Today four of us lads decided to hit it hard on the rapids! We woke early once again, got kitted up in the freezing cold and made our way up the valley in a minivan. After about 20 minutes the van stopped, we all got out and got in the raft!
Once we were going down stream the idea was very much to learn on the job! The four of us were spread around the raft with the instructor at the back steering and shouting commands! At first we only did Grade 2 rapids, which were really fun but the only commands were 'easy forward' and 'hard forward'. I.e. chill out a bit or get moving lads!
At this point I fell in! Although, I felt a tiny bit set up as we had only just got in and we were smashed into a rock right on my side, at the front where I was, and I went swimming! Although Harry who had to pull me back in board kept shouting "GET THE PADDLE". - Glad to see he has his priorities in order, paddle before mate! He did pull me in first after a bit of persuasion and we collected the paddle before moving on!
The commands got more interesting as the grades increased! Things like 'back paddle', 'right side' or 'left side' (everyone goes to the same side of the boat to tilt it) and 'HOLD ON', which was always done the quickest!
As we went downstream more the grades got harder! We ended up doing about 4 Grade 5 rapids which were awesome! Got really thrown around! At one point, the boat got trapped between two rocks and the current was rushing over the top! We got told, "Everyone to the front of the boat" so Me and Harry jumped forward and George and Josh jumped on us! Then the instructor said "That's not the front, keep going". We were almost kissing the water when the boat finally gave in and was released from the rocks! Really thrilling how you really have to pay attention, and it's good teamwork!
There were rapids that we got to ride without the raft, so we jumped out and floated on down! Put Centre Parcs to shame! Great fun!
We did some more serious rafting where Harry almost came out big time, if it wasn't for his foot trapped in the boat holding him in! After that, we got paddled to shore and got told to get out, climb this rock and wait for instruction at the top! At the top our instructor was in the boat at the bottom and shouted "Jump". Josh was first and replied, "What! From here!?" He ended up jumping! Harry followed easy and as I got to the front I looked down! It was about a seven meter drop with a few rocks to miss on the way down! I stepped forward as George behind me asked' "do we have to jump?". I pushed off hard and fell to the water! Easy after jumping out of a plane!
We headed back down streams and ended up at the lodge again. We had a hearty lunch to warm us up and jumped on the bus towards Wellington.
On our way we stopped at a place called Bulls for a break. Was cool as they all had places named after the town. So the bank was called Bankabulls. Police station Constabulls ect.
We got to Wellington around 5 and as part of our hostel got a free chicken salad meal which didn't have any chicken in. We chilled out and went out on the town! Saw some live music which was cool and then took a taxi home and got back at 3am. Knowing I had to be up at 6am wasn't great!