The Battle of Bull Sluice

The morning dawns clear and cold, the crickets are silent as even they know what’s in the offing. The breeze stirs a bit as if to mark the beginning of the contest yet to come. The combatants begin their rites as they prepare. The adversary rushes and roars as to invite the foe to its watery clutches. The hero sips his tea and contemplates breakfast. Granola bar or ham & cheese omelet?

Well, ok, so it’s overly dramatic. But I do admit that doing the white-water rafting thing was in the back of my mind very shortly after June made the reservations. It’s been on my bucket list for a very long time, but self-preservation reminds me that there IS the possibility of getting seriously hurt. So therein lies the battle. Do I go for it and check off that bucket list box? Or do I take the safe route and not risk injury?

First let me back up just a little and explain. The river in question is the Chatooga river in Northern portion of South Carolina. We booked with Natahalla Outdoor Center (NOC) for the excursion. They have good reviews and it wasn’t super expensive. June filled out our waiver forms online and faked my signature (I’ve suspected for a long time that she wants to ‘off’ me for the insurance money, this must be how she’s gonna do it)!

We show up at the place 45 minutes before zero-hour and check in. I do have to admit they were very friendly and the whole process only takes a couple of minutes. June finds a shirt that she likes and wants me to pick one out too. At this point the only thing I'm considering are any last-minute updates to my will, I couldn’t care less about a stupid shirt. They have us watch a video describing how to survive drowning should (WHEN!) you fall out of the boat and try to not die among the rocks and thrashing water! Ok, if I wasn't super nervous before, I am now!

Then they have us gather around with the rest of the victims, uh sorry, paddlers and they go over again(!) what to do if (WHEN!) you fall out of the boat. Then they have us load into these forty year old busses for the fifteen minute trip to the scene of the accident, uh where we put in.

Alright, I’ll admit that the first hour or so of the trip was very nice. A couple of small rapids and then we stop for lunch and some wading in the shallows. Then we load up and hit a class 2 rapids. Ok, not so bad, I’d even go so far as to say it was fun. Then our guide, Will, starts talking about the highlight of the day, Bull Sluice. A class 4 monster that takes no prisoners. The demon from hell that chews up paddlers for breakfast. Suddenly we’re talking about crouching down in the boat so there’s less chance of crashing the boat and people dying (no, he said boat flipping, in my mind I heard people dying).

We get to the entrance of Bull Sluice. He stops the boat, we get out, and walk up to an outcropping to look over the situation. Shit just got very real! It really IS a monster! My self-preservation was kicking in big time! Will is explaining how we’re gonna tackle this monster and I’d bet that I heard maybe two words of what he said. Then he’s saying to go back to the boat and let’s do this! Every step back to the boat I’m thinking that I’ll just give some flimsy excuse and meet them downstream. But for some crazy reason my legs keep going back to the boat.

Just like that we are underway and the roar of water is getting louder and louder. Will is giving paddling commands and I can’t believe we’re gonna do this. In what seemed like seconds, we were right at the edge of the rapids. Down we go, the water rushing all around, Will yells ‘Get Down!’. We crouch down and the water just poured over us. Then there’s a huge rock right in front of us! Will’s yelling to paddle and we do. Then just as fast as it started, it was over, and we were cheering! Can we go back and do it again? That was AWESOME! Totally can’t believe we did it and now we want to go back for more!

June and I are in the second row

So this day the heroes won the battle of Bull Sluice! We came, we saw, we kicked its butt! So was I a little bit scared? You bet. But it felt awesome to check that box on the bucket list!

-Mango