A Close Call

I know most of you probably read my Mom's blog to get here... and I think you need to hear my side of the story of her last post to really get it.

It all started 2 weeks ago, at FFA camp.
The archery...
Walking on logs & ropes 20 feet in the air...The kayaking...
The adrenaline rush of it all.

It got me pretty convinced I could do it all.Then I went off to Look Up Lodge. Again, more kayaking, zip lining, face plants...

...most importantly, KAYAKING.

So I'm all like, "MESS WITH ME!" 

Then I go camping with my family... and we go tubing. And this is no white water we're tubing on, this is a LAZY river. Completely lazy, I had to paddle with my hands if I wanted any speed at all. The only time it gor "crazy" was when I turned my tube in circles really fast. Oh, and I passed some ducks that I thought were gonna attack me.
So that disappointed me a little. No adrenaline rush. No real excitement. 

But the next day my family decides it's time to take it up a notch and go white water rafting on the Nantahala River, which I've done before.

Afraid of the lack-of-excitement a regular old raft may bring, I decided to take it up a notch. Those two weeks of camps got me pretty confident in my paddling skills, so I decided I would go out on my own private duckie.

I was pretty confident, until the guy told me about all the rocks I had to avoid.

One had a cave underneath that would suck me under, the other would suck me in, spin me around and then spit me out... He told of waves that would knock me over and rocks under the river that would grab my feet and send me face first into the river... Yeah, I got pretty nervous. In my mind, I just didn't want to break a leg or something, of course then my sister Patti starts talking about me dying...

Good thing I just got back from Look Up, me and God are on good terms right now.

So I get in my duckie and we go down the river for about 2 hours. It was soo much fun. These waves were bigger than anything I'd expected.

So what happened when I almost died was...I was following a raft that had my sister & uncle on it, and, since I was so confident, I was the lead duckie. 

I come up to what looks like an easy waterfall, and I'm pretty excited because it's white water, which always means FUN!

But then this guy who was stopped above the fall starts yelling at me to go left. At this point, I was about 3 feet from the fall, so I couldn't help where I went down it.

And HOLY CRAP I just realized, this is the fall the guy said stay left or right at because the center would suck you in, spin you around and spit you out.

Atleast it will spit you out, right?

So I go down this thing and my duckie doesn't tip - so I think I'm safe. When suddenly, my duckie's not going anywhere.

Oh my goodness, this rock is sucking my duckie towards it... Oh my goodness my paddle is gone, Holy crap just let it go.

I was literally up the creek without a paddle.

Not a good feeling. Then this rock spits my duckie out, and sucks me in and starts spinning me around like the waves in the ocean, until it finally spits me out!

My dad says he saw my duckie go flying in the air.

So after I just thought I was drowning, I could suddenly breath. I was calm, because I knew I lived and I was so happy to breath. 

Until... something else pulled me under.

HOLY CRAP not another one... I thought I was going to die.

Then, when I came back up, I saw about 20 people standing on land watching me. Doing NOTHING. So I yelled to them to save me. I don't think I should have been the one to think of that... but some man finally throws a life saver out to me, and tells me to swim to it. 

This river has the strongest current, even if I wasn't tired as crap after almost drowning, I'm pretty sure I couldn't swim to it. 

Luckily the current brought it to me, and the guy's just standing there, not helping me at all. The only way he helped me was by not letting go of the floaty thing.

But I finally got to where I could stand, and I see a raft floating down the river with my dad holding on to his empty duckie, and I find out that my cousin Brian and my dad went through the same crap as me. And then I saw the pictures....

HILARIOUS!