Despite the fact that Mike just got here yesterday, and was probably super jet-lagged from his long trip to Kampala, we decided to take full advantage of our first weekend day. Therefore, we traveled to Jinga, the source of the Nile River (which drains out of Lake Victoria) for a weekend adventure (although I think that calling it an "adventure" would be putting it very lightly...). From where the Nile first drains out of Lake Victoria, the water then travels 6500 kilometers through Sudan and Egypt before exiting in to the Mediterranean Sea. Pretty impressive...
Jinga is known as the "adventure capital of East Africa," and has been known as such ever since someone realized that it was a great location for river rafting. But this "rafting" is not your average drift down the river. No, no. I guess a better name for it would be "extreme, adrenalin-pumping rafting," perhaps? During the course of our afternoon adventure, we traversed 22 kilometers of river and nine different rapids. Four of them were rated grade 5 rapids, while the other five were rated grade 4. How would I rate the rapids? Scary as shit. With names like "Hair of the Dog, Condolences, Vengeance, and Graveyard," you can maybe start to get an idea of the experience we had on the river...
Despite Jinga being a very popular adventure destination, we had a small group go out, consisting of only eight people in the raft, along with our guide, Tom. (This is likely because it is rainy season and, hence, there are less tourists.)
Tom has worked on various rivers throughout the world and has been guiding trips for over 4.5 years. In addition to our guide, there was a "safety raft" with another guide and a driver (which tried to take the easy way down the rapids and stay upright), as well as five other employees in kayaks who were there to support us during the trip, should anything go wrong.
From the very beginning, safety was stressed as incredibly important (which made me feel much better!) and we were given snug-fitting life vests and helmets (even better!!). Tom tried to teach us what we should do and how we should act, should we be thrown out of the raft or the raft tips en-route over a rapid. The key is to remain calm, we were told. After living through it, I can tell you that this is much easier said than done... After our crash course in rafting, we headed down the river to tackle our first rapid. I think my heart was beating at least 150 times per minute...
We made it through the first rapid without much issue (meaning, miraculously, everyone stayed in the raft and we didn't flip, although I did manage to lose my paddle on the way down - oops!).
Unfortunately, the same can not be said for the second rapid, when our boat literally went vertical and the entire left-side (I was on the right-side) of the boat was flung in to the water.
From there we battled through a couple more rapids (one of which we had to get out and walk through the top part, as it was considered too dangerous for recreational rafting), choosing the more "extreme" routes when the option arose (I was too chicken-shit to speak up and admit that I was scared out of my mind, but I'm glad we took this route - it was great fun!). There was a rapid-within-a-rapid during one of the routes that is known as "50-50," where basically there is a 50% chance that the raft will make it out right-side up.
We made it out right-side up, which was very exciting, only to have our raft flip (which I think was purposefully done by our guide) when we hit the next wave...
On the fourth rapid, I had a quite scary mishap in which I was flung out of the boat at the top of a long rapid, getting tumbled around underwater for a few seconds (where I literally thought I was going to drown...), only to finally reach the "surface" where I realized that I was traveling underneath the right-side-up raft.
Everything I learned during our crash course quickly went out of my head and, yes, I panicked. I had to crawl my way along the bottom of the raft to get myself out behind, where I finally took a precious breath of air, mixed with tons of Nile water. Only to get beat back down by the next wave. I was probably only under water for about 6-7 seconds (and was rescued by a kayaker and taken to the safely raft within 20-25 seconds), but it was definitely the scariest 6-7 seconds of my life. And I'm pretty sure that I drank at least 2 gallons of Nile water. Yumm... Upon arriving safely in the safety raft, I was, surprisingly, offered a Xanax, which I declined. I took a couple minutes to recover and was offered to spend some time in the safety raft, but decided "Hey, if I made it through that, what could be worse?" and quickly joined the rest of my rafting buddies to finish our adventure.
The rest of the trip was nothing like "smooth sailing," by any means. On the very next rapid, our raft flipped after hitting the first wave, leaving everyone (including our guide!) propelling down the river while our raft floated upside-down behind us (even when the boat flips, many of the rafters - and almost always the guide - still manage to hang on to the side ropes of the raft, keeping it from wandering away).
The safety raft had to throw out a long rope to everyone, where we grabbed on and were hauled in to the safety raft, while the kayakers commandeered our raft and searched for all of our paddles (though I did manage to hold on to my paddle for the entire time, a fact of which I was very proud!).
After the end of our hair-raising rafting adventure, we were treated to an awesome barbecue lunch, complete with Nile beer. Yum.
Although I was terrified during pretty much the entire trip, we ended up having a great time and I am glad that we did it.
Mike would like to point out, however, that he was never scared during the entire trip and that he is a bad-ass. That is what he says (though take a close look at his face in the following picture - he is second from the back on the right - and then make up your own mind...).
Jinga is known as the "adventure capital of East Africa," and has been known as such ever since someone realized that it was a great location for river rafting. But this "rafting" is not your average drift down the river. No, no. I guess a better name for it would be "extreme, adrenalin-pumping rafting," perhaps? During the course of our afternoon adventure, we traversed 22 kilometers of river and nine different rapids. Four of them were rated grade 5 rapids, while the other five were rated grade 4. How would I rate the rapids? Scary as shit. With names like "Hair of the Dog, Condolences, Vengeance, and Graveyard," you can maybe start to get an idea of the experience we had on the river...
Despite Jinga being a very popular adventure destination, we had a small group go out, consisting of only eight people in the raft, along with our guide, Tom. (This is likely because it is rainy season and, hence, there are less tourists.)
Tom has worked on various rivers throughout the world and has been guiding trips for over 4.5 years. In addition to our guide, there was a "safety raft" with another guide and a driver (which tried to take the easy way down the rapids and stay upright), as well as five other employees in kayaks who were there to support us during the trip, should anything go wrong.
From the very beginning, safety was stressed as incredibly important (which made me feel much better!) and we were given snug-fitting life vests and helmets (even better!!). Tom tried to teach us what we should do and how we should act, should we be thrown out of the raft or the raft tips en-route over a rapid. The key is to remain calm, we were told. After living through it, I can tell you that this is much easier said than done... After our crash course in rafting, we headed down the river to tackle our first rapid. I think my heart was beating at least 150 times per minute...
We made it through the first rapid without much issue (meaning, miraculously, everyone stayed in the raft and we didn't flip, although I did manage to lose my paddle on the way down - oops!).
Unfortunately, the same can not be said for the second rapid, when our boat literally went vertical and the entire left-side (I was on the right-side) of the boat was flung in to the water.
From there we battled through a couple more rapids (one of which we had to get out and walk through the top part, as it was considered too dangerous for recreational rafting), choosing the more "extreme" routes when the option arose (I was too chicken-shit to speak up and admit that I was scared out of my mind, but I'm glad we took this route - it was great fun!). There was a rapid-within-a-rapid during one of the routes that is known as "50-50," where basically there is a 50% chance that the raft will make it out right-side up.
We made it out right-side up, which was very exciting, only to have our raft flip (which I think was purposefully done by our guide) when we hit the next wave...
On the fourth rapid, I had a quite scary mishap in which I was flung out of the boat at the top of a long rapid, getting tumbled around underwater for a few seconds (where I literally thought I was going to drown...), only to finally reach the "surface" where I realized that I was traveling underneath the right-side-up raft.
Everything I learned during our crash course quickly went out of my head and, yes, I panicked. I had to crawl my way along the bottom of the raft to get myself out behind, where I finally took a precious breath of air, mixed with tons of Nile water. Only to get beat back down by the next wave. I was probably only under water for about 6-7 seconds (and was rescued by a kayaker and taken to the safely raft within 20-25 seconds), but it was definitely the scariest 6-7 seconds of my life. And I'm pretty sure that I drank at least 2 gallons of Nile water. Yumm... Upon arriving safely in the safety raft, I was, surprisingly, offered a Xanax, which I declined. I took a couple minutes to recover and was offered to spend some time in the safety raft, but decided "Hey, if I made it through that, what could be worse?" and quickly joined the rest of my rafting buddies to finish our adventure.
The rest of the trip was nothing like "smooth sailing," by any means. On the very next rapid, our raft flipped after hitting the first wave, leaving everyone (including our guide!) propelling down the river while our raft floated upside-down behind us (even when the boat flips, many of the rafters - and almost always the guide - still manage to hang on to the side ropes of the raft, keeping it from wandering away).
The safety raft had to throw out a long rope to everyone, where we grabbed on and were hauled in to the safety raft, while the kayakers commandeered our raft and searched for all of our paddles (though I did manage to hold on to my paddle for the entire time, a fact of which I was very proud!).
After the end of our hair-raising rafting adventure, we were treated to an awesome barbecue lunch, complete with Nile beer. Yum.
Although I was terrified during pretty much the entire trip, we ended up having a great time and I am glad that we did it.
Mike would like to point out, however, that he was never scared during the entire trip and that he is a bad-ass. That is what he says (though take a close look at his face in the following picture - he is second from the back on the right - and then make up your own mind...).
He definitely looks scared to me. What an adventure!
ReplyDeleteah! that sounds so scary! glad you guys made it through safely. xo
ReplyDelete