May 20th, 2009: Needing to get back onto a river before my new fear of water controls me, I decided to do a 3 hours hydrospeeding trip down the Rio Fonce. Hydrospeeding is an activity where you are given a board that sort of resembles a thick miniature foam snow sled, a helmet, fins and one of those non functioning lifejackets which I became quiet familiar with on the Rio Suarez. I thought this was a perfect way to get over my rafting incident because I would not have to worry about falling into the water since I will already be submerged. At times…things sound better thinking about them than doing them.Standing on the bank of the river at about 10 am, I balanced myself on some rocks and extended my toes into the water, attempting to gauge the water temperature. I couldn’t tell in Fahrenheit or Celsius for that matter, but it did bring up the question…”why am I doing this?” Dropping into the water I moved very…slowly, as I attempted to catch my breath. Before pushing off we had to do the standardize safety training, which felt more like a game of, Monkey See, Monkey Do…as I followed the other two individuals that understood the instructions in Spanish. I only asked for the official translation to the important parts…such as the guide’s sign for lots of rocks and what direction to go in order to avoid other obstacles planted in the path of the river.
Training also involved holding the handles on the board and performing these technical kindergarten rolls as a child would perform in a wading pool. If I had to list the things I was great at…this would be one of them. I was so good at it, I was sort of showing off…left roll – left roll – right roll – left roll. Getting caught up in the moment I even pulled off a double roll to impress – umm…nobody but myself I guess.
It was time…we were giving the sign from our guide and we kicked our tiny fins vigorously as the current caught us and whisked us down the river. You could tell that the rafters who passed us must have thought we looked quiet amusing by how they stared at us laughing as they went by. I even thought we must look quite entertaining as we were floating down the river, as if this was our feeble attempt to save the television show, American Funniest Home Videos.
The Rio Fonce is a class 2-3. Even though the rapids were tame…the rocks were not. I could have had a better mind set, but in all actuality, I did not want to be here…just performing some forced therapy. As the minutes slowly added into hours we progressed down the river, coming that much closer to be able to say I did it.
Getting colder, my jaw began to move uncontrollably as if I was an auctioneer with nothing to auction and nothing to say. Shortly after my body began performing some extreme body shivers to hint that I needed to warm up. I tried to ignore what it was telling me hoping that we would be off the river soon. I attempted to mentally escape to a warmer place but struggled due to already being overwhelmed with the multitude of shallow rocky rapids we had to float through. My body, getting a tad annoyed with its subtle but ignored signs decided to painfully throw down a mighty calf cramp. Needing to exit the water immediately so that I could give myself a nice little Thai message to work out the huge excruciating titanic like knot…I performed a one legged kick and two hand paddle making my way to the shore. I grazed past the rocks to a small sandy spot on the side of the river, rolling off my board grabbing my calf trying to untie the knot that rested beneath my skin.
The thought came to my weakened mind…”can I quit and if so…how do I get back?” - it lingered there longer than the usually random thought. After a few minutes of enjoying the nice cool moment resting beneath the clouds on the sand, I realizing I needed to get back in the water and complete this, not because I wanted to…because I had to. This whole trip would have been a waste if I would have jumped into the guide’s boat. I had a burst of fake energy as I happily stood up and entered the frigid water to continue to be toyed by the river rocks. Rock after rock, bouncing off and over the stones, skinning after skinning of the shins by the potato peeler like rocks, I finally made it to our exit point. Okay…”I did it,” I thought, I am on the road to recovery. Thankfully, I am not scared of the river anymore…I now just hate it - until my short term memory forgets that this ever happened.
Arriving back at the Hostel I quickly took a shower and stood under a nice trickle of hot water, warming my core body temperature to an optimal 96.6 degrees. Getting into some nice dry clean clothes, I slowly moved into the common area at the hostel feeling as if I did a double marathon, but mentally feeling great…accomplishing what I set out to do.
About 12:14.0053 minutes later, some friends of mine told me that they were going caving and asked if I wanted to go. “Yes” was blurted out - It took my brain 0.0002 seconds to come up with my answer. My body didn’t agree and somehow my brain…which is so much smaller than the rest of my body, made the commanding decision that I was going - wanting to punch this gray matter…I realized, it just wouldn’t work. Quickly I changed back into my wet clothes and patiently awaited the cab to pick us up.
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