I've only gone whitewater rafting once, I think it was also a nice easy class 2, and man it was an absolute blast. Been hankering to get back to it again someday ever since.
One of our group ended up falling in the river when we hit one of the few somewhat dicey patches. I was closest to her so I got to pull her in (and by some miracle remembered how to actually do it the way we were shown). Unfortunately, the sudden shift in weight after she was back onboard tilted the boat just enough that it dumped me in immediately after. And boy it's kind of amazing just how quickly you can lose track of where you are, what direction you're facing, etc.
I was never in any real danger but I was definitely more alert after that!
I did something remarkably similar. My buddy had this look on his face "What's going on? Why's the boat going away?" But I made the great proper-gripping rescue technique that I don't remember at all anymore, but I hauled my buddy out of the American River near Sacramento.
If you're really interested, I'll tell you the story of trying to find a bathroom at the end of the trip.
as we all know, the boat going away is a very sad thing
+10
FishmanPut your goddamned hand in the goddamned Box of Pain.Registered Userregular
It occurs to me that I don't think I've ever gone whitewater rafting, which seems like something I always expected to have done by this stage of my life. I am now somewhat surprised that I have never actually done it, because it is the kind of thing that would be very in line with the kind of things I do and am into.
Brovid Hasselsmof[Growling historic on the fury road]Registered Userregular
Whitewater rafting is one of those things I accept on an intellectual level that people enjoy but absolutely can't understand.
"you know how the sign of a good boat is it stops you from ever going in the water? We have invented a method of boating where the boat is constantly trying to throw you in the water."
It occurs to me that I don't think I've ever gone whitewater rafting, which seems like something I always expected to have done by this stage of my life. I am now somewhat surprised that I have never actually done it, because it is the kind of thing that would be very in line with the kind of things I do and am into.
There’s some pretty good whitewater rafting up my way, apparently.
Whitewater rafting is one of those things I accept on an intellectual level that people enjoy but absolutely can't understand.
"you know how the sign of a good boat is it stops you from ever going in the water? We have invented a method of boating where the boat is constantly trying to throw you in the water."
“What if this inanimate boat behaved like a wild animal when you tried to ride it, would you be interested in that while also being surrounded by water, so you can simultaneously try not to brain yourself while also trying to avoid drowning?”
+12
WeaverWho are you?What do you want?Registered Userregular
Whitewater rafting is basically mechanical bull riding but in nature instead of a bar.
It's a blast.
The very first time I rafted we literally did the last major rapid, got onto relatively calm waters (that were still moving fast), hit the tiniest rock imaginable, and I just flew over the side of the boat and ended up just riding the water down to the out point.
I did whitewater canoeing once, it was "only" a class 3 but considering we were in the Alaskan bush and any injury or loss of equipment would've still potentially meant having to get three days downstream, the vibe was pretty blood-and-thunder
Tynnanseldom correct, never unsureRegistered Userregular
I did a bit of whitewater kayaking in college, around the same Yough/upper Potomac Appalachian streams Jhraggen described on the last page. Really incredible wilderness up there.
Whitewater rafting is basically mechanical bull riding but in nature instead of a bar.
It's a blast.
The very first time I rafted we literally did the last major rapid, got onto relatively calm waters (that were still moving fast), hit the tiniest rock imaginable, and I just flew over the side of the boat and ended up just riding the water down to the out point.
This reads like a bizarro world post.
If someone said these words to me I’d try to comfort them and ask how long the recovery process took.
I've only done whitewater rafting...I guess twice, the first day in a raft and the second day in, effectively, a kayak, and it fucking ruled. I preferred the kayak day because I went straight at all the rapids everyone in the raft wanted to avoid (and also they'd let water out of the dam the night before, or something, so the rapids were much more rapidsy). I was also, like, 17, so I'm sure that had something to do with how much I enjoyed it
Oh, that reminded me I have whitewater river kayaked before and yeah it totally ruled. I was not REMOTELY in control of what was happening at least half the time.
there was one bit where they were like "the trick to this part is that you have to not do anything but sit there. if you do anything you will get fucked up. just let the river pull you through" and they even were like, "if you do not want to do this, you can stand on shore and we'll send your boat through without you, and then you can reembark on the other side" and I was like "absolutely I'm going through that"
anyways I went hiking in the mountains one time and there was a stretch where we could climb up a mountain, just for the view, and I was like, "there is absolutely no way I am doing that, that's scary" and it was basically just walking at a slightly steeper angle than we'd previously been walking, on a narrower path, in case anyone was wondering if I was cool about everything slightly risky
I've gone whitewater rafting twice and I'm good with that. The first time the raft decided it really wanted to stick to the only side of the river with lots of overhanging plants and the second time I caught air, looked down like Wil E Coyote, and immediately slammed back into the boat to compress my spine and knock the wind out of me as the boat started turning around.
Then afterwards I was completely wet both times in open air and that's easily one of my most hated states of being.
there was one bit where they were like "the trick to this part is that you have to not do anything but sit there. if you do anything you will get fucked up. just let the river pull you through" and they even were like, "if you do not want to do this, you can stand on shore and we'll send your boat through without you, and then you can reembark on the other side" and I was like "absolutely I'm going through that"
anyways I went hiking in the mountains one time and there was a stretch where we could climb up a mountain, just for the view, and I was like, "there is absolutely no way I am doing that, that's scary" and it was basically just walking at a slightly steeper angle than we'd previously been walking, on a narrower path, in case anyone was wondering if I was cool about everything slightly risky
I'm not one to take risks at all, but one time when I was like 18 or 19 I visited my mom up in Alaska for Christmas. A few days after I get there my stepdad asked if I wanted to go ride some snowmobiles and I was like sure, sounds fun. So we load em up and take em to Big Lake, and we ride across the lake to where a buddy of his lived. He met up with us and we head out into the woods and everything is going well. We took a break a couple hours later and my stepdad tells me, "Okay, coming up we're going to get onto a river and ride it back to the lake. It's frozen over so we'll be fine, but sometimes the ice gets thin and you'll break through. If you feel yourself start to sink down just hit the gas and push through." I ask him what happens if it's not enough and I fall in and he laughs and says, "Don't let that happen." I was struck with the sudden realization that I could be in actual danger, and that I had to rely on my own ability to stay safe. At one point I did start to break through and I gave it some more gas and got out just fine, but it puckered my butthole so hard I think I stuck to the seat.
Afterwards when we parted ways with his buddy and were headed back across the lake I made a mistake coming up out of a ditch and got thrown over the handlebars and twisted my back real bad, but that wasn't nearly as scary (it sure hurt like hell tho)
+1
Tynnanseldom correct, never unsureRegistered Userregular
It's always interesting to coach a person to do something where there's a point at which the only way out is through.
there was one bit where they were like "the trick to this part is that you have to not do anything but sit there. if you do anything you will get fucked up. just let the river pull you through" and they even were like, "if you do not want to do this, you can stand on shore and we'll send your boat through without you, and then you can reembark on the other side" and I was like "absolutely I'm going through that"
anyways I went hiking in the mountains one time and there was a stretch where we could climb up a mountain, just for the view, and I was like, "there is absolutely no way I am doing that, that's scary" and it was basically just walking at a slightly steeper angle than we'd previously been walking, on a narrower path, in case anyone was wondering if I was cool about everything slightly risky
I'm not one to take risks at all, but one time when I was like 18 or 19 I visited my mom up in Alaska for Christmas. A few days after I get there my stepdad asked if I wanted to go ride some snowmobiles and I was like sure, sounds fun. So we load em up and take em to Big Lake, and we ride across the lake to where a buddy of his lived. He met up with us and we head out into the woods and everything is going well. We took a break a couple hours later and my stepdad tells me, "Okay, coming up we're going to get onto a river and ride it back to the lake. It's frozen over so we'll be fine, but sometimes the ice gets thin and you'll break through. If you feel yourself start to sink down just hit the gas and push through." I ask him what happens if it's not enough and I fall in and he laughs and says, "Don't let that happen." I was struck with the sudden realization that I could be in actual danger, and that I had to rely on my own ability to stay safe. At one point I did start to break through and I gave it some more gas and got out just fine, but it puckered my butthole so hard I think I stuck to the seat.
Afterwards when we parted ways with his buddy and were headed back across the lake I made a mistake coming up out of a ditch and got thrown over the handlebars and twisted my back real bad, but that wasn't nearly as scary (it sure hurt like hell tho)
Some of my cousins grew up in Montana. Most folks who rode snowmobiles on ice would have a milk jug tied to the back with a twenty-foot rope. That way they could find it when they came back with a winch.
There's a certain part of the Arkansas river in Colorado where you end up going through a narrow gap that has only space for one boat between two boulders and both times I've rafted the two different guides explained about how the boulders create this horrid undercurrent that can suck people in and because of how dangerous it is no one knows how deep the channel is.
Like, people have tried using instruments, but no one has gotten solid after even 30 feet.
It's basically the world's actual hell mouth and it's incredible that it's in this secluded little place that you can't even see unless you're literally in a boat.
The folktale I've heard, and I don't know if it's true, is that a few years ago a bloated corpses finally ended up near the shore there and it was like, 50 years old or something. Just stuck swimming around in the undercurrent the whole time.
0
3cl1ps3I will build a labyrinth to house the cheeseRegistered Userregular
That strikes me as probably untrue or exaggerated because 50 years in a marine environment would result in it mostly being disarticulated bones, all the soft tissue would have been eaten and degraded.
Went back and looked through the original boatstuck thread, forgot I was the one who made it lol. Good times. God I can't believe it was in march 2021, 2 whole years ago, and a year into the pandemic already.
Sounds like the Strid in the UK. Looks like an innocent babbling brook, has a 100% mortality rate for anyone who goes in the water because it extends to unknown depths filled with caves and has a fierce undercurrent just beneath the surface of the water to drag anyone down to the abyss
Sounds like the Strid in the UK. Looks like an innocent babbling brook, has a 100% mortality rate for anyone who goes in the water because it extends to unknown depths filled with caves and has a fierce undercurrent just beneath the surface of the water to drag anyone down to the abyss
I thought that other one sounded familiar but this is the one I was thinking of.
Posts
I did something remarkably similar. My buddy had this look on his face "What's going on? Why's the boat going away?" But I made the great proper-gripping rescue technique that I don't remember at all anymore, but I hauled my buddy out of the American River near Sacramento.
If you're really interested, I'll tell you the story of trying to find a bathroom at the end of the trip.
"you know how the sign of a good boat is it stops you from ever going in the water? We have invented a method of boating where the boat is constantly trying to throw you in the water."
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
“What if this inanimate boat behaved like a wild animal when you tried to ride it, would you be interested in that while also being surrounded by water, so you can simultaneously try not to brain yourself while also trying to avoid drowning?”
Chief O'Brien?
picard has a robot heart, give this poor dude a flange so he can raft
It's a blast.
The very first time I rafted we literally did the last major rapid, got onto relatively calm waters (that were still moving fast), hit the tiniest rock imaginable, and I just flew over the side of the boat and ended up just riding the water down to the out point.
This reads like a bizarro world post.
If someone said these words to me I’d try to comfort them and ask how long the recovery process took.
They did.
They have.
Over and over.
But his arm is just the perfect design to destroy all shoulder replacements.
Because O'Brien Must Suffer.
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better
bit.ly/2XQM1ke
And step family...
~ Buckaroo Banzai
anyways I went hiking in the mountains one time and there was a stretch where we could climb up a mountain, just for the view, and I was like, "there is absolutely no way I am doing that, that's scary" and it was basically just walking at a slightly steeper angle than we'd previously been walking, on a narrower path, in case anyone was wondering if I was cool about everything slightly risky
Then afterwards I was completely wet both times in open air and that's easily one of my most hated states of being.
I'm not one to take risks at all, but one time when I was like 18 or 19 I visited my mom up in Alaska for Christmas. A few days after I get there my stepdad asked if I wanted to go ride some snowmobiles and I was like sure, sounds fun. So we load em up and take em to Big Lake, and we ride across the lake to where a buddy of his lived. He met up with us and we head out into the woods and everything is going well. We took a break a couple hours later and my stepdad tells me, "Okay, coming up we're going to get onto a river and ride it back to the lake. It's frozen over so we'll be fine, but sometimes the ice gets thin and you'll break through. If you feel yourself start to sink down just hit the gas and push through." I ask him what happens if it's not enough and I fall in and he laughs and says, "Don't let that happen." I was struck with the sudden realization that I could be in actual danger, and that I had to rely on my own ability to stay safe. At one point I did start to break through and I gave it some more gas and got out just fine, but it puckered my butthole so hard I think I stuck to the seat.
Afterwards when we parted ways with his buddy and were headed back across the lake I made a mistake coming up out of a ditch and got thrown over the handlebars and twisted my back real bad, but that wasn't nearly as scary (it sure hurt like hell tho)
It was interesting having that realization! Not exactly pleasant, but interesting nonetheless
Some of my cousins grew up in Montana. Most folks who rode snowmobiles on ice would have a milk jug tied to the back with a twenty-foot rope. That way they could find it when they came back with a winch.
Like, people have tried using instruments, but no one has gotten solid after even 30 feet.
It's basically the world's actual hell mouth and it's incredible that it's in this secluded little place that you can't even see unless you're literally in a boat.
I thought that other one sounded familiar but this is the one I was thinking of.
That
shit
is
terrifying
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
edit: i think it's this one🫠
It's like a mimic posing as a creek, just straight up premeditated homicide.
Tom Scott did a video on The Strid a while ago.
There is also the 1896 short story, "The Striding Place" that's a spooky little read.
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
I like/hate how it's narrow enough that people are tempted to just hop across it. It's the geographical equivalent of an anglerfish.