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We got underway at 10 am on Monday morning and 6 hours later (by bus) we made it to the river. After an hour of safety talk, airing up the four NEW boats and donning our wet wear, we hit the water. It only took about 20 minutes to get to our first camp with the 13 of us on this trip. Half of them were from the UK, 3 from USA 1 from Lima Peru and an Ozy. We were all in our 20s and 30s, all but BOB, he is 48 and from Arizona. Bob has been all over the world and has seen a lot of it from a bicycle. Most of the people on this trip were city slickers and didn't know a tent pole from firewood, so I had to go around and help where I could. The guides were very good at cooking and keeping us safe but would still let us do the dangerous class 5+ rapids of "The Tooth Ache and Your First."
Day two was to be an easy and short day, but it turned out to be a long one and something unexpected happened that hasn't happened in 9 years and you know that I had a little to do with that. Well we were on the water about 20 minutes when we came to a large rock. We climbed on top of it and would jump off. It was about 25 feet high and in deep water. It was my turn and I readied myself and...well that's all I remember. The next thing I remember was coming to, set up next to Katie, a 25 year old art student. Apparently I did a front flip off the rock like I've done a hundred time before, but for some reason I over rotated my flip and I hit face first in the water. It pulled most of the muscles in my upper back and knocked the wind out of me and I could not remember who or where I has for about 45 minutes. Somehow I made it back to the boats and Andy a lawyer from the UK pulled me aboard and said I was as white as a sheet. As all of this was going on a Doctor, also from the UK, jumped from the rock and hit hard on his butt. It turned out that he hurt his back bad enough that he had to be lain flat on his back on the beach while three of our four guides walked, ran, and swam over a mile to make it to the next boat team. They were still going down the river and someone forgot to charge the batteries in our teams phone and we needed a helicopter. Four hours later they came back with the battery and kelp calling for help. By this time I came back down to planet earth and was my old self again, but my back did hurt. I just took some pain killers and kept my mouth shut about my back. The Dr. was still on his back all that night and from what I hear in a great deal of pain, 20 hours later the chopper came flying over the canyon and landed next to the water, we had no idea of the power that the army chopper would have and everything we had was blown either all over the place or into the water. It was like being in a sandblaster. It only took about three minutes to get the Dr. on the chopper and out of the canyon. They kept asking me if I wanted to go to the hospital with him but I was not about to pass this trip up just because I pulled some muscles and could hardy remember my name, come on, this is the Phoenix your talking to.
After we cleaned up the mess and readied the boats we were on the water again, I had to pull the straps on my safety vest really tight to keep my back together and that day I had a stomach ache from the food the night before, but when I was in the rapids I felt nothing but the rush.
We had to make up for the day before, but it turned out not to be that hard and soon we were back on our timetable again.
This was day four and we are going to hit three class fives today and a lot of fours. The rapids were awesome and I was having a great time, the water was cold but the air was warm.
Our guide Danny, who was been on this water for years and proved to be a great guide, put the fifteen foot paddle to the front of the boat as we went between large rocks. Well one time the paddle hit the rock and torpedoed right at me as I was right in line with the other end of the paddle. It hit the rock and came out of it's bracket that was part of the boat and hit me right in my left side in the ribs, it didn't hurt to bad but it did brake at lest two of my ribs, it still hurts to the touch as I write this. A little later down the river the same thing happened again but this time it hit my chest, Lucky for me, my safety vest stopped most of the blow to my body.
For the most part I had a great time and the trip was a good one, we ended our trip at about five that night and I was the only one that got the poop kicked out of me (why is that) and when I got back to Cusco my week had just started as you read above. The Doctor is ok. He was in the hospital for about five days and is now out with a back brace.
Well that's about it, the first time I wrote this story it sounded a lot better and then the computer crashed, but I think you got the idea. (actually some bonehead turned off the power strip at the internet cafe) I will let you know what happens this week, every day something new happens be it good or bad, but you know, that's how you learn and what is an adventure without the bad times. YEA-YEA give me a break!! You can keep the bad stuff.
The Phoenix Is Out Of Here!!
originally written at Mama Africa in Cusco, Peru around June 2001