Wenatchee River White Water Rafting

We left Auburn around 5:45am yesterday morning to make it to Wenatchee by 9am for our rafting trip.  Neither of us had ever been white water rafting before so this is one to cross off the bucket list!  Let me tell you, I wasn't sure quite what to expect but it turned out great and we had so much fun.  John & Stacey spear-headed this trip and we are so glad they did.  We will definitely be doing this again!

I have more photos that I'll post from our waterproof camera but we have to wait for them to be developed - no way was I going to chance getting my good camera wet (which is why all of the rafting photos below were by the photographer the company hired).

::Left Click on the photos to enlarge::

It started off nice and calm...

Rico chose to be the "Master Stroker" for most of the trip (the person in the right front position that keeps the pace up for the rest of the team.

The below shot is not a great one to see everyone in action, but you can pick out that Rico is taking a wave to the face!

 We had an amazing time!  We rode over rapids named The Poop Shoot, Meat Grinder, Devil's Eye, Drunkard's Drop, Snow Blind, Granny Rapids & Rock and Roll, such cool names!  We also got to see the Treetop Apple juice line (they make so much juice during the apple season in Eastern Washington that they ran a pipeline to transport it all across the state!).

During the calm parts of the river, they encouraged us to play games, such as Trust - two people hook their oars together, standing up on the side of the boat, leaning out away from each other.  Rico and John played this one... John was dunked first, lol.  Of course, he swam around and pulled Rico over the side for payback!  We threw buckets of water at the other boats and played Rodeo, where one person stands on the bow of the boat, holding a rope, while the remaining passengers paddle the boat around in a circle as fast as they can until they fall off!  Photos to come, I promise!!

After the rafting trip, we drove through Leavenworth but found it too crowded and small to make us want to stop.  So we continued on and took the scenic Rte 2 home.  From the shots below, you can see some of the mountains are still topped with snow, which is great for the rafting season.  It also explains why the water was freezing just 4hrs before we hopped in the boat!

Today, we're recovering from slight sunburns (yes we wore sunscreen) and sore arms and backs!  But tonight we're going out and seeing the fireworks and I get to practice my firework shots some more :)