Bolgers 3, Arve River 2

Yesterday afternoon we went waterboarding.  No, I mean riverboarding (as it is called in the States) or hydrospeeding as it is called here in France where it started.

Carol was pretty dubious about this all day, and got quieter and quieter as the time drew near.  After having enjoyed the paragliding -- more about flying off an Alp shortly -- she didn't say much about hydrospeeding, just in case she liked it.  The girls and I were very much looking forward to it.

After a nice post paraglide lunch at the chalet featuring prosciutto and egg sandwiches on baguettes bought from the village patisserie, yogurt, and some other things we scrounged, we drove down to the Cham Aventure river launch area.  With the combination of the Tour Guide festival and a bank holiday (on a Thursday, which makes for a convenient four day weekend excuse) going on, Chamonix was packed, but we parked for free in a jammed lot on the northeast side of town by the river.

The struggle to get into our wetsuits and full gear should have been taken by Carol and I as a sign this would be difficult.  Not only did we have a two layer wet suit, we had gloves, an unusual lifejacket, boots, flippers, and a helmet (the easiest thing to put on).  To put on the life jacket, you have to lift your hands up in the air and have someone put it on over you.  I almost quipped, "I feel like a typical French soldier -- surrendering," but I had the good sense to self-edit myself because I didn't really need to tick off the guides (bet you are chuckling right now though!).

Then came the briefing, which caused me to realize this wasn't as simple as I thought it would be.  All of the instruction led me to one simple understanding -- I was in trouble.

The briefing is usually the point at which Carol glares at me and mutters, "I told you fill-in-the-blanks was a bad idea," but since she was wrong about snowmobiling, ziplining, and now paragliding, she didn't say anything.  I mistook that silence to be cheerful optimism, while I was getting more and more confused and concerned by the complex directions delivered in a heavy French accent.

We waddled like penguins over to the river, climbing slowly down the rocks.  Except Torie, who promptly fell on her butt into the river.  Fortunately she didn't take off.  The Arve is a fast moving, glacier cold water river.  It is glacier blue and rages through Chamonix and down to the Rhone River (I know that because I looked it up.  I thought maybe it flowed into Lake Geneva, but nope).

Now it was time to start, so I followed the others.  Except they started fine, while I immediately flipped and lost my water sled (It's called something else, but I will go with that for simplicity's sake).  The main guide, Jean-Michel, was helping Carol, so the other French guy got me righted and reunited with my sled.  Carol's guide was nice and happy to help.  My guide was not. 

At one point, my guide was yelling "Good one, good one, good one."  I was feeling good about it.  Then he enunciated -- "get down" -- which meant I was too high up on the sled.  (Fortunately there are no pictures of our misadventures). 

Meanwhile, Julia, Maddy, and Torie are so rocking the hydrospeeding that Jean-Michel is having them do tricks -- pirouettes, going backwards, and other things.  I was so far behind that I couldn't really see what they were doing.  The older British couple were having their issues too, and the younger girls who were also doing it had some problems but seemed to do okay.  (The funniest scene was when we were all stopped by the side of the river, and the Brit -- very nice guy -- went flying past with no chance of stopping -- the guides had to go rescue him and pull him over).

Anyhow, I was generally fine when we were going down the river -- it was the stopping and starting that was hard.  Of the five times we started, I flipped twice.  Stopping was also difficult until I learned not to care about my fellow hydrospeeders and just ram into them to stop.  Kicking to get over to a side of the river was also not natural for Carol or I. 

So, there were three noteworthy things about me floating/speeding down the river.  One was that occasionally the French guide held onto my sled, so I had to protest and get him off.  Second was that occasionally we'd bang off rocks below the water's surface, but we were moving too fast to let the pain bother us, and thirdly, the really fast parts meant ice-mountain cold water in your face, which was actually fun (Carol may not agree with everything written here).

Every time we would stop, the girls would be smiling, and then ask in a concerned way, "are you alright?"  I'd be gasping for air and ignore the question.  And then the French guides would give more orders that I couldn't hear because of the rushing water, or understanding because of the accents, and we'd be off again. 

At the last stop before the finish, I was determined to go 3-2 on successful starts, so as soon as I heard "ready," I went.  This caused much consternation and yelling among our guides.  Apparently I had done something on the level of choosing the wrong wine with dinner, because they yelled at me and chased me down.  I got a strong talking to from my least favorite Frenchman of the trip (beating the sommelier from Normandy out).  I didn't really care -- I had taken off well!

There are no pictures or video, which is a good thing, because I'd be the one usually in the rear or close to the rear.  The girls loved it.  They kicked the Arve's arse.  But, in revenge, it kicked the adults arse.  Carol said, "well, that's checked off my bucket list" (which I gotta say, I don't believe it was EVER on her bucket list).  Me?  Well, I'm not sure how I would feel about doing it again.  I have to think I would do better the next time (my last two starts were fine!) and I was even getting better at stopping.   On the other hand, I'm certainly not going to seek it out again!