It was the first time rowing my own raft.

The river was high.

I had seen the rapid once before.

My heart raced faster as the raft drifted toward the mouth of the largest and longest rapid on the river. There was no turning back now. I had been training for weeks to be a raft guide, this is what I wanted to do that summer and maybe even more summers to come. My first taste for whitewater had happened the previous summer when I was able to join rafting trips anytime there were spots. However, it wasn’t until the following summer that my understanding of whitewater and being able to guide a boat through it transpired. In reality though I was new to rivers, and in a sense was still illiterate to reading the water. Due to a couple weeks of training I knew what I should be seeing,but just couldn’t decipher it, not yet, at least.

We were running the Chilliwack river, with class 2-4 rapids. While able to do most of the river confidently, there was one section that I had yet to run: Tamahi Rapid. Tamahi is a long rapid about 800 metres long, and bends around 2 corners; a class 3-4. In high water we would often walk clients around it because it was too risky should something go wrong. This particular day we had two training boats and two with clients out on the water.

It’s an overcast day and my confidence wavers.

“Am I ready for this?” I wonder.

The boat drifts toward the entry of the rapid, leaving the choice of turning back far behind me. The only way now, lies in moving forward. This was it, it was time to sink or swim. I knew what was needed to make it through this, after seeing the full rapid once before and having gone over the line a couple of times with the other guides.

As the horizon line for Tamahi comes into view my chest tightens and my stomach drops. I enter the rapid orientating my boat to make the entry move: splitting two massive boulders on river right. The gap is just big enough for the raft. If the move is missed, the boat may end up wrapping on the left boulder or bouncing off straight into a massive hole that will likely flip me. Just before reaching the boulders, I do one last strong pull on the oars and make it! Relief floods over me and immediately my confidence soars….

That wasn’t so bad, that was probably the hardest move, I can totally do this. Ok, what’s next?.... there was something else, wasn’t there? it looks like I’m good until the bridge though, just keep it straight. That’s not so hard. Oh…Shit….

The number one rule of the river:

if you get too cocky or complacent, the river will put you in your place, and her lessons are never gentle.

I see the massive hole just before dropping into it, it is too late to avoid. With one last forceful push on the oars, and hopefully enough momentum to charge through, the boat drops in. Joy fills me as the raft makes it out of the hole and then I’m stopped dead in my tracks. The boat begins to get pulled backwards, towards that which I thought I had been able to escape. My boat is immediately turned sideways and begins getting surfed by the hydraulics of the hole.

I am stuck.

Looking down at this angry beast that now holds me captive I notice one of the oars sticking straight into its centre. Panic hits.

That oar is going to flip me!!

I move down the boat as much as I dare, if too much weight is put on the low side of the raft it will be me, and not the oar that flips the raft. Once within reach, I kick the oar as hard as possible trying to get it off before it capsizes me. It quickly disappears into the surging froth of the beast that holds me within its grasp. I scramble back up the metal rowing frame to get as high as is feasible, which sometimes means sitting almost on the outside of my nearly vertical raft.

While sitting there getting clobbered by the river and clutching at my boat, all I can remember is that just downstream, near the bridge, there has been at least two deaths. These deaths are due to an undercut rock. It’s on the right, or was it the left, in my panic I can’t remember. Should this situation go wrong I have absolutely no idea which side of the river to avoid.

I can’t let this boat flip, I can’t do this swim.

In anger and frustration, I grab the oar beside me and start pulling and pushing on it hoping that it might grab some sort of current that will be enough to drag me out of this mess…nothing. The hole gets even more violent, my footing slips and I tumble towards the bottom of the boat getting tangled in the metal frame. Trying to get free, I’m instead bashed against the frame over and over again. Repeatedly I try to grab onto anything I can, and get my feet under me in this jostling mess. Finally, I’m able to scramble back to my perch. My body screams in pain, terror fills me, tears sting my eyes and I just pray that there will be no swimming.

I can’t swim! I can’t do it! What if I go straight for the undercut? Why can’t I remember where it is?!

The hole calms just a bit, but it’s enough for me to decide that shore is more than close enough to jump to. I find a solid hold on the frame and get my feet under me preparing to jump. However, as I begin to stand, I’m struck with the realization that jumping and abandoning my boat, will result in me owing beers to the other guides.

I am not buying beers!! Not for this!

In my stubbornness I crawl back into the boat prepared to find another way out. The viciousness of the hole seems to start all over again, and once more I am knocked to the bottom to get tangled amongst the frame. It feels like time has stopped. It has probably only been a couple of minutes, but those few minutes were more than long enough.

Clutching my raft alone, with not another boat in sight, I’m caught in a relentless cycle of emotion: fear, pain, anger, and hope. As these emotions cycle so do my efforts. From trying to get out of the hole, to holding on with everything in my power, to scrambling back up the frame each time I’m knocked down, but more than anything I fight to keep my raft upright.

Then, as fast as the beast had grabbed me and pulled me back into its clutches, it was over, it had had enough and let me go.

The relief was so great that for a moment I forgot about the rapid, the beating was over and I was finally free. That moment was enough for me to miss one of my only chances to get the boat sorted. The oar that was kicked off the frame, when this whole ordeal began, had been ripped off its tether, gone to wherever the river decided to take it. Down an oar, with the spare strapped to the frame in two separate pieces, it was not looking promising. Instead of celebrating ,I should have been getting it untied and put together. It was too late now; I was already at the start of the next set of rapids.

With no way of getting power or moving the boat in any direction, my only option was to try and at least hit things straight. Just maybe I would get lucky…. there are only four more monster holes in the rapid. What are the chances I would hit them all? Escaping the rapid underneath the bridge, the river slows, as if taking a breath before returning to its tumultuous and fearsome form once more. To the left is one of the other guides. I call to him for help as exhaustion takes its toll on me.

I’m done… I want out. I don’t want to be on the water any more…

Right ahead of me, stuck in the very hole my boat is drifting toward, is the other guide-in-training. I knock them out of the hole with my own boat, and of course take their spot. I close my eyes and begin my beating all over again….

momentarily I glance toward shore and see a man wearing a white t-shirt, filming everything …I hate you.

Suddenly, the raft popped out of that hole, dumping me unceremoniously into the one directly behind it, handing me over so this one, too, could take part in my glorious Tamihi inauguration of suffering. I reach for the oar and instead get nailed in the face by it, and then am released too from that hole. Emerging from my beating, the guide that I had passed appears beside me and yells to grab on.

We are now half way through the Tamahi.

Making my way to the front of the boat and grabbing his I promptly remember that my carabiners are not in my PFD (Personal flotation device also known as a fancy lifejacket)….having just bought them and being a new guide in training, the I had figured the likelihood of needing them today was slim to none.

Idiot…

So, instead I grab his boat with both my hands and hang on for dear life, as we get pummeled by the waves. My arms are stretched as far as they can go, on the verge of being torn from their very joints, only to have the boats slammed back together with the violence of a high-speed collision. Over and over again this repeated with each wave, arms screaming for a break.

Finally, we round the last corner. It is here that two of the biggest holes in this rapid are located, each large enough to flip us instantly, and devour us as though we are nothing more than an overpriced piece of cheese on a charcuterie board, disappearing into the seemingly insatiable gullet that is this evil, tumbling mirth of a river. I’m exhausted, probably couldn’t swim now even if I wanted to. The first hole begins pulling us closer towards it and away from shore, it doesn’t look like we will be able to escape. It is then that the other guide throws us a rope and pulls us toward the shore we want, just enough to miss everything.

It is over.

Even though it may have all happened over the course of a few minutes, my boat is a mangled mess and I am no better, both a mere reflection of what we were but moments before. My body is already covered in bruises from head to toe, and I seem to have a limp. At least I’m in one piece, which is more than I can say for my boat: It is missing an oar, the seat board has been ripped off and the metal frame is twisted and broken in half.

As I sit there terrified to get back on the water and aching everywhere, I wonder if this is really for me? Do I want to do it so badly that I’m willing to risk going through this again? Am I actually cut out for this?

Maybe it was a mistake from the beginning? At least I tried….right?

By: Bethany Paquette

Read PART 2 here