White Water Rafting

On August 18th, fourteen people out of our group went white water rafting.  We left very early in the morning and took a van to the river, which was about 1.5 hours away.  The workers at the rafting company had two large St. Bernard dogs-like big Teddy Bears!  We first put on wet suits, wet jackets, life jackets, and helmets.  Then we drove upstream to the start of the river.  I was in the only raft with 5 people, including our guide. I was a little bit nervous since I´d never been rafting before.  Our guide was very fun from the start.  We made a team name (Cusquena-a Peruvian beer) and would throw our paddles in the water and bump our helmets together yelling our team name.  We were quickly soaked from the water and Joe McCormick almost fell out of the raft towards the beginning.  Sometimes our guide would have us ´´surf´´, where we would paddle hard up a waterfall and then all lean towards the front of the boat, getting sprayed.  Our guide instructed us in Spanish when saying ´forward´ and ´backward´ and ´stop´.  The view was breathtaking while paddling the river surrounded by gorgeous mountains.  Our raft definitely laughed a lot, and I eventually was brave enough to go to the front of the raft-where you had the largest chance of falling out. 

After we rafted, we went in a sauna-very warm after being out on the cold water!  It was a tight squeeze to fit all of us.   Then we changed from our bathing suits into our clothes.  We then went zip-lining across the river.  I didn´t actually go because I´m afraid of heights.  I took pictures of everyone zip-lining across the river and some people were crazy and put their feet up on the rope. 

The rafting company provided us a yummy dinner with quinoa soup, chicken, sweet potatoes, carrots, and green beans.  After that, we headed home and slept on the way back.  Rafting has been my favorite part of the trip so far!  I hope to come back to Peru someday and participate in the 3 day rafting trip our guide told us about.

-Christine Zugaro