The River Wild - part deux

By the time we reached camp I had a raging sunburn and a bee sting. Don't feel too bad for me though - one member of our group pulled in with a dislocated shoulder. But don't feel too bad for him either, he was fooling around on the boats while going down the rapids. Silly guy.

That night they gave us a big dinner. You had your choice of chicking or steak served with corn on the cob and a potato as big as your head wrapped in four feet of aluminum foil. Now, I don't know about you, but as I get older my eating habits have gotten healthier and more vegetarian. This was meat- and starchapalooza-land. Fortunately, I had a cooler filled with fruit and health food. That's right, while everyone else was chugging beer and chowing on meat I was nibbling on berries and guzzling water.

About that time I really started to notice something. I had expected the rafters to be outdoor enthusiasts and athletes, but when I looked around I noticed this: These people were large - really, really large. In fact, I'd say that out of the 500 rafter/campers I could count the svelte ones on my fingers and toes. Nope, not kidding.

Dinner was followed by more drinking and partying at camp. This meant lots of drunken strangers wandering around and helping themselves to our food. This lot was strangely lacking in social skills.

Later on, there was a raucous outdoor disco/dust fest. But it was past my bedtime. I'm religious about getting up early and that means going to bed early. I put in my earplugs and tried to nod off but they were useless, I heard everything. Even after the music ended I could hear the other campers snoring. I also heard some guy talking in his sleep all night: "Dave!" "C'mon Dave!" "Daaaave!"

Somehow I ended up getting some sleep and was ready to face the new day. We went down the same rapids as the day before and I was even more anxious because I knew what was coming. We let everyone go ahead of us so we wouldn't be caught in the traffic jam again. Only one raft was there, caught in the rocks. Naturally, we rammed right into them and capsized. I swim regularly so I plunged in head first, didn't suck in any air and then buoyed right back up.

What shocked me the most was seeing Jeff in the water as well. I expected him to be sitting in the boat so he could rescue me and instead he was bobbing right beside me. Well, heck. We were okay though. Someone caught our oars and raft and Jeff rescued my hat. My sunglasses were lost forever though. Fudge.

On our way down we saw two men whose raft had smashed against some rocks and popped. They clung to the rock helplessly and we could do nothing to assist them. Just before we reached the end another pair were thrown out of their raft. The girl was clinging to some rocks and was apparently having a panic attack. She could have floated to the shore easily but she was in full freak out mode. Her boyfriend was patiently trying to coax her off the rocks but she looked like she was going to be a while. We stopped and tried to help but there wasn't much we could do.

Jeff and I were caught on the rocks a few times on this trip down but we made it back successfully. But I had been so anxious this second time down that I knew I would never go white water rafting again. I think what it came down to was that the challenge was something I neither craved nor needed. I like being athletic and adventurous but white water rafting is not something you ever really get better at with practice. You can't master it. The only thing that determines whether you swim with the fishies is luck, pure and simple. And I like the allure of mastery and control.

But don't think that I didn't have a good time on this adventure. I laughed, I high-fived, and, most importantly, I yelled giddily at Jeff the whole drive back home: "LEFT! LEFT! LEFT! Okay, now it's a soft right! GO! GO! GO! YESSS!!!"

The River Wild

This weekend I went white water rafting for the first time. It was great fun that I will never ever do again. Before I break down the events, let me tell you that I really hadn't given much thought to it beforehand. I was told that we were spending two days on the water and there would be camping overnight and there would be imbibing of alcohol. I figured it would be a large raft manned by one or two guides while we floated down a wide river. Nope. Here are the highlights from our trip:

• On the bus ride to the launch point we were packed in with 50 people who were chugging cans of beer. We can see the river on our left and my friends start screaming with laughter when they spot people whose rafts are stuck on the rocks. I see that the rafts fit only two people, so clearly we weren't going to have a guide ride with us. I start to get nervous, but I think to myself: "If these guys can do this drunk, it can't be that hard."


• We arrive and receive a brief orientation along with a life vest. No helmets. I remain calm.


• We hit the water all at once and within 10 minutes there's a major pile-up. Several rafts are stuck on the rocks and the people behind them ram into them and capsize. We barely make it through but I see a girl in front of me get thrown in and get stuck under our raft. I start screaming that she needs to be saved but there's nothing we can do because the current is pushing us. I am now completely freaked out. I'm pretty sure she made it but I am totally and completely freaked out.


• Jeff and I pull over to the shore so I can calm down. Several other boats pull over with us and some people are just as horrified as I am. However, some rafters are still having a great time. A bunch of drunken twenty-somethings pull in laughing and shouting that their cooler full of beer fell into the river but they saved their tequila. They also managed to save a bag full of marshmallows which they chuck at everyone floating by.


• We head back out after I calm a bit (it's not like you can go back up the river) and meet up with our group of friends and stop for lunch. They give you a dry bag full of sandwich fixings, which I'm not a huge fan of but I chow down like a champion. A woman and her eleven-year-old son pull up and she's completely and totally wasted. She laughs a lot, falls out of her raft and complains that she lost her margaritas. Her son just sits quietly and looks completely mortified.


• As I eat my lunch I take stock of the other rafters floating by. I see a guy with a blender on top of his cooler, he throws us otter pops. Everybody has water bazookas and they feel great as we are repeatedly hit with them in the heat. Several rafters are wearing wigs, funny hats and masks. This is starting to feel more like burning man than a sporting adventure.


• We continue on and I feel like we're getting better at this rafting thing. It's not all that physically strenuous but it is mentally challenging. Good communication is essential and since I'm sitting in front of the raft I act as the lookout for rocks and rapids. Jeff sees a side of me he rarely sees: loud, bossy and screaming. This is because I have no intention of capsizing or getting caught on the rocks without a fight. Sometimes Jeff already sees what I'm yelling about, sometimes there's nothing he can do when something is coming our way, but sometimes it helps because he's staring slack-jawed at rock formations (he has a PhD in geophysics). Fortunately, Jeff has thick skin and I suspect he thinks it's cute when I bark out orders.


• We approach the large rapids known as "Mother". A young man stands on the rocks (did I mention the temperature is about the same as the surface of the sun?) waving an orange flag around. He's not helpful as all I can focus on is the sound of rushing water. Just like at Disneyland there is a camera awaiting us as we go down Mother:

Many of the pictures I saw of other people showed only feet flying up in the air.

shortly after Mother we make it to camp having only getting stuck on the rocks a couple of times and without capsizing. In fact, it turns out we were the only ones in our group to not have capsized. This turns out to be a lucky thing for us as it turns out my back pack wasn't strapped down to the boat and our car keys were inside. Oopsy.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's post (maybe) as the saga continues...

Promises Broken

Yeah, remember when I said I was going to update everything today? Yup, I lied. Hopefully next week....

Promises, Promises

I know, I know, I haven't been posting much and I have all these adventures to tell you about. But here's my plan: I have this Friday off of work and no plans except to blog like a mad woman. Not sure if I'll just combine everything into one post or several posts but I'll catch up either way. Until then, enjoy your week!

Happy 5th of July!

This has been a very laid-back weekend for me and Jeff. Today was the laziest day of all though. I literally sat in front of the TV all day and watched the Food Network. Finally, I mustered my energy and Jeff and I took a walk, ending at a Gelato shop in Downtown Campbell.

I'm very much my mother's daughter (she can attest to this) when it comes to lines. We're impatient and we don't like it when people try to cut in. So, when two German-speaking women came in and marched right up to the register in front of me I was quick to assert myself. Sort of.

"Uh, hi," I said politely.
"Yah, yah, yah," one of the women said, "we're just looking around."
Internally I growled but externally I just smiled politely.

After explaining to the clerk several times what I wanted (seriously, do I mumble that bad?), I got my tiny cup of dark chocolate goodness. Jeff and I left the shop and I recounted the confrontation to him as he had wandered off.

"Yeah, Germans are like that," he explained. Jeff has travelled to Germany so he knows what he's talking about (and he has so many international friends he should be an ambassador at the UN). "They're direct and they can be kinda rude."

"Really?" That surprised me, I always thought that they were big fans of order.

Jeff is by far a quicker wit than me. "You should have said, 'Are y'all from Germany? Ain't that by Holland? I love strudel!' That would drive them nuts."

I laughed so hard I almost spit out my gelato. Clearly, I've missed an opportunity to create some real mischief. Poop.

Santa Cruz Gay Pride

I wanted to share with you some images from the Santa Cruz Gay Pride Parade. This is probably the tenth time I've caught it completely on accident. I'll just be making my monthly pilgrimage to Santa Cruz for some shoe shopping and ZOOM! Dykes on Bikes go roaring by:


While it's smaller than the San Francisco parade, it has a lot of heart. I always end up crying happy tears because the parade makes me think that this is how I want the world to be: Everyone is open minded, colorful and having a ton of fun.

The Derby Girls made an appearance:
Probably the best part is when the librarians do a little dance with their carts:
Even Home Depot gets in on the action:
Aaaahhh Santa Cruz!

This was an especially happy parade because, about a month prior to this, there was another parade in Santa Cruz that went very badly. A few losers dressed in black jumped into the parade and smashed some windows; hurting the local, independently-owned businesses. Everything went well during this parade though!

Wave Organ and more of San Francisco

Hello!

I know, I know... I've been remiss with posting my posts. But I have some great stuff to put up today. I hope it makes it worth the wait!

About a month ago Jeff and I went to San Francisco (shock!) to see the Wave Organ and do a bit of wandering. We had a great day and made lots of discoveries.

At the eastern edge of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area on the jetty by the boat harbor is a work of environmental art created by Peter Richards and George Gonzales in 1986. The Wave Organ is a wave-activated acoustic sculpture that has been called the world's biggest seashell. It's a pretty cool piece of art in itself:

There wasn't much motion in the ocean on the day we went so we didn't actually hear anything. But you can go here to listen: http://www.exploratorium.edu/visit/plan_your_visit/wave_organ/

After the Wave Organ we walked to Fort Mason. Jeff got in a workout on the way. My He-Man!

At Fort Mason we almost ate at Greens, a very trendy vegetarian restaurant but we left after being seated at a stump and not finding much on the menu that would fill us up. Fortunately, there was a Oaxacan food vendor outside and we ate yummy tacos and tamales. Then we continued our walk. We found the butt of an old ship:

And then we made our way to Fisherman's Wharf where we went on a tour of a World War II submarine, the Pampanito:
After that, we wandered down to Ghiradelli Square (yum!), Pier 39 and ended up on Chestnut street. This is a very cool area with lots of shops and restuarants. I found another art heart:

And found some very cool places to eat:

(I love this one because my dad's name is Barney!)

And, like the rest of the city, Chestnut street is dog-friendly: