My journal stops here. I didn’t feel like writing.
Today SUCKED. Least favorite part of the trip by far! We woke up and had some breakfast, then waited to raft out. Chulo was our guide, taking Me, Jess, and a couple from NYC. The new wife wasn’t experienced with adventuring in general, and the rest of us were just amateurs when it came to rafting. We waited for a while while some other people rafted in on a day-long rafting trip. Today was the exciting day. Class four rapids. I hate class four rapids.
Well, the other two boats showed up, and we set up our convoy. One guy on a raft with all the gear, two guys on canoes, one to take pictures, and three boats of tourists and guides. Oh, our boat did have one other guy. A guy that wanted to be a river guide.
So we set off, did some class threes, all was going pretty well. The first problem we had was that one of the sections in the middle of our raft came loose, making it difficult to wedge your feet appropriately to stay stable in the boat. We got through and fixed that. Then we started hitting the class four rapids. We made it through the first two okay. On the third set of class four rapids, Jess got sucked out of the boat. Sucked. Look at the pictures. She’s there one second and gone the next. I remember getting hit with a big wave, and then looking around and Jess isn’t there anymore. Neither is the other girl. I turn around and see them both floating through the rapids. Jess’s face is relatively calm, but you can tell the other girl is terrified. We pick up the girl in our boat and one of the canoe guys gets Jessie safe. We pull off to the side to get ready, but you can tell the other girl is still in shock. Jess tells me about getting pulled under. Really, just wait, hold your breath, and try not to panic. Eventually, you’ll get bobbed up again, that’s what the life vest is for. Get some air, and then repeat. Good advice, especially because at the next set of class 4 rapids, we flip the boat.
Everyone gets tossed out. We all hit the water. I drop in near the boat, but my first instinct is to turn around so my feet are facing forward. That’s what they tell you to do, so that you don’t get dragged backwards onto any trees or rocks. When I look behind me to see if I can grab the boat, but I’m already ten or so feet away.
Jess and I are near each other in the water, and I, (somehow) have two paddles with me. She’s making eye contact to make sure I’m okay, and then it’s just us versus the river.
Let me explain something to you, this is TERRIFYING. In my head, I was trying to relax, time my breaths, and look for an opportunity to stop myself or get pulled in. But when you’re getting tossed around in the water like that, your body clenches up, and terror just seizes you from within. This is why waterboarding is torture. Because when your body can’t get enough air, and you think you’re in danger, you get *instinctively* scared. I’m doing my best to keep my head above water and keep air in my lungs, but every once in a while there’s this long ripple of rapid and I’m under water again. It was scary. It was very, very scary.
Jess got rescued first. The same canoe that picked her up before gets her again. The guy asked her if she was alright, and she actually told him to drop her and go after me. “I’m only okay if he’s okay.” Luckily, she stayed with him and he dragged her to the side. Behind us, the boat had gotten upright and came down to pick up Jessie. I, on the other hand, kept going.
Between me and open water were the two other rafts. One tried to toss the emergency rope to me, but it ended up too far away and I couldn’t grab it. The other came after me. They got me up to their side and then pulled me in. I was alright, and after they negotiated a few more rapids, they pulled off to the side to wait for everyone to regroup.
Jess and the rest of my boat came stroking up eventually, and Jess has blood running down her face. I’m surprisingly okay with this, because I know that even a tiny cut will do that, but it’s still a spooky sight. It turns out that when Jess and the NYC guy went through the next set of rapids, she got bonked in the eye with his handle. She actually couldn’t see out of that eye for a while, but she didn’t tell me because we were both panicked enough as it was. And eventually, the sight came back.
We stopped for lunch at this point, and our entire boat is just a wreck. The NYC girl just goes off and cries with her husband for a while, and Jess and I just sit next to each other. Upon further research, we don’t think our lives were actually in any danger, but at the time it felt like we had both just dodged a bullet, and we were really just glad that neither of us were widowers. We would have abandoned the rest of the trip at this point, but the only way out was along the river, and so we had to get back in. I ate some food, for fuel. (There might have been rice or beans, I wasn’t paying attention) Then I got back in that boat, determined to show that stupid river who was boss.
We actually got an addition to our boat, another guide to help us paddle. There was one other class four rapid to negotiate and...we made it through just fine. There was one other gut-wrenching moment when we got the boat stuck on a rock, but we made it through okay. After that, we just rode out the river, and every time we hit rapids I’d start cursing out the river, telling it that it had *nothing* and that I was going to show it who was boss. Eventually, we made it back to land. Sweet, sweet land. Jess and I both showered and got some of the pictures from our harrowing trip, and then we had to endure a bus ride back to the hostel. We were the last people to get dropped off. So we were scared, wet, annoyed and very, very tired. We had some food and then went to lay down, but every time we closed our eyes, we kept seeing water. To try and keep us from obsessing, I came up with a game. It was 20 questions, and we had to guess which of the other favorite moments from the trip we were thinking about. The Peace Lodge, Hunter, Zip-lining, canoe trip together, stuff like that. It helped us relax, but after the adrenaline had worn off, we both felt pretty horrible. Eventually, we fell asleep.
Day 12: Today, we went home. I actually woke up at 2 in the morning and couldn’t get back to sleep. Sleeping at all without obsessing about river water was enough of a task, and I didn’t feel like forcing it, so I just went out into the common room, picked up a random book from the book exchange, and started reading. I got about 250 pages into it before Jess woke up and it was time to get ready to go. We took some video of the hostel, then packed up our stuff and got ready to go. One again, Mayra, our hostel matron, got us a taxi, and we zipped off to the airport. We got there entirely too early, of course, but we hung around and had some food. There was even a cinnabon at the airport. So that was a nice treat. We got on the airplane and flew home, getting through customs no problem. We got picked up by Jessie’s mom and hung out at her house for a while, going through old school notes and family albums. We spent the night, then woke up, flew home, petted our kitties, and then just spent the rest of the weekend glad to be home, safe, and happy.
All in all, it was a really great vacation. We had fantastic time everywhere but that stupid rafting trip. It’s just a shame it was the last thing we did. Of course, if it was the first thing we did, Jess wouldn’t have been able to get me to do *anything* else. “Zip lining? Oh yeah, is this going to be like white water rafting?” But we had a great time, had a wonderful honeymoon, and would definitely recommend Costa Rica to anyone that wants to see some amazing nature up close. Just stay away from the big rafting rivers in the rainy season unless you know what you’re doing.
And...one more movie.
-N
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