The river wasn't much warmer, but I digress.
After surviving the 100 yards of cold water we ate lunch with the camp staff and then loaded our gear in the van and headed down to the river.
On our first stretch of 10 miles of river we had a very nice float. The most excitement happened right after we put in. There was short stretch of rapids where 3 of the 4 canoes made it through, but our guide ended up swamping and was rescued by our two Scouts. Way to go guys!
We spent the night on an island that had a lot of evidence of beaver activity. It was really cool to see how many trees they had cut down. It gives new appreciation to the term "busy and a beaver".
For dinner we boiled water on the backpacking stoves we had with us and used packaged Alfredo and noodles with packaged chicken. It wasn't half bad.
After dinner President Bingham gave us a spiritual thought. He asked each of us to help the group get to know us better. After sharing some things about ourselves, each person in the group (there were 5 of us total) would share something positive we knew about the person, or that we had learned that day. Afterward President Bingham shared a scripture out of Alma in the Book of Mormon about the seed. He brought out a bag of Acorn seeds that were from the Boise Temple grounds and had made into necklaces. He compared these Acorns to our testimonies, and that once planted, our testimonies needed to be shared to help the seeds grow.
We woke up the next morning, ate breakfast and broke camp. Our new guide joined us (the second guide from the previous day had gone back to the Scout camp) and we were off.
I don't think we were on the river for more than an hour when we encountered another set of rapids. This time President Bingham and I were not so fortunate. We ended up rolling our canoe to the left and all hands abandoned ship. I am telling you that river is COLD! Nathan and Joseph both said you should have seen the look on my face and I went into the water.
We were soon rescued and back in the canoe shivering. It wasn't before long before we were back at it. We covered 30 more miles on Friday. It was beautiful country. 10 miles of those 30 were protected habitat for Bald Eagles. We saw several of them flying around.
Just before lunch President Bingham and I decided to take another plunge in the river going through another set of rapids. The water wasn't any warmer the second time. In fact I couldn't stop shaking all through lunch. The last 15 miles were pretty uneventful (mostly because we would hook all 4 canoes together so we were more stable going through the rapids). The last piece of excitment was right at the boat ramp where we were to take the canoes out. Our guide Ben was right in front of us and as we tried to turn into the boat ramp we cliped the back of his canoe and sent both of our canoes into a willow tree. Luckily no one got hurt.
We spent the evening back at the camp shooting guns at the rifle range and watching the closing campfire for that weeks session of camp. Afterward we held our own little campfire at our camp where President Bingham shared another thought with us about activity in the church. He used the embers of our campfire to show how each ember helps each other burn. But as one ember moves away from the others, its heat diminishes and the fire goes out. He also showed how once the ember returned to the fire it began to glow and burn bright once more.
On Saturday morning we got up, ate breakfast and broke our camp. We headed up to near Hoback junction in Wyoming to meet the Lewis and Clark Outfitters to run the upper part of the Snake River. Boy was that water moving, about 18,000 cubic feet per second. I guess the close the river to rafting at 24,000. We covered 8 1/2 miles of river in just under an hour. That was so much fun. The best part of the whole ride was going over lunch counter. The swells were probably around 15 feet high. There were 3 boats in our group and we were in the middle boat. As the first boat entered the white water it disappeared from site and then came back headed up the huge swell and went over to the next one. What a ride!
I am grateful that we were all able to return home safely and that the boys had such a great experience. I know that those type of activities is what I remember from being a Boy Scout, and I am happy I could share those with Nathan and Joseph before we move out of the ward. I also really enjoyed getting to know President Bingham better. He is a great man and I really appreciated the spirit he brought to the trip. It was a fabulous time!
To see all of the photos from the trip click here.
