Pursuits beyond Court Street: class IV on the New Gauley
By Jaclyn Lipp, Staff Writer
November 2, 2006 | 11:06 p.m.
Many Ohio University students associate their craziest adventures with being dressed up as movie stars or vampires, but I was far from Court Street and sporting a wet suit when I went for the ride of my life.
When I calmly signed up for my first white water rafting trip, I had no idea I would soon be traveling through Pure Screaming Hell, one of the many rapids I would encounter on my trip with <a href= “http://www.ohiou.edu/recreation/op/index.htm”>Outdoor Pursuits</a>.
For a moment, I became lost in the gorgeous deep red, orange and yellow colors of the changing foliage rising up around me in the river valleys of West Virginia.
I was forced to snap back to reality as our guide, Justin, began yelling paddling commands. Our raft was quickly approaching an ominous looking stretch of rapids.
“Okay, guys,” Justin screamed, “this is a test! You’re going to need to paddle together, or we’re all going swimming. This is a Class IV rapid, and there’s a lot of undercut rock. Remember, if you fall out -- water good, rocks bad! Now let’s go! Dig it in! Paddle like you mean it!”
I could feel my knotted stomach growing more uneasy as I dug my paddle into the churning river. When the first wave slammed into the bottom of the raft, icy water sprayed into the air, and I let out a piercing scream as it came right back down inside of my nice, warm wet suit. Despite the cold, a huge grin spread across my face, and I kept paddling. The raft soon returned to smooth water, and my nerves were gone. I started to laugh as I turned to see if everyone’s foot braces had held.
With all the fierce paddling and our surging adrenaline, Justin guided us safely around rocks. We had just managed to make it through our first Class IV rapid with no casualties, yet the adventure had only just begun.
I was a part of two rafts filled with 14 OU students and guides who traveled down a 13-mile stretch of water on the Lower Gauley River on a cool, crisp Saturday morning in October, as well as another nine miles on the New River the next day. Adding to the whole experience, we all roughed out the night by sleeping in tents at a campground.
Amber Heft, an OU junior and Outdoor Pursuits trip leader, has two years of trip rafting experience. At one point on the river, a novice rafter asked her to name some of the upcoming rapids, and a grin crept across her face as she proudly rattled off the old river rhyme for rapids: “Take the Stair Steps up to the Roller Coaster. Ride the Roller Coaster down to Cliffside. From Cliffside, watch the Rattlesnake chase the Rooster Tail into Pure Screaming Hell.”
As if those weren’t enough intimidating rapid names, we nervously giggled about the Mash Brothers and Meat Grinder rapids while we were headed downstream past menacing, jutting rocks.
“Usually, you just meet people, and it’s nothing exciting,” freshman Melissa Fischer said of her experience with the trip. “But to meet people on a white water rafting trip was cool because you’re all going through the same thing together.”
Even though we all had a good time, rafting is full of dangers. The worst thing that happened on our trip was three girls ended up swimming during one of the rapids. They were quickly pulled back into the raft, though.
“If people are scared, we can give them a safer, gentler ride,” Heft said. “But if people want a wilder time, we can step it up and make you swim. Our intention on this trip was to go white water rafting, not white water swimming.”
The trip still got my adrenaline pumping.
“So where do I sign up for my wild ride?”
Outdoor Pursuits (OP) is an OU outdoor recreation program run through the Ping Center. Along with offering numerous trips every quarter, it is also in charge of the indoor climbing wall, running the Rental Center and the outdoor Challenge Course, as well as organizing a variety of other outdoor clinics.
Apparently, the cold is not stopping OP from venturing out even in the stark cold of winter. Potential trips for winter quarter include a day or weekend skiing trip, backpacking trips and even a snowshoeing trip -- as in the shoes that look like tennis rackets. Even indoors, the organization is set to stay busy with a possible clinic featuring back country cooking, which is learning how to cook fun meals on a little backpacking stove.
Heft also added something to remember: “Drinking is fun. Sleeping in is fun, but the things we do are fun, too. You get to meet new people and try something new. And you’re never going to get the opportunity to do it as cheaply as you will through OP.”
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