Sat
Jan
12
2008
Tuesday June 8th 2004
6:00pm
Somewhere around N 16’54.60 W 93’38.70
Well, yesterday was quite the eventful day. I can hardly move right now. Every part of my body aches – I am so sore. My fingers can barely grip this pen. The river is a bit larger now and we hit numerous rapids throughout the day. Most of them were passable, but some were not. On the latter ones we would skim our kayaks over the rocks by hand, and then lower them slowly on the narrow spots. Most of the day Jason was very weak because he vomited the night before and he couldn’t eat anything all day. Yesterday it rained most of the day and by mid-afternoon we pulled into a wide sandbar on the side of the river and cooked up some pasta under a large overhang. It was Jason’s first food in a long time.
We were able to get a GPS location from that last point, and figured that we needed to make some more headway, and so we took off all refreshed and ready. Barely had we made it around a couple of bends that we got both pounded hard in a large, rapid, channel. After scouting it out, we concluded that there was nothing we could do but attempt it – and that decision took its toll. What happened then was very similar for both of us. The current slammed our Kayaks sideways up against a big rock, and within seconds the kayaks filled with water and flipped over. We both lost everything. Every piece of luggage, both paddles, everything went floating down stream. After about 45 minutes we were able to round up most of the stuff, but Jason took off downstream to find his paddle. I stayed in the rapids for a while, but finally concluded that my own paddle was nowhere to be found, and might possibly also be downstream. So, then I took off downstream, swamped in my little boat and with no way to paddle but my bare hands on the outside. Going down the next few rapids I felt like a little cork bouncing down a river, totally uncontrollable. Luckily my kayak just sort of followed the main channel.
Well we decided to spend the night right away, and of course everything was soaked. It was dark, we both had a number of cuts and scrapes, and sand was stuck to everything. But hey, even with all that there’s still so much gleam in these eyes (look at my eyes) – we’re having a serious blast. So what if we lose everything and have to walk out??? We spent a good portion of the evening, cutting down branches, weaving, and whittling a paddle together. We’ll see if it works.
Right across from camp we saw a creature that at first looked like a monkey, but later looked like a marsupial or mongoose or something I’ve only seen in zoos.
Well, as I lie in bed this morning, it’s my turn to be as weak as a butterfly because I vomited myself all last night. I’m very tired and weak right now from throwing up, and every inch of my body aches from head to toe. Whew, yesterday was quite a day, hopefully today’s is better. Luckily it is not cold because we sleep right on our mattress pads on the tent floor without coverings. Jason’s blanket is soaked, and all I need is just a sheet to keep all the sand off my pad, and I stay the perfect temperature all night. We tried to get up early so we could take off, but I’m falling back asleep and Jason went to go look for my paddle upstream and maybe he’ll get lucky and find it. Well, it’s Tuesday morning and I’m falling back to sleep to try and catch up a little sleep. My gut sort of feels a little wrenched out.
