Rules of the River when floating

Today, we went on a rafting trip. I blogged about it later down in the page, but you can look at the pictures and then read the event we had mid-way through the trip. This was us just getting started in our four boats. It is hard because all the kids wanted to ride with one another, which you know would never fly. All kids had to be in life jackets and we had to have them with us--now why would we ever need them?

Dana and Grandpa taking care of the boat as they started out.

Isabelle, Abby, and Astrid were on the girl boat starting out. It was quiet and non-chaotic.

Little Sophia getting ready to enter back into the boat after some people jumped off a rope swing that we found on the side of the river. we had a great time jumping off even though it was a bit chilly.

This was Scott jumping off before his wife to prove his manliness. The last time I saw him jump off a rope swing into the water was at his college graduation when he did it in the nude. Much better with shorts on.

This was Isabelle jumping off the rope swing. Jonah did it as well, but he didn't do it until he saw other people do it.

They had to work hard trying to get each person up there and then catch the rope with a long stick.

Grandma keeping Nate warm after he had jumped in the water.

Here is Robb and Reba on the back of the boat--more story to follow. We never should have picked the back of the boat.

Scott and Lara taking a moment on our boat to snuggle until we pushed them into the water.

Eli taking over the captain position on the boat.

Another dry picture of Rebecca and I prior to the sinking of the ship.

Jacob hopped around from boat to boat, depending on his mood.

The boys hanging out.

This is what our boat looked like after part of it popped. So funny. All it would have taken it one more hit, and she would have sank completely.

Occasionally, we tied all the boats together to transfer kids or share snacks. It was crazy but fun.

Scott thinking that he is in control of the river, which he never was.

This was us coming in to meet the company. There boat was at least in tact.

The van picked us up and we were trashed but had a great time. Now, the story to follow so that you all can hear what happened on our day of rafting. Here you go. Enjoy!!

Most of us would say that "floating" a river shouldn't be something that should cause too much stress. Now mind you, there were 22 of us floating down the river in four big rafts. You could hear us coming a mile away. It took enough time for all of us just to get down to the water, figure out which boat each person was going to be in, and finally make sure everyone had gone to the bathroom and had enough snacks. It was partly cloudy but we started out anyway. We had a good time and just a half hour in, we found a rope swing and various people swung off making of statement of their strength. We do have some pictures of that but they are on other people's camera's-more to follow. We floated down the river more and at this time, Reba, myself, Scott, Lara, Jacob, and Eli were all in our raft. We came over to the side of the river to try and let Lara off to use the bathroom and pick up Jacob from the shore since he had jumped off into the water. We were coming in fast and right towards and large, pointy, stick protruding out from the landscape. We heard a large popping sound, and just like in the movies, Scott turned and yelled in slow motion, "NOOOOOOOOOOO", diving out of the way saving himself from disaster. At first, the family thought that the multiple fiber bars had caught up with Robb throughout the day, but this wasn't the case. We knew that something had gone very wrong since the massive air exiting the boat blew against the dirt filling the air with dust. We could also tell from the loud sound of air moving out of our boat. Rebecca and I were sitting at the back of the boat and we started falling backwards. Everyone says that Rebecca's face was awesome to watch as she realized that she was going back into the water and down with the ship. Rebecca and I fell off into the water as everyone watched both in amazement and in humor. I immediately made sure to grab the soft cooler of snacks and then I made sure my wife was alright. Rebecca grabbed onto Jacob which sent him into a tailspin, so we had to grab him out of the water and help calm him down as Rebecca and I tried to stand to our feet. Lara was both laughing and trying to help out and Scott had a look of amazement on his face, much like a captain does as the ship goes down. Then, we all started laughing. Two of the other boats got caught in the current and had a hard time getting back to us. We had to then tie up the boat, the portion that was popped, since there were three other chambers that could possible help us float down the rest of the river. Scott and I took on a McGeiver move and tied up the front of the boat and began scooping out the water. We shifted other children to different boats and Scott, Lara, and I decided to ride the boat the rest of the way. We were sitting quite low in the boat so we shifted things around and sat on life jackets. We felt like we were munchkins sitting low. Other people would pass by in their canoes and give us a very funny look. We had to yell across the river, "We ran into a large stick and popped part of the boat." We finally did pull into the spot where they picked us up and the staff said, "what happened to this boat?" We had to make sure our stories were straight, but we got off without having to pay a fee to fix the boat. We were wet, tired, but had a great time in that 3 hour tour. My mom brought her camera along so I will get some of those pictures posted on the blog so you can see how much fun we had. Once we got home, we were tired, but of course with a lot of kids, there still is swimming, tennis, bike riding, movies, and the hot tub. It was a great day and memorable.

Robb