River Wild...well sort of...

So I'm not the most outdoorsy guy in the world. I have a web page and like video games...that right there should tell you that I'm not cut out for the next episode of "Survivor." Don't get me wrong, I don't mind being in the great outdoors, but it usually has to be on my terms...meaning, perfect temperature, I have absolutely nothing else on my agenda, and the event has to be well planned out with some structure and activities...I'm OCD like that, but that's another story for another day.

Anyway, over last year, Kim and I decided to try out luck at the world of river rafting. Nothing too wild and crazy, just a little summer activity for Ethan (8 years old) and Ryan (5 years old) to get into with us. Kim and I went down the Payette river with my dad, sister, and brother-in-law a few years ago, and we all had an absolute blast. It's pretty rough in spots and we managed to get plenty wet, but it's not something I would take my kids on at their current ages.

Anyway, last year we bought our gear and took a few runs down the Boise river, which for the record is probably the easiest river to navigate and for the most part is waist to shin high in depth...not much rougher than a mill pond, Below is the roughest part of the entire ride...nothing terrifying by any means:



Anyway, a couple of weeks ago we decide to take a quick run down the Boise, and little did we know...it was gonna get wild. I had my shoes off and my swimming suit drawstring not done up...no big deal...it's the Boise River right? Well, under the Broadway bridge there's a sign that informs rafters to keep right since there's a set of rapids that could pull you into the brush...not a good thing with a raft. I'm looking around and as we make the turn to head into the first swell, another raft to our right picked up speed and all of a sudden we t-boned the side of it flipping our raft completely over backwards. Keep in mind, this water comes out of the bottom of Lucky Peak reservoir further up the river and felt like absolute ice when we went in. Unfortunately for all of us, this was a deep part of the river and the rapids were sweeping us all away. When I came to my senses and realized that this was not going to be cool, I immediately grabbed onto Ryan and had to hold onto someone else's tube. Ethan on the other hand was about 20 yards away from me and terrified as he floated further and further away from me screaming for me to come get him. Oh yeah, thank freakin goodness the kids had life jackets on!!! I saw Kim, but she eventually disappeard down the river.

As I'm trying to get my sons gathered up and calmed down, I'm still in some very swift water and I noticed that I'm feeling a little more 'natural' than normal downstairs and suddenly realized that my swimming suit, you know, the suit that I had mentioned was NOT cinched up?...was down around my ankles. I became quite the contortionist in freezing cold water while holding onto my kids, and getting banged up in the rocks...but come hell or high water, I was NOT going to wind up on the shore suitless, even though I would have impressed the masses. ;)

With the help of other VERY concerned rafters, many came to our aid and finally the boys and I made it to the shore, and we finally met up with Kim. Other than a few bruises and damage to one of my toes everthing turned out ok...well, other than the future therapy my boys will probably need to get them back on the river...heh heh!

It's somewhat embarrassing to say that all of this 'drama' went down on the Boise River, but you never know what can happen in the water. I'm so thankful that my kids had their lifejackets on, otherwise I could have been in the horrible situation of "which child do I go after first?" How does someone make that choice? Life can change in the blink of an eye...you never know when your clock is gonna get punched...it was a nice wakeup call.

More than anything, I'm just glad Boise didn't open the newspaper and see a naked man holding his terrified boys after a rafting accident on the EASIEST river in Idaho!

Cheers!