Most of the decisions I’m making on this trip are made after
being unable to answer the question: “Well you’re here, so why not?!” That’s
how I ended up taking two days to jump off a ledge almost 150 feet above the
Nile River and go rafting, for the first time ever, in class V white water
rapids.
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| Our "team", before we started |
Adrift Adventures picked my friends and me up in Kampala
early in the morning and drove us out (about an hour and a half) to the
starting point for our adventure up the river. As we boarded the raft and
went over the instructions, my friends and I tried making jokes to hide our
fear, but the guide kept on with his straight faced tips, which made us second
guess this decision even more.
Soon enough, we were approaching our first rapid and I was
yelling at myself "WHYDOYOUALWAYSDOSTUPIDSTUFFLIKETHISYOUARESOSTUPIDTHISWASASTUPIDIDEAANDNOWITSTOOLATETOTURNAROUND!!" for allowing it to come this far. But, we made it through and
it was awesome! Moving over the rapids while in the raft you are literally walking
on rapid waters (well, sitting and gliding on it really). It’s like a roller
coaster, but way, way cooler.
Our raft floated along thirty or so kilometers (almost twenty miles) of the Nile,
with rapids interrupted by occasional patches of calm water. Then, our guide
told us we were coming up on the most intense rapid of the course. We had three
routes to choose from. The first was called “chicken walk”, the second was
something else mellow sounding, and the third was “the bad place”. This third option is only available when the waters are really high, "like today", otherwise it's too dangerous because there are so many rocks and the water can suck you down too far. Really, we
didn’t have a choice.
As we made our way towards the rapid, the clouds became grey
and we heard thunder in the distance. “If I were going to write a horror story
about rafting, this is how it would start,” joked Sera, nervously. We got out
of the raft to walk around the class VI rapid, and before I knew it we were
bracing ourselves for "the bad place".
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| Tipping over in "the bad place" |
It took about four seconds for our raft to tip over, and as
our guide had instructed, I curled myself up into fetal position and tried to
mentally put myself in a “happy place” as the water pushed me left, right, up,
and down. I know I made it to five counting slowly, thinking about my "happy place"; I tried to remain calm
for what felt like at least another ten seconds –but was probably three-, and
then I started to panic. Luckily, as I flared my hands upwards like a lunatic, I felt air, and soon
enough I got a breath of air, before water pushed me back under.
One of the wonderful safety guides quickly came on kayak to
get me, and in no time we were all back on the raft laughing, wanting another.
Adrenaline is crazy like that—not even five minutes earlier I had thought I was
going to die, and now I couldn’t wait to be in the same position again.
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| Coming up for air |
We floated down the water for a while longer before hitting
our final rapid, which was relatively calm compared to the previous, but still an
enormous amount of fun. Here our guide actually instructed us to allow
ourselves to go over the rapid twice, which was awesome.
After rafting we were treated to a delicious lunch buffet
and driven to the Adrift lodge, right outside Jinja. If you find yourself in
Uganda, white water rafting is an absolute must, and I highly recommend going
through Adrift and staying at their lodge. While you sit at the bar, you look
over the world’s greatest river, and watch people bungee jump in front of you,
all while drinking a cold Nile Special beer. The atmosphere is great too—you’re
surrounded by a ton of adrenaline junkies!
To wrap up the trip, the next morning my friends and I
climbed the stairs up to the bungee jumping platform… and jumped! I don’t have
much to say about bungee jumping, because there really isn’t much to it. I
climbed the stairs to the top, I watched my friend before me jump, I sat in the
chair while they strapped me up, I walked to the ledge while following
instructions and making sure I did not look down, I counted down from five, and
then I jumped, screaming bloody murder. I’m really glad I did it, but I have no
desire to do it again (Dad, you can breathe easy now). After rafting, I felt a great
sense of accomplishment. I had helped paddle the raft, and swam myself to
safety-- albeit with a lot of assistance. After bungee jumping, I just felt
sore. Still, it was an unforgettable experience and I feel so lucky to have had
the opportunity to do it all, and come out alive to tell you about it.
