September 11, 2006

The Magnetic Wall






(The first picture is of the rapid called Sock-it-to-Me; it's from the all about rafting.com website. The second picture is of Funnel Falls from the Canyon Voyages Adventure Co. website)

So this weekend we went rafting along the great Westwater Canyon. It was a blast! I rode in a 16 foot paddle raft so I was really close to the action…perhaps too close as 5 out of 7 people (including me) high-sided and got dumped in a class-IV rapid called Sock-it-to-Me. We went through the rapid ok, but then the waters slammed us into some rocks called the magnetic wall. Below is a video of someone else going through the same rapid. You’ll see that they get pretty close to the magnetic wall…which is where I fell out. It was still a blast though! And luckily I got back into the raft before hitting another rapid.

To see the video, Click http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=68176095480347800

To see more of where I went, Google Westwater Canyon and click on Google Images.

And if you're wondering, YES, I would do it all over again!




4 comments:

raxiro said...

si me gusto el paraiso

Susie said...

Gracias!

Anonymous said...

Ooh...Shivers. We once almost flipped in Sock-it-to-Me. Everyone else was able to get back into the boat, but I got carried into the eddy and banged along the wall as I went back upstream, swallowing water the whole way. It was awful! Thank goodness the guy in the raft behind ours had good aim with the throw rope! Glad you made it out okay and had a good time.

Susie said...

Wow, that would be scary, but I'm glad you lived to tell the tale! There are so many cool stories about Westwater.

Yeah, luckily I flipped out and went away from the rocks. I was only in the water for about a minute, trying to swim back to the raft and I'll tell you what...that was exhausting! Once I got back into the raft, I was pretty useless for helping to paddle through Last Chance. But I wouldn't change anything about the trip and I'll make sure to take a paddle raft for future Westwater trips!