mind was called “death by dismemberment” and was a nice way to get back in the groove about 200 yards from where we got back in the water again after lunch.
• The river was flowing on the high side at “4 and a quarter” whatever that means, and Jason told me that most of what we did was class three with a few “four minus” sections thrown in. At this point I would be terrified to step it up much further than that, but I suppose that like anything else, the more you do it, the better you get.
• We had one friend kayak alongside the two boats for the length of the trip and it looked like a lot of fun. Seemed like you had more control of your own destiny and were more connected to the river. I would like to give that a try one of these days too.
• Having your guide yell “Lookout! Front Back! Left Right!,” which is a confusing, nonsensical, panic-inducing command, is actually a pretty funny way to end the trip.