Livi Girl: Whitewater Adventure

livi girl what?

You may be wondering about the name "livi girl." When I first started with this whole online community stuff, I wanted to maintain some anonymity (and yet I put up pictures of my boys for all to see?). But when you choose an online user name for yourself, you are choosing an identity, one name to tell others who you are. So I had to ask myself - who am I? I wanted my user name to go beyond my job as a housewife or mother because I so often get caught up in those jobs that I forget there's more to me. So I didn't go for "mom of 2" or "domestic goddess." But I wanted my name to be meaningful and larger in scope. What is truly most important in my life? Well, the obvious answer is God. And the attributes of God most important to my life are love and peace. So I went to a baby names website and looked up names meaning peace. Livi was one of the names and it seemed lively and energetic, so that's how I came to have the user name "livi girl."

Sunday, September 23, 2007

Whitewater Adventure

Last night Casey and I went whitewater rafting with my brother, sister-in-law and dad. My mom had the enviable task of watching our 4 kids. (Thanks Mom!) I hadn't been rafting since my freshman year of college and we had a blast. We rafted at the US National Whitewater Center and our guide Brent was a lot of fun. The USNWC is the largest man-made whitewater site in the US and I think a lot of pros/Olympians go there to train. The weather was great and the water was perfect - not the icy cold water I remember from the trips in my youth. I had always been in natural rivers in my previous rafting trips and the man-made aspect felt different. It didn't seem as scary since the conditions were controlled and we did the same rapids several times. But also it was nicer because we didn't have to do a lot of boring rowing in-between rapids and there was a current to help us go in the direction we wanted to go, so we got to run through lot of rapids in a short time. And when we did fall out (see below) we didn't have to worry about being swept all the way down the river or the dangers of getting our feet trapped under jagged rocks and stuff like that.

My sister-in-law Kristine attached her waterproof camera to her personal floatation device and just let it record when we went through rapids and then posted her best shots on YouTube.

In this video we intentionally head straight into a complete deluge. It was great! Casey and I are in the front.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXfrKj5QRSM

Although we were unwilling to go for a deliberate raft overturn, everyone thought the idea of falling out was somewhat appealing. Everyone but Kristine, that is. On our last run through the class IV rapid, we collided with another boat and everyone fell out. Everyone but Kristine, that is. So it worked out well for everyone. No, we didn't jump in intentionally - it happened so fast I didn't even know we crashed until I was already in the water. And the accident had nothing to do with the fact that our lead rowers (Nathan and Kristine) were busy waving at their daughter Lauren on the side of the river mere seconds before the collision. Anyway, falling out was a lot of fun. This footage is a bit jumpy, it might make you dizzy or queasy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-c-nw46YDw

Read and post comments | Send to a friend