Hello everyone! I know it's been a while since my last post, ten months to be exact. But to be honest, I've been really busy enjoying my life out here in West Virginia. (Not to mention I don't have access to the internet all that often) :)
My season as a raft guide this summer wrapped up in late October during the end of Gauley Season. I had checked out, or become certified, on the Lower Gauley as well as the New, and took some very crazy thrill seekers down 2 very technical rivers. It was super scary, and unbelievably exciting. Training on the New River in the Spring introduced me to the fears of undercut rocks and foot entrapments, so learning the Gauley was just a new area of dangers. But the Gauley, being a Class V+ damn release river, was bigger, colder, faster and much more intimidating. Needless to say, I guided the Lower portion and not the Upper.
The Upper Gauley is infamous for it's dangerous Class V's, which claimed four lives this past season. I was present for one of those unfortunate fatalities. It was a freezing cold overcast Friday near the end of the season, and I was on a Double Upper training trip. While we were on the bus traveling back upstream to put in for our second run, we heard a call over the radio from one of our own on a different trip. She radioed in for assistance for a man who had been without pulse or breath for 20 minutes. Before we put our rafts back in for our second leg, we huddled together and agreed to make sure the guests stayed unaware of the situation taking place down river. All we knew was that one of our Ace trips had a fatality downstream in a portion of the Class V rapid Lost Paddle, known as "Tumble Home". As we neared Lost Paddle, we saw the emergency medical helicopter taking off. Then we saw an Ace raft with one of it's tubes deflated pulled up on the rocks on the tree line. We assumed they left it that way so no one could steal it. Then we came upon the trip itself. They were grouped together in an eddy, with pale sullen faces staring blankly off into the distance as if they'd seen a ghost. It was clear to our guests what had just happened here, and they started to whisper about it. "I don't know what happened, but I'm sure everything is fine." Is all we would and could say to them. Finally we made it to the take out, after two hours of me telling oddball 'happy place' stories in attempt to keep the moral up. As we're getting everyone loaded up on the bus, our River manager Bo comes along and tells Kirk, my boyfriend, that 4 people needed to go get 'the boat'. I knew I was more warmly dressed than most of my fellow raft guide friends, so I immediately volunteered to go along. We were then driven back up stream, and dropped off equipped with a pump to inflate the boat and a paddle. The paddle came in useful on the quarter mile hike down to the boat, considering it was slightly more than a vertical drop to the river. We learned that a boat had flipped in Tumble Home, and another raft picked up all the swimmers but one. With the weight of 11 people in his boat, he got stuck on a rock. They decided to deflate one of the tubes after 20 minutes of not being able to get loose, and when they did a body floated out from under. So when we made it to the boat, it was a horrific sight of torn wetsuit gear, used medical supplies and a few spots of blood. It was if we were paddling a crime scene down the river.
After that, slowly but surely all my friends left for the season. Kirk and I were living in a bus in the Bone Yard at Ace, and getting ready to move to Snowshoe for the winter. It had been a wonderful experience making new friends, challenging myself physically and mentally on the river, learning how to survive outdoors, and partying like a raft guide. An experience I am now addicted to, and look forward to doing again and again.
Now, living at Snowshoe Mountain Resort for the winter, I am selling tickets to pay the bills and snowboarding in my free time. Some of my friends also live up here, so the atmosphere is similar to rafting season, with the outdoor adventure activities and the late night debauchery. Kirk is a Snow Patroller, so we're not short on the excitement of injuries either. He broke his collar bone the third day we were open when he fell on his snowboard and landed on his radio, and hasn't been released to ride since then. We've had 145 inches of snow, over 12 feet, since the beginning of the season and it's been absolutely beautiful out here. I've learned from having my Jeep stuck 4 times that my tires are not "all terrain", but I do think I'm getting better at driving through all types of crappy winter conditions. Plus, the house we rent is in between two farms, so waking up to the sound of cows mooing or sheep baaing is not uncommon. And, we eat deer meat regularly that was "harvested" in our own back yard. (It's all natural Caroline!)
Well, that's all for now, feel free to come and visit me anytime!
Much Love, Lindsay
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
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