4 White-Water Thrills

White foam shooting up out of swirling waters all around you ... beyond the water, high cliffs rising at both sides ... jagged rocks jutting up out of the water ... and pressing in on you, the roar of the rapids and the rushing wind—you are white-water rafting!

You can go to Disney World andride Splash Mountain. It's safe and lots of fun. But Splash Mountain is the same ride over and over again. If you want to try something different, try white-water rafting. A white-water ride is never the same twice. New thrills and dangers lie downstream every time you“run the rapids.”

White water means “river rapids.” The water becomes a foamy “white” when it swirls over and around rocks. All rapids are called white water. But not all white-water rivers are the same. Some are pretty tame ; others are really wild. Rafters need to know what they are facing. A gentle-looking river can turn into a beast around the next bend. So all rivers are rated based on how hard they are to travel down.

The most common rating system uses Roman numerals from I to VI. A Class I river is wide with a few small waves. It's not much more exciting than a splash in an old bathtub. A Class III river is much more difficult. It has rocks and waves up to three feet high. You can expect to get wet running the rapids of a Class III river.

If you move up to a Class V river, you will face violent rapids with no breaks. You can get killed on a Class V river. A Class VI river is even worse. It's a real hair-raiser. All kinds of dangers await you there. Anyone who takes on a Class VI river must be two things—an expert and a daredevil. A few rivers have sections that are off the scale. These “Class VII” rivers can't be rafted by anyone.

Rivers change all the time. A heavy rain can turn a Class III river into a Class V or even a Class VI. Some rivers can be run only in the spring after the snow melts. The rest of the time there just isn't enough water in them.

Rivers are like magnets for thrill seekers. Some people run the rapids in canoes. Others use one-person kayaks. Still others choose 16-foot rubber rafts. The rafts have one big advantage. They can stay afloat on rivers that would swamp a canoe or kayak.

One of the top 10 white-water rivers in the world is the Gauley River. It runs through West Virginia. The Gauley is a rafter's dream ... or—if you're not careful—a nightmare. It has 28 miles of heart-pounding rapids. Each set of rapids has its own name. Some give fair warning to rafters. One is called Pure Screaming Hell. There are also Lost Paddle, Heaven Help Us, and Pillow Rock. River guide Roger Harrison describes Pillow Rock this way:“[It's] 15 seconds of uncontrolled violence.”

Clearly, white-water rafting is not for the meek. Dangers lurk everywhere. There is, for example, something called a “keeper.” A keeper is a kind of whirlpool. It is created when water rushes over a huge rock with a steep face. A keeper has enough water power to trap, or keep, a boat for days. Imagine what it could do to a person! Keepers cause more drownings than any other hazard.

There are other pitfalls as well. There are waterfalls, fallen tree limbs, and sharp boulders. Any one of these can spell disaster. And no rafter wants to be caught in a “Colorado sandwich.” That can happen when a raft hits a big wave. The front and back of the raft are folded up toward the center. Anyone in the middle is lunch meat in a raft sandwich.

Most rafters know the risks. And they are willing to take them. But they also do what they can to cut down the dangers. They carry at least 50 feet of strong rope for towing. They often wear wet suits and life jackets in case they get flipped into the water. And they wear helmets in case they hit a rock when they're dumped overboard.

Rafters also wear waterproof shoes. Some rookies want to take their shoes off as soon as they get wet. Wet shoes are uncomfortable. And rookies worry that wearing shoes will make it harder to swim if they're dumped into the water. But taking off their shoes would be a mistake. Shoes offer rafters' feet their only protection from rocks.

Look at it this way: if you end up in the river, you can't swim anyway. The current is just too strong. All you can do is to float on your back with your feet pointed down the river. You'll need your feet to help steer around the rocks. If you're wearing shoes, your feet won't get cut up too badly. And when you finally reach the shore, you'll be glad you're wearing shoes. It might be a long walk home over very rocky ground!

Every year, thousands of people enjoy white-water rafting. But once in a while, the sport turns deadly. That happened in the summer of 1987. There were four accidents in British Columbia. Twelve rafters died in the span of eight weeks. The rivers in that part of Canada are snow-fed. They are very cold. Five of the dead rafters were American businessmen looking for a thrill. On August 1, they took on the wild Chilko River without wet suits. A huge wave knocked them out of their raft. The men died in the frigid water.

So to enjoy the sport, you must respect the power of the river. That means playing it as safe as possible. But no extreme sport is completely safe. Dave Arnold owns a rafting company on the Gauley River. He warns his customers about the potential risks. Arnold and his guides are cautious. They make sure people know what they are doing. As Arnold puts it, “We never say rafting is safe.”