A week ago today I was stressed, and a little scared. The feelings began to emerge the Sunday previous as I began planning for our white water trip. The tickets had been purchased long ago but the camping/food/gear/activities still needed a good hour of concentration to be anywhere close to done. The trip garnered that focus from me for the first time since mentioning the idea to the other planner, Mel, a month ago.
Planning things happened quickly, however, I had a unsettling revelation. When planning the trip, Mel had asked if I thought she could do the upper gauley. i said yes. She has a strong constitution and listens well and is reasonably physically fit. In a boat full of other rafters with experience it would hardly be an issue. My response may have been interpreted a bit more optomistic than originally intended because I was sitting in a restaurant planning the camping logistics for a group of 17 people, 12 of which had little to no experience. One of those twelve was Rachel. sigh. I started doing research of my own on the rafting and saw most companies explicitly stated that they did not recommend the Upper Gauley as a first trip. I was nervous. One new person is fine; two, probably okay; A whole boatload of new people starts to get me anxious.
Throughout the week I worried and researched. I sent out little blurbs in my logistics emails making sure everyone knew that it was a dangerous river. No one said a word. They silently implied their consent while asking to borrow plenty of gear. I called different companies and asked for their opinions. One said they try to talk a group like ours into an easier trip. Our company, on the other hand, said go for it! (as long you want to do it.)
When we showed up at the log building bright and early the day of our trip my apprehension was palpable. Mel and I discussed it and she went to ask the guides if the experience thing was an issue. I heard him chortle and say something along the lines of "Hell, you're all under thirty. You'll be fine!"
And he was right! It was a blast! I'm so glad we went.
It hard to describe the rapids, so instead I'll impart a story our guide told us. We had just run a short class III and were on a piece of flatwater when our guide say's,
This next rapid up here's called scales. Some people call it Julie's Choice. But I, myself prefer scales. I dunno why it's called scales, but as for Julie's choice.... Well, awhile back a guide, her name was Julie, fell out o' her boat up above the main rapid by them rocks over there. They saw her go under and then didn't see her again. Down at the end, the rest of the boats were waiting and noticed straight away Julie was gone. The other guides started talking with her boat 'bout where she went under. The guides rushed portaged and managed to get over to the rocks where she'd be last seen. These rocks, see, they're undercut rocks. That means water been rushin' on them so long it had hollowed out a cave underneath the water level. They're real dangerous. 'you get caught under there it's pretty much game over.
Well, the guides figgrd that Julie'd been trapped up under the rocks and was a lost cause. They were more looking for a body than a person. But as they're walkin out there on these rocks they hear somethin comin' up from beneath them, in the rocks. So they get to kneelin and puttin their ears on the rock. Sure enough they hear Julie. She'd found a pocket o' air!
Now, we're gettin' to part the rapid's named after. The guides up top could only think of two solutions here, and it was Julie's Choice to decide which one. The firs option was this. The guides would lower down a rope and pull her out. O' course the risk here was if she let go or they couldn't pull enough or somethin like that, then she might not make it out from under the rock and she might not find her pocket o' air again. And her second choice weren't much better. They told her she could wait for the water to lower. She could wait the five hours in that freezing cold water with her face in that dark lil pocket o' air. She chose the latter.
Julie was stuck under there for the 5 hours. And when they got her out she was damn near frozen. Hypothermic for sure, but she was alive. She didn't raft the gauley again for about 6 years. And that's Julie's Choice
Our raft made it through without incident but here is a quick update on this story. After a some searches on Google I have not been able to find a single other account of this story, which leads me to believe it may be mostly fiction. I prefer to hope for truth. It's a good story.
Hope live's are going well!
--Luke
P.S. The title refers to the name of a rapid on a less dangerous part of the gauley which guides like because they can flip their boat easy and "safely". Our boat managed to get high side fast enough to prevent it from tipping. (also becasue we had our Kitten Mittons. The other Capital One boat was not so lucky. A third boat was most entertaining to watch. The guide managed to tip the boat enough to get everyone out of the boat except for himself. This feat, our guide informed us, is the much sought after DumpTruck.
