ugh! erg! ouch!

Well, I started physical therapy for my tailbone.. infact, I just finished my routine of hip and leg exercises. That stuff is tiring, more so than I was expecting. *whew* If it helps to heal me up, I’m all for it!

Anyway, time to take care of a few things.. btw, the artist Alpha has some groovy chilled out electronica.

Rafting details (ouch!)

Here I am Sunday afternoon and my sunburn is finally healing up. Rafting the Deschutes last weekend was a most excellent time, and I earned my 2nd (or 3rd?) degree sunburned feet! My feet were swelled up and difficult to stand on for all of last week. Luckily, I was able to work from home all week and kept caught up, and actually made some progress on some projects I’m working on.
This trip was a great time because we would hit some exciting rapids then have awhile to goof off and splash (water war) other rafters. Next year we’ll remember to bring a bucket, the ultimate in water warfare. Our group liked to have a good time and this meant that at any point someone was going to be pushed off the raft into the river. There were a few attempts to push me off but I held my ground and battled back! hehe
The stretch of river we rafted was about 4 or 5 miles long and there were two Class IV, and a couple Class III and several Class II and lower rapids. Our shuttle dropped us off at Harpham Flats and we loaded our coolers and people into our boats and shoved off. Shortly after departure is a rapid called ‘Wapanita’ which seemed like it was a 2 or 3 foot hole which we missed but our second boat hit squarely and got soaking wet. yay!
Further down the river you find the first Class IV rapid called ‘Boxcar’. Boxcar is surprisingly big rapid and if you don’t hit it straight on you’re likely to get either really wet or to flip over..Throughout the weekend I saw a few rafts flip on this rapid and it kinda looked like fun.
Further down the river you hit some Class III rapids called ‘Surf City’ which were fun to float and no one got tossed out. Just past Surf City is another Class IV called ‘Oak Springs’ which is usually a 6 or 7 foot nearly vertical drop but since the water was so high it was only about 4 or 5 feet. This was the most exciting rapid on our trip and we hit it deadon! One of the pictures I’ll post shows me nearly falling into the water off of the side of the raft as my corner went towards the deepest part of this hole.
Nearing the end of our trip is a Class III rapid called ‘Elevator’. At the base of Elevator is a huge opening where people tend to dock thier rafts to swim, visit others, and to float down Elevator in thier life jackets. Sunday afternoon Wendie rafted again and this time she floated down Elevator a couple of times in her jacket! That looks like a blast, I’ll have to try it next year!
We’re all jacked up about going rafting again, can’t wait for next year!! One thing is for sure, I’ll remember to put sunscreen on the top of my feet!

Rafting the Deschutes..

That rafting trip was a lot of fun! We had around 16 people on two rafts going down the river just outside of Maupin, Or. The drive was about 3 hours from Albany and my tailbone was hurting at the end, so I planned to see how our float on Saturday went to decide whether or not it would be a good idea for me to float Sunday just before our ride back. It turns out we had a blast on Saturday, our float was about 4.5 hours long and we took a couple long breaks. I didn’t put sunscreen on my feet like I should have and scored a very nasty sunburn which is still painful to walk on. The water was cold so you really couldn’t tell the sun was as hot/strong as it was.. or atleast I couldn’t. heh.

We camped at ‘The Oasis’s’ campground, which is nothing more than a grass field packed with other rafters partying. We had a good time getting our drink on and enjoying the hot weather.. Saturday at 11, our shuttle service dropped by to pick us up and drop us off at our rafts upstream. The shuttle service was ‘Allstar Rafting’ and they did a superb job in my opinion. Allstar Rafting provides guided services but we had a couple of experienced rafters who guided for us so all we had to do was rent the equipment and pay for the shuttle service.

I’ll add some more detail when I get copies of the pictures to post as well..
fun fun!

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday to Wendie, my beautiful wife! The plans are to have some good food with friends at The Gables and this weekend we’re going rafting. Neither of us have been rafting in any significant waters so this should be exciting.. I hear there are a few class 4 rapids. I’ll drop a full report on the event when we return..