Don't Lose Your Shorts

After all these years I am saddened to find out that the only family picture we have that shows us river rafting is the one above. I remember many fun times with Dad at the Snake or Green Rivers. I remember camping with him and then getting up the next day to hit the river hard. We would run the river multiple times a day. From first light until it got dark. It was always a thrill.

One really memorable trip with Dad was the time we went to the Snake River for a family reunion with Dad's brothers and their families. During one run down the river, everyone on the raft was daydreaming and enjoying the water, sun, and scenery when we realized we were too late to maneuver around a shallow rock in the river. Behind the shallow rock was a large drop off with a lot of back flowing water. Because we were not paying attention, we tried to paddle the boat at the last minute and just ended up making the situation worse. We went over the rock sideways and the raft got stuck in the back flowing current. The raft started to fill with water and eventually collapsed in the middle dumping us all in the river. The moments of panic went a little longer than normal as we tried to account for all the bodies we had before entering the rapid. My Dad took longer than everyone else to emerge. Most of us came up somewhere near the over-turned raft. Instead, the river pulled Dad down and spit him out about 75-100 feet below where we entered. By the time Dad came up the rest of us had already started to swim to shore so we could turn the raft back over and then start down the river again. When we turned the raft over, we paddled down the river to meet my Dad. For some reason my father was still sitting in the 50 degree river. Most people would not be able to sit in 50 degree water for too long. The water was good for cooling off but you would have hypothermia if you stayed in it too long. As we got closer we found out why my Dad was still in the water. He had lost his swim suit. When he fell in the water the current was pulling his suit one direction and the life jacket the other. Thankfully, my Dad valued his life more than his dignity and he held onto the life vest. It all worked out in the end as one of my sister-in-law's had a pair of shorts over her swim suit. My Dad borrowed her shorts and we were back on our way. But there wasn't any more daydreaming on that trip.
-- Matt