On July 9, 2011, Dora and I took a little different water adventure, white water rafting down the Chattooga River.The Chattooga River is where the movie "Deliverance" was filmed and we rafted many of the same rapids as featured in the movie. We went with two other couples who are friends of ours. David and Franziska Heinze, David and Franziska live in Germany. Scott and Jamie Gross live in the Atlanta area. David, Franziska, Scott, and I all work for Siemens.
We started the day off with a friendly game of corn hole. It was Scott and me against David and Franziska. They beat us at the last when Franziska put two bags on the board. there is a short video of the game. David is closest to the camera wearing a dark shirt. Next to him in a white shirt is Scott. Franziska and I are at the opposite end. I am the easiest to spot throughout as I wore long pants.
From there we met up with our guide, got outfitted, and headed down river. Our first stop was at a small set of rapids. This was our first swim and we were able to float down river over the rapids. In our group the order is David, Franziska, Jamie, and Scott. If you watch the video you will see Franziska and Jamie slide over the rocks. Scott rode a little lower in the water and bumps the rocks. Dora and I aren't in this scene because I had put the camera up when it got to be our turn.
There were some great spots and we made a number of stops. During our lunch stop the guides made a bridge of the rafts and flipped them upside down. The idea was to run across the bottom and make it to the last boat where you did a belly flop. The guides would throw buckets of water and try to knock you off. I was the only one in our group to make it to the end (wearing long pants).
Our favorite stop of the day was Bull Sluice. You will notice there are a lot of people hanging around Bull Sluice. It is a favorite spot for people to come and watch the rafts, kayaks, and canoes that run the river. Check out the "Media" section of this website and look for "Off the Beaten Path". There are a couple of videos of rafts from our group going through the sluice so you will get an idea of what it was like. We did not get a video of our boat but there are some stills of our boat. David and Franziska are in the front of the boat. Scott and Jamie are in the middle. We are in the back. Our guide was John Reese. John, along with the other guides on the trip made sure Dora and I had a good time. Everyone looked after Dora so she could do what everyone else in the group did. While at Bull Sluice we got to jump in the rapids and ride the sluice down. There are some neat pictures of all of us jumping in plus a video of Dora jumping in. It was just the thing for a hot summer day.
The photos in the following slide show were taken by the rafting company and purchased for our use.