White Water Rafting - Day Zero

Earlier this month, Heather and I decided to go white water rafting. I've lived down the road from the Kings River forever, but I had never tried this particular brand of fun. Heather had done a bit of kayaking, but she was eager to get into some serious white water. Our decision came late in the season, so we searched for a river in Northern California offering moderately challenging weekend trips that we could drive to on a Friday night. The American River, which lurks in the mountains between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe, fit the bill.

We selected All Outdoors based on tour availability and their great web site. We found out later that this was definitely the right choice. We read up on the options and decided that we could handle an "intermediate" trip. I booked a two day excursion on the middle fork of the American River and we were off to buy a tent.

Fresno now has an REI. If you have any interest in outdoor activities and are looking to kill an afternoon, go there. We took advantage of the opening day discount to pick up a two-man tent. The salesperson who helped us make our selection invited us to break down and set up the display model. We considered her offer for .5 seconds and ransacked the demo unit. The tent seemed sturdy and easy to operate, so we bought one. We also bought enough complementary gear to make the REI staff even friendlier than usual.

All Outdoors called us up to negotiate a change in our trip. Apparently, there were not enough brave souls to field a full trip down the middle fork on Saturday. We were offered a combo trip featuring the more sedate south fork on Saturday and the intermediate middle fork on Sunday. This sounded acceptable to us, and we went with the combo. If you have never rafted and want the full experience, book the combo trip.

I printed Google maps, maps from the All Outdoors site, and a few pictures of the area from space. Armed with all this material, I was sure to get us hopelessly lost. We set off after work on Friday and flew up 99 to the campgrounds.

Shockingly, I managed to get lost. We stopped for directions at a local restaurant, where the manager assured me that I was quite close to my destination and that Google and Yahoo don't know shit about Coloma, California. After a final 20 minute detour due to my poor navigation and creative signage, we found our patch of dirt at the aptly named Mother Lode River Center and pitched our new toy by flashlight. Heather brought a headband-mounted LED lamp, which I immediately fell in love with and attempted to use to set fire to her corneas.

After some convincing, I put the head lamp away. We set our alarms for "still dark" and "too cold" and went to sleep.