Getting My Feet Wet Always On The Move

Myself, My Sister and April By Our Rapids

Today was pretty awesome and wild, definitely a step up from that horrible day I had the other day. Which reminds me, I have something to add to that as well.

I think I’ll start with that bit of an addition. A couple of posts ago, I talked about that horrible day at work when one of my co workers called in sick and I couldn’t find a cover shift. Well, after that I decided to go to the lake to just relax and soak up some sun; make the day a little better. So I went down to one of my families favorite spots where nobody else was swimming so I could have the nice peace and quiet.

A bit about the lake I was at: The entire shoreline is owned by BC Forestry, and there is a small campground they set up there with only 16 different camping spots. But they usually have a campground caretaker there, just to keep it clean and make sure nobody is bothering the wildlife, being dangerous or bothering other campers. It used to be this really nice older fellow, that was pretty relaxed but performed his job very well. Now for the last couple of summers, they have had this lady from Ontario in the position of caretaker.

We’ll just say she’s not the most pleasant person on earth.

Anyways, I was relaxing on the beach and actually starting to enjoy the late afternoon, when she came riding up rather loudly on her ATV and ultimately disturbing my peace. Then all she said was,

“Get off this beach. You can’t swim here, it’s for campers only. You can go swim at the boat launch.”

Normally, the only problem I would have had, would have been her attitude, though I’d have still listened. Except this time I knew I had full rights to use that beach. It’s owned by forestry, therefore public property. Plus, nowhere it said that that beach was only for campers. Secondly, I wasn’t going to the boat launch. Usually there are thirty people all in that area partying and whatever other shenanigans. Not to mention you always have to keep out of the way for the steady stream of boats coming in and going out.

So instead I just told her politely, “Sure, I’ll do that as soon as you show me the paperwork stating that this beach privately owned”.

This she did not like.

Rather than either telling me that she didn’t have any paperwork or just showing me her paperwork if she even had it, she got angry and told me, “If you don’t leave right now, I’m going to call the police!”.

So I just ignored her, and kept soaking up the sun, trying not to let that disturbance ruin the rest of my day. That became really difficult though, since the police showed up about twenty minutes later to “deal with me”.

Boy did I ever get perturbed now.

The cop didn’t really have much to say, he just asked me what the problem was. So I told him there was barely a problem, the caretaker just wouldn’t let me use the public beach to my advantage. Then I explained that I refused to move unless she showed me the paperwork saying that property was privately owned. Then out of my anger, I told him that if he wanted to nail someone, then he should give the caretaker a ticket for riding her ATV on the road without a helmet.

After I explained all that, the police officer walked over to the caretaker (whom was still on her ATV) and asked her if she could show him the paperwork stating the land was private. Then lucky for me (finally some luck!), she let him know that she didn’t have any paperwork and the land was owned by forestry. Then by golly, the cop really did give her a ticket for not wearing a helmet. I know it’s only something like $60, but it still helped me relax a little bit.

Once all of that was dealt with though, I didn’t really feel like being there anymore, plus I was getting hungry. But I stayed an extra half hour anyways, just to stick it to the caretaker a little more.

There's Me! Whitewater Rafting!

So that was the end of my bad day. Especially since I went whitewater rafting today, its in my rearview mirror! Today was pretty wicked with some crazy rapids that we got to experience. I had a blast to say the least!

My sister came with me along with one of my co workers and a friend of mine, April. Our guide and safety person was William, he’s from Peru and I was pretty happy with him, he was very funny, and even intentionally crashed us into a rock to get our hearts going early on. The trip was kinda funny too, my sister ended up bailing before we even got into the boats. Just another example of my accident prone family.

Halfway through the trip, our guide even stopped at this little island with a huge cliff and told us we could jump off of it, into the river if we wanted to. I was totally down for that, I’m always looking for something crazy to do! Plus I knew it would fun thanks to that one time I jumped off a 150 foot cliff with my own harness I made out of rope. This cliff obviously wasn’t THAT big, but it was still pretty sizeable at 8 metres, or almost 30 feet for my American friends. I was right too! The jump off that cliff was pretty amazing. Although only three of us from the entire tour did the jump, myself and two other girls that I didn’t even know.

There were a couple of awkward moments, I was the only guy in the boat (go figure!), somehow I always end up in those situations where I’m the only boy. As a result, whenever someone flew out of the boat or fell out, I always had to be the one to pull them back up. But when you pull them, they are pretty heavy from being soaking wet, so I had to push myself with my legs to yank them up. When I did that though, they always ended up sprawled out on top of me. One poor girl even had her face end up in my crotch.

All in all it was pretty crazy, and I think if anyone of my subscribers gets the chance, they should go and whitewater raft. Especially the level 4 and 5 rapids, but even more especially in beautiful British Columbia.

Here We Are, Catching A Wave

“An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered.” – Gilbert K. Chesterton

Tyson Trepidations.