My Nyami Nyami pendant necklace came untied yesterday. When I took off my life jacket at lunch, I noticed that it wasn’t around my neck anymore. I thought it was gone. But, thankfully, I found it in the lower part of my shirt around my torso. Not wanting to lose it for good, I put it inside our dry bag at lunch yesterday, and I decided not to take another chance of losing it today by putting it back on so I left it in our tent this morning. With how our day unfolded on the river today, I realized that this was a big mistake. Don’t anger Nyami Nyami!
We had the option to run the same rapids as yesterday again today. If I was naive as to what I was in for yesterday, then today I was just plain stupid since I knew what was coming now. Part of me didn’t want to push my luck since we survived yesterday relatively unscathed. What were the odds of that happening again today? I was only going back out if my entire boat crew was all in (which they were). When Debra asked me in the morning how I was feeling, I replied, “Terrified.” She asked, “Then, why are you doing this?” Sigh, good question, Debra. Probably something about not letting my fear hold me back from adventure. I was honestly quite surprised at the number of folks who were up for round two today – only four people opted to stay at camp for the day and one woman (who went overboard yesterday) was transported early to our final lodge. The staff did a great job accommodating everyone’s needs, even bringing in a massage therapist down to camp later in the day.
Italo led a morning yoga class on an old helipad for those who were interested before breakfast. As much as I would have liked to join, I didn’t want to put any pressure on my arm which was still hurting. I took Advil when I woke up this morning and hoped for the best with paddling.
After breakfast, we had a very steep hike from our riverside beach camp up and out of the gorge. Halfway through I was questioning myself again why I was doing this! The trail was primarily loose rock, and I was on my hands and knees a lot due to how steep the trail was. It made me appreciate even more the dancers who had hiked down this last night and the porters who carried all of our gear in and out.
Once we finally emerged at the top, I was surprised to find local vendors waiting for us to sell their wares. I’m always up for a little shopping! Then, we loaded into the truck to drive back to Lookout Cafe in Vic Falls. What goes up must come down! Now, we had to hike back down to the bottom of the gorge via the same trail as yesterday. Thankfully, I had an easier time today with less items obstructing the view of my footing. I opted to switch to my Merrell minimalist trail shoes on the raft today instead of my Chacos. This worked out much better because the ballast was rubbing my toes yesterday when I locked in my right foot to secure myself (Kurt came to the same conclusion with his footwear choice for the day).
With fewer people today, we only needed two rafts instead of three. We had to reshuffle passengers too, and Gail ended up in our boat in the back with me today. With only two rafts, we also made faster progress downriver.
Things got real again in Rapid #5. Stewart’s raft flipped ahead of us, and Diego reminded us to focus on ourselves as we prepared to enter the rapid. After yesterday, Kurt knew that we’d take a big hit of water in this rapid, so he closed his eyes and came through with both contacts intact.
Rapid #6 brought what I was afraid of. Unbeknownst to my teammates in front of me (but, obviously not to Diego who was behind me), I got thrown from the boat, likely from the impact of a wave on my side. I found myself underneath the boat, and I stayed calm at first because I knew that I was supposed to track my fingers in one direction on the raft above me then I would pop out from underneath once I was clear and I could grab the rope. But, that’s not quite what happened because I didn’t make it out from underneath the raft. I got pulled down into a whirlpool instead, which was very, very scary. I was swirling around underwater, and I couldn’t get myself up to the surface (despite the buoyancy of the life jacket). What felt like several minutes to me was in reality not that much time at all based on this video.
I was shaken up afterwards, but I had to get ready for the big rapid ahead – #7. This is a rapid that you definitely don’t want to flip in – we saw that firsthand yesterday with Stewart’s raft.
Thankful to have made it through #7 (claiming only a bit of blood from Karen’s lip), next we had the portage at #9 again then lunch after #10.
We knew that The Mother (#13) was looming ahead after lunch. And, she had her way with us again today. Our raft flipped toward the bottom of the rapid, shortly after Diego declared that we were good. While we cleared the massive first wave(s) cleanly, we re-entered the current and The Mother slapped us back down in one of the later waves. Our videographer, Isaac, later told us that he knew we were in a bad spot at that point so he kept shooting and captured our less-than-graceful ride (and swim) through the end of the rapid. Oh, look, I’m under the raft again. We swirled through the final part of the whitewater then things calmed down under the boat and I was able to take advantage of the air pocket. I found myself in Diego’s spot at the back of the boat, so I was able to hold onto a metal bar and try to get my breath. I didn’t know it at the time, but Kurt was also underneath the raft and we were both the last ones to come out. The safety kayakers and Stuart’s raft were nearby, so they were able to help us out of the water while we waited for Diego to turn our boat back over. Kurt thought that he lost his left contact again in the chaos, but thankfully he found it in his eye when we got back to camp later (He said he might need to get LASIK before our next rafting trip – ha, ha).
Oblivion (#18) gave us a little more excitement than it did yesterday, but at this water level it certainly didn’t live up to its reputation.
When we arrived back at camp, I felt like a traumatized soldier returning from battle as I was walking from the river up to the tents. We all joined the Zambezi Swim Team today! I immediately put my Nyami Nyami necklace back on when I got to my tent. Do not mess with Nyami Nyami! Honestly though, we made it through two of the situations that I had been most afraid of – getting caught underwater in a whirlpool and having our raft flip. Hopefully this will inspire more confidence that I can deal with these situations if/when they happen again…because I don’t want to give up big water rafting due to fear. I mean, just look at the demographics of our group here! There’s no reason that we can’t continue doing this for many, many more years ahead.
Later that evening, we had dinner around the campfire, sharing stories from the day. The highlight was when our local guides sang for us! We pack up from this camp tomorrow morning and head further downstream into the unknown again. You can bet that I’ll be wearing my Nyami Nyami!