Rafting!!!

Hello all!

I suppose I'll begin this email with an update to calm the fears of any and all parents and adults who were worried about their student rafting but everything turned out great! We went 22 miles down the Poudre (said poo-der) River in Fort Collins. This year the water is crazy high from all the snow that is still melting (not to mention the three inches of rain we got last night) so it was an interesting day. We ended up doing 8 Class 4 or 4+ rapids, and a handful of class 3s. It was crazy, but really, really fun. I've been rafting 4 times before this and I have never done rapids like these before. The water was 40 degrees, so they put us all into wetsuits (super attractive) with fleece jackets, and waterproof jackets, and then lifevests over that. Also, we had helmets, so you knew it was going to be intense. The morning wasn't too bad, mostly threes and one four-plus and twos between everything. It was fun. Then we broke for lunch along the river and then got back into the big stuff. We did one class-3 and then it was four class 4's right in a row - each one awesome but way more intense than the morning. Then we had to take our boats out to bypass a Class FIVE PLUS (wowza) and then we finished. Everyone made it out alive (ha ha) and not injured, and we only had ONE swimmer (what they call it when someone falls out of the boat, and it was Rachel K) and she ROCKED it and got right back into her boat and gave us a "rock on" sign to let us know she was ok. Our guide told her that she was a privileged member of the Poudre Swim Team now. :) When all was said and done we rafted for about 5 hours; add in the breaks and lunch and it was closer to 6. We're exhausted, but had a blast and are ready to get on the road tomorrow morning and head to Cheyenne for our day of service at Wyoming Coalition for the Homeless.

Natalia