Dylan ~ "Kayaking Chaos"

Kayaking Chaos

As I bounced over the last wave, I gasped. There was Kings a giant rapid in the Snake River. I remember trying to go left in my cramped kayak, but the current was too strong. I had one thought before I felt cold water rushing up my back. “Will I make it?”
I was in the summer Kayak Club; it was amazingly fun. The greatness of it hung on to me and swallowed me up like nothing else was happening that summer. This trip we were going down a section in the Snake River. We were going to start at the end of the Hoback River and end at a bridge in the Snake River. I pulled my kayak’s bow, the front of the boat, down a steep hill, towards the river. It felt like it was pushing me. I thought, Why does this kayak have to be so heavy? Then, I squished into my kayak.
“I won’t be surprised if all of you flip today,” my coach chuckled in an exited tone. Right then I panicked, it felt like my kayak was to small for me. What had I gotten my self into. (I thought about the time I signed up.)
“Do you want to do Kayak Club this summer?” my dad had asked.
“Yeah,” I shouted in a positive tone.
“Okay,” he said. When he was signing me up, I went around playing in kayaks imagining what it would be like in Kayak Club. Never did I imagine flipping into a roaring river.
We lowered our boats into the water. Everyone was exited, but if I looked closely, I could see fear in their eyes. We floated off into the river full of rapids. Even as we floated over small rapids, my panic grew because I had never flipped before. The water was very cold. We all had little conversations like, “That wave was swirly,” or, “That wave was fun.” We kept talking like that, especially me, because it helped me keep my fears away. We finally got to the rapid called Kings.
My instructor yelled, “Keep to the left,” but I couldn’t. The current was very strong. I noticed he was trying to follow me. He wanted me to get out of the rapids. It was pulling me to the right. It was amazingly powerful. After a while, I gave up. I still paddled in fear of flipping. The waves were like wallowing elk because they were very rolly. I stopped paddling over the next wave. I was scared. I felt like crying. Before me was a big five foot swirling wave. It would take a miracle to make it though. I tried to go to the left one more time, but it was already to late. Fear rumbled towards me with a menacing roar. It taunted me and chuckled with hatred. I knew I wouldn’t make it. The kid in front of me flipped. Oh No! I had a bigger chance of flipping. The wave was breaking every second. I felt helpless, as if being attacked by a lion. I felt myself in breathing air then under water the water. All of a sudden, I breathed in air again. It took me a while to realize I had done a backflip, one eighty. I was stunned. I didn’t drown! I dropped behind a big yellowish rock into an eddie with my friends. They clapped and cheered to me. They thought that I was going to die. (Sooner or later they started being normal again. They didn’t cheer much any more.) This didn’t stop me from bragging.
“I just did a backflip!” announced.
The other kid that flipped said, “I did one too.” That was totally true but the rest of the group said, “You flipped over as soon as you were up.” I had such a high adrenaline rush on the way back I felt like a person that had fallen in a frozen pond. I had so much pride that I could have been a millionaire.
After that experience, I realized miracles can happen. They’ve happened to me more than once. Before flipping in a kayak I didn’t believe in them but if you don’t then you’re wrong. They’re a big part of life. It’s not just planning that your life runs by, it’s also luck.