My nephew, Jerry & his gf, Leah came up to see me this weekend. We went to the Wye also know as the Y to locals in the Smokies. While there we watched everyone come down the river on brightly colored inner tubes. We were swimming around in the icy cold water that felt great.
We came up with the idea of buying our own inner tubes and put a vehicle downstream and we would drive back to the campground. So off we go in search of our inner tubes so where else but Walmart. Yep found one. A cadillac model with a back rest, cup holder and clips to hook us together. All right, we are ready to go. We get all of them pumped up and we have 2 blue and 1 red. Off we go into the Little River.
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| Leah and Jerry getting ready for the float. |
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| Sitting in the cadillac of inner tubes. |
Oh, we were relaxing and enjoying the cool water and warm sunshine. Her comes our first "rapids" and no problem but we have to lift up our butts out of the tube to get over some of the larger rocks. Next comes a calming pool so we can get off and swim and relax.
Watch out, here comes our other rapids and somehow Leah comes loose from us. Over the rapids and oops, what was that??? OMG, my tube hit a jagged rock and down I go quickly. Right smack in the middle of the rapid water, flowing over the rocks. Do you know how hard it is to get up and try to walk? Nearly impossible! So Jerry comes to the rescue and he gives me his tube. He is going to take mine, which has the back rest inflated and hold on and go down the rapids. Ooh, bad idea! Rocks are hard on the knees and the big red tube with a hole in it is gathering all the water to make it hard to hold on to.
I said I can get out, because we had not gone that far and I could walk up the road back to the campground and they could go on. "OH, NO, you are going with us." Leah decided she could hold on between the two tubes. Okay, let's give it another go.
Everything is fine for a few more short rapids and smooth spots and then, POP, I've had another blow out. Yes, you read correctly, it's was mine again, not as big a hole but I'm going down none the less. Jerry keeps saying we are not very far from the car we can make it just body surfing. Well, let me tell you, this body doesn't surf anymore in rocky water. So Leah and I are going to the shore to wait on Jerry to go downstream to get the car and drive up to get us.
In the meantime, Leah and I are trying to get to the side. I'll have to say I'm having more of a struggle than Leah. I decided it would be best to go down butt first in the water than try to get up and walk. We notice that Jerry has stopped at the beach and gotten out and was talking to some guys. Then off he goes with one of the guys. I haven't made it very far and Leah took the almost deflated tube on down to the beach. One of the girls from the beach started bring up a tube to me. Come to find out this is not the first time she has had to do that. They live close to this beach and come there all the time so they are used to it. By the time I get into the tube and ride the rapids down, a guy (spouse of woman rescurer) sent his son out to catch me and bring me to shore. Whew! Exhausted.
Jerry comes back and picks us up. That "we only have a little ways to go" turns out that it was about another 2 miles downstream. Now we are thirsty, hungry and tired. We get back and my bathing suit was full of little gravels and now I'm black and blue on my buttocks! That didn't deter us, after we rested a while, we went down to the river, where it was calm, and got back in the water just to relax.
All in all, it was a great time. Great story! and I hope I painted a funny enough picture because it really was fun. I'll do it again but I'll probably pay the $13 to one of the vendors around here to use their tubes and come pick us up. Another trip to Walmart for a refund!
Later...
