Krista, Mikey and Stanley: May Westwater

In May, we went on Westwater again and it was much warmer! We actually got in the water by choice this time. Our first day was a casual float to our campsite at Little Delores where we hiked to the waterfall! What is usually a little, pretty waterfall running into a small brook was a roaring waterfall running into a river! We took turns climbing up the rockface and jumping into the waterfall. It was cold enough to take my breath away!

Our fearless TL (Trip Leader) Ben Wheat (aka BW, B-Dubb, Benjamin, Sweet Wheat)

Carlee Roderick Wheat (aka C-Rod, Carl)

Thomas Batey (aka Tom, Batey, Tomasso)

Jevan Saddler (aka Jev, Jevers, the Jev Meister)

After a few minutes of working up the courage to jump, Miss Jaimee Gamble took the plunge!

After many others had jumped, I was finally convinced I wouldn't die from the cold or hidden rocks, but I still made Jaimee and Carlee come jump again so I wouldn't chicken out.

In the evening, we played a few new games which involved jumping on each others backs (similar to musical chairs, but with moving people as the chairs) and crawling on peoples backs. As safe as that sounds, you might be surprised to see this injury:

The water flow was in the "Terrible Teens," around 17,000 cfs (cubic feet per second). At this level the rapids are big and unforgiving. At higher levels, the rapids are washed out, and lower levels the rapids are smaller, but the river is more technical due to the exposed rocks. Luckily twelve of the eighteen people on our trip are or have been river guides, so we had experience on our side. We still played it safe, rigged to flip, all wore helmets, and had a serious safety talk. A group floating by during our safety talk asked us if we were doing a safety training course... that's how safe we looked!

Jaimee, Mikey and me on our boat, the Mewok! Jaimee was a bit nervous about the big rapids, but I assured her that we were in good hands with Mikey oaring the boat...

and then he flipped the boat on Skull, the biggest rapid in the river which leads into Shock Rock and the Room of Doom!

Click here to see the video of our flip!

Luckily, all went well with the rescue, we held onto the boat, the waves coming off Shock Rock prevented Jaimee and me from being smashed between the boat and the rock, and we didn't go into the Room of Doom! Our rescue crew was right there to quickly get us out of the water and help flip the boat back over. Two minutes from flip to complete rescue was quite impressive, and we didn't lose any gear at all! Great rescue crew and awesome rigging Mikey!!!

Because Mikey flipped the boat, apparently he had to drink a beer out of a booty. Ugh!