To read part four of day six, click here.

Jen and Glenn drove off with the car, truck and two trailers. They were meeting someone who would transport the vehicles to the place where we were getting off the river.

They were gone for over two hours.

During that time we learned how to do the rest of the packing, and we spent almost an hour learning how to navigate the river.

You followed the V’s in the river – they showed you where the rocks were. So if the water looked like it was flowing like this, (if you were coming from the bottom of the screen):

v^v^v^v

You wanted to go through the ^’s. The rocks were at the point of the v’s, and you wanted to avoid those at all costs. 😀

Sorry if that didn’t make any sense – it makes sense to me!

Jen and Glenn got back right after we were done with the river lesson. I was glad they were back – it meant we could get on with this and get done with the river.

I wasn’t letting myself think. I knew that thinking would just make everything worse. I kept as busy as I could, but there wasn’t much to do. I think I ended up playing a drinking game with some of the others – and don’t worry, it’s not as bad as it sounds. It was just water. 🙂

Ten minutes or so after Glenn and Jen got back, we were told to get the canoes in the river.

Katie helping me and Bruce get our canoe in the water

We had to step down these huge steps that came over my knees. Katie came to help me with my side of the canoe, since I was having trouble just making it down the stairs, without even carrying any of the weight of the canoe. 😀

Once we got the canoe in the water, Bruce held it so I could get in. I climbed in and sat the way I was supposed to. I asked Bruce if he needed me to grab the stairs so he could get in, and he said that he was fine and didn’t need me to.

Waiting for Bruce to get in the canoe

I was turning to see how he was going to get in when out of the corner of my eye I saw him jump from the stairs. I had just enough time to think “what on earth is he doing?” before the canoe started rocking, threatening to flip and take me with it.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part five of day six, click here.

I panicked. The boat was rocking wildly, and I couldn’t remember what they had said to do when it was rocking like that.

Slowly, the boat started to stop rocking. I turned around to see what Bruce was doing. He was sitting there, in his spot, rocking back and forth with the canoe.

“Oh, that’s what we were supposed to do. Oops!”

“What?”

“We were supposed to rock back and forth with the canoe, not panic and grab at the gunwhales.”

“Yeah. Loose hips, remember?”

“I remember now. When you made the canoe rock like that I couldn’t think! What did you do that made it move like that?”

“I got in it.”

The look on his face told me I wasn’t going to get any more out of him, so I gave up. We turned the canoe around, somewhat awkwardly, but we made it.

At that point, all of the canoes were in the water. Patrick and Glenn gave us a few final instructions, and then we were told to get out of the eddy.

An eddy is the little calm spot right behind a big obstacle. In this case, it was a tree that stuck out into the river. We were all hiding behind the tree and the water just stayed in place there.

Trying to get out of the eddy

It took us a bit of time, but finally everyone was out of the eddy, and all of us were pointing the right way. 🙂

We started paddling, and we were on our way. And it wasn’t long before the first rapids were in sight.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part six of day six, click here.

That day was getting embarrassing. First I melted down with Jen, then I panicked when Bruce got into the canoe, and then I froze up when I saw the first rapids.

I stopped paddling and stared at the rapids in front of us. All I could think was “I’m going to die, I’m going to die. I can’t do this…”

“Brett? You need to start paddling. We are getting left behind. Brett?”

Bruce shook the canoe to get my attention, and it worked. I realized that we were falling way behind and paddled as best as I could to catch up. We caught up just in time to hear Patrick’s description of the rapids.

The first set was a shallow one, but if we stuck to the V’s in the river we should be fine. We were going to go through the rapids ducky style, meaning we would go one behind the other. In this case you had to wait until the canoe in front of you was half way through before you started.

Patrick finished his speech by telling us to just follow the canoe in front of us, and we would be fine.

“So – who wants to be the canoe behind me?”

Bruce spoke up. “We will!”

I twisted so I could see him. “We will??? Bruce!”

“What? Let’s get this first rapid over with. If we wait any longer, you are going to be nervous wreck. Just get it over with. Besides, you’ll be fine. We’re going to make it through no problem.”

Patrick started paddling. He passed the spot where the water turned white.  He was going a bit more to the left than I would have, and I tried to remember that.

“Brett, make sure you’re watching where he is going. That’s the path we’ll need to take.” I nodded – I knew what to do, I was just terrified to do it.

Glenn told us to go. I said a quick prayer and started paddling, knowing that all of my crewmates knew I was terrified, and that they were all watching me.

We made it about half way before it happened. We got stuck on a rock.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part seven of day six, click here.

It was my fault we got stuck. I should have done the proper correctional stroke and turned us. But I saw us heading for a spot that looked shallow, panicked, and did the wrong stroke.

So instead of turning away from the rock, we ran right into it.

“Rock your hips, Brett! Let’s see if we can slide off to the left. Lean that way and rock your hips.”

I did what Bruce said to do, glad I had him in my canoe. There was a sickening groan as the canoe slid a little bit, coming to rest a couple of inches from where it had been.

We kept wiggling, trying to get the canoe off the rock. Seven minutes later, (I remember – I looked at my watch. LOL) we finally slid off the rock. We were free!

I can tell you this – I was a lot more careful after that. 😀

Despite getting stuck, Bruce and I were still the first crewmembers out of the rapids. We sat with Patrick and watched what was going on. It was pretty funny, actually. We had one canoe going backwards, one going sideways, and one stuck on a rock. Jen and Ben were coming straight for us, and the other canoe had flipped.

Glenn was going around the rapids telling people what to do. The canoe that was going backwards managed to turn around and start going forward, but then got stuck on a rock. The canoe that had been stuck on a rock got free and got to us about the same time Jen and Ben did.

We were all floating slowly down the river. Thankfully before we got too far, the other canoes caught up to us.

Everyone congratulated each other for getting through our first rapids. Then we picked up our paddles and headed down the river, heading straight for our next rapids.

I don’t remember how many rapids we did before lunch. I remember that while Bruce and I did get stuck on rocks one or two more times, we never flipped. Which was a good thing, because I was scared of flipping more than anything else.

All of the others flipped, and they acted like it was fun. They would catch up to us laughing, saying they couldn’t wait for the next rapids. But even hearing someone talking about flipping would make me panic.

I’m not proud of my fear of the water. It became a problem later on in my course. And my fear of the water led me to ask Jen a question that I regret asking. (Don’t worry, that was the next day.)

I almost didn’t put this in there. I didn’t really want to write about my fear and let the whole world see it. I didn’t want everyone to see just how scared I was on the river. But I said I was going to write about my trip, and my fear of the running water defined my trip.

Without my fear of the water, things would have been easier for me. I would have been able to enjoy the river like everyone else. I wouldn’t have been terrified every time we had to cross a river or a creek when we were hiking.

So I’m going to write about my fear of the water. It’s not easy to write this, but I want to write everything like it was. I’m not going to sugar coat it just because I want to put it on my blog. I want to write the truth, I just don’t really want everyone to see it. 🙂

After we had done a couple of rapids, Glenn yelled out “Who wants to take a break for lunch?”

Everyone yelled back, “YES!!!!!”

We were hungry. 😀

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part eight of day six, click here.

Glenn laughed and told us that there was a good spot to eat coming up, right before our next rapids. Everyone cheered, and I think we were all moving a lot faster than we had been. I’m not really sure, but my arms started killing me from paddling. LOL

We made it to a spot where the bank wasn’t three feet above our heads. It sloped down to make a (kinda) beach. We all paddled over there and tied our canoes to the plants along the edge.

I hopped out of the canoe and waded through the knee height water to get to land. I went to find a spot to go to the bathroom – Jen had told us to just pee in the river, but there were a bunch of other people hanging out in the river. 😀

When I got back, the cooks had lunch out and had started preparing it. I found my bowl from the stack and sat down on a grassy spot.

Everyone was talking about what we were having for lunch – peanut butter and jelly on tortillas. Nobody thought it would be good.

“You guys, PB and J on tortillas is good! We have it all the time at my house, when we run out of bread. And the boys eat a lot of bread, so we’re out of it a lot.”

They all just looked at me like I was nuts.

I decided it wasn’t worth it, and got in line for my food. Kayce gave me a tortilla and a squirt of peanut butter, and Maggie gave me a big helping of jelly. I almost asked if anyone wanted some of my jelly, but decided that it would be more trouble than it was worth.

I sat down by Bruce and Bobby and ate my lunch in silence. I thought that maybe if I listened to the talking around me, I’d forget that we were going to have to get back on the river.

It didn’t work.

Most of us were done eating when one of the girls yelped. “There’s a huge bug on my leg!”

Bobby went over to look at it. “Huge? That’s nothing! I ate an inch worm yesterday that was bigger than that!”

I didn’t think I’d heard him right. “You ate an inch worm yesterday? Where was I?”

“I don’t know – I think you and Maggie were cooking.”

That made sense. “You ate an inch worm.”

***If you get nauseous easily, don’t read the next three paragraphs. It’s gross.***

“I already told you, yes, I ate a inch worm. It was awesome. I swallowed it whole, and then I felt it crawling up my throat!”

I looked at him in horror. “You what?!?!? It was crawling up your throat?”

“Yep! Then I drank a full water bottle to drown it. And it stopped moving! But then I was nauseous, so that wasn’t cool.”

It’s still kinda gross now, but not as bad as those three paragraphs. 🙂

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “You seriously ate a bug?”

“Geez. You don’t believe me? Look, I’ll prove it to you! Gimme that bug, Maggie.”

We all watched, mixed expressions on our faces as he put the bug in his mouth and swallowed. He turned to me. “See? No problem.”

Patrick and Katie came over to us. “Bobby, you know that eating bugs is the first part of ninja training, right?”

“That’s awesome! How many bugs do I have to eat?”

I started cleaning up. I was going to have to do it anyway, and it gave me an excuse to get away from the disgusting bug talk.

While I was cleaning up they took this picture.

A couple minutes later, it was time to get back in our canoes and get on the water again.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part nine of day six, click here.

I waded into the water, heading for our canoe which was at the end of the line. Bobby came and put a hand on my shoulder.

“You’re going to be fine, Brett.”

I smiled at him. “Thanks, Bobby.” I guess the look on my face told him I didn’t believe him, because he started talking again.

“I’m not kidding. You, Bruce and the instructors are the only ones that haven’t flipped yet. You’re doing great.”

He got called by Jordan then, so he headed back to his canoe. I finished walking to my canoe and grabbed my water bottle to take a big drink. I couldn’t get into the canoe until Bruce was there to hold it – I was to short to get into it without climbing over the side. If it was resting on the ground I could do it, but when the bottom of it was over my knees, I needed some help. 🙂

Bruce walked over and held the canoe so I could climb into it. It was a very awkward process, but I managed to make it in the canoe without hurting myself.

We headed off and the next rapids came into sight shortly, after we went around a bend in the river. By now, we knew the drill. When the rapids came into sight Glenn or Patrick would give us instructions, including how far apart to stay. Then we would separate, making sure that everyone was as far apart as they needed to be.

Bruce and I were usually one of the first, if not the first canoe after Glenn or Patrick. I don’t know why it worked out that way, but it did. Sometimes Luke and Sarah Margaret would go in front of us, but most of the time it was me and Bruce.

I have a feeling they did that on purpose. They all did everything they could to help me on the river, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they sent me through each of the rapids first so that I could get that one over with, and I wouldn’t have to see them all flipping in front of me.

On one of the rapids we did after lunch, a couple of people got stuck or flipped. Glenn told those of us who had made it through to go to a little eddy that was next to the bank and wait there.

There were two or three canoes with us, so we all paddled over and waited there. We grabbed vines from the edge and grabbed each others gunwales. As canoes started coming from the rapids, they joined us.

Everyone had gotten out of the rapids, and we all gathered in the shade of the eddy. People were taking drinks, we were talking and laughing, and pretty much just taking a break.

Taking our break.

The peacefulness ended when one of the girls shrieked.

“THERE’S A SNAKE!!!”

There was a moment of general confusion, and she shrieked again.

“IT’S ALMOST IN MY CANOE!!!!”

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part ten of day six, click here.

Most of the girls were freaking out. The guys were all cracking up, trying to see the snake. Bruce and I were all the way on the end of the line, and the snake was somewhere near the middle. Apparently it was hanging in the bushes near the place where one of the girls had been holding on. I couldn’t see it, and I didn’t particularly care.

Bruce leaned over, trying to see the snake. I yelped as the canoe leaned over, way to close to the water for my comfort. Bruce sat back up – apparently he had heard my yelp over the freaking out of the other girls.

I don’t remember if the snake actually landed in the canoe or not. I think we moved right after that, and if the snake had gotten in the canoe, I have a feeling that I would remember it. 😀

We headed for the next rapids, everyone eager to get away from the snake. We only had two or three rapids left, and I was eager to get out of there.

The next rapids looked pretty easy when we were coming up to it. It was a pretty long one, but it looked like it was only a shallow one, not a hard one. And then we got into it, and I realized that it was a lot harder than it looked. What had looked like shallows that would have been somewhat difficult to maneuver through, was really deep water with huge rocks all over.

It took all of us a while to get through, but we made it eventually. I was surprised that we didn’t flip on that one, but thanked God and prepared myself for the next one.

The next one was really easy. It didn’t take long at all, and no one flipped on it (which almost never happened).

It was a good thing that no one had told me about the last rapids until right before it. Because I would have been a nervous wreck. (Ok, I already was a nervous wreck. But I would have been worse.)

Our last rapids for the day was a really scary one. You had to go straight, turn to the right, and then turn left immediately. If you didn’t turn left, you were going to go over a shallow spot, and then straight into the big hole.

If you did make the turn, you would pass in between two big rocks. As soon as you were done passing those rocks, you had to turn back to the right. If you timed it just right, you would make it over the big hole and you’d be fine.

Glenn didn’t say what would happen if you didn’t make it. He didn’t need to.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part eleven of day six, click here.

I was petrified. I was sure that Bruce and I weren’t going to be able to make one of those turns and we would flip.

One of the instructors went, and made it safely through. One of our crewmates in their canoe went, and flipped. Another one of our crewmates canoes went, and they flipped. After that, it was our turn.

At first I had thought, ok, don’t paddle to much. I figured that if we were going slower, it would be easier to make the turns. We got in the rapids and I needed to paddle to keep us going the way we needed to go. So I was moving us forward, and Bruce was trying to turn us the way we needed to go. It wasn’t really working.

I threw in a couple of correction strokes before going back to paddling. I was surprised to see that we actually made the first turn! But then we had to turn to the left, and we were this close to not making it. But Bruce was able to turn us that time, and I didn’t even have to use a correctional stroke!

So we had made two of the turns. But we still had to make another turn, and we had to go over the big hole.

All I could do was pray, paddle, and pray some more, with an occasional correctional stroke thrown in here and there.

We passed in between the two rocks. I did some big correctional strokes, praying that combined with whatever Bruce was doing, it would be enough to get us over the hole.

The hole was right in front of us. It was massive! It was probably two or three feet deep, and right on the other side of it was a big white foamy spot that was about two or three feet above the surface of the water. I panicked, paddling frantically.

The tip of our canoe went down, and I knew we were going to flip. My paddle was connecting with nothing but air – all I could see was the final rapids of the day, the one that was going to make us flip. Bruce and I hadn’t flipped yet. We were the only canoe to make it that far without flipping, other than the instructors.

I still don’t know what happened there. All I know is that a few seconds after I knew we were going to flip, we were going straight through the big, churning white spot. And when I say through, I mean through. We had over four inches of water in our canoe. But you know what? Our canoe was still upright, so it could hold over four inches of water.

We floated downstream for a couple of seconds before turning abruptly to pull our canoe up on the bank where everyone who had gone before us was waiting. Once we were there we had the fun job of flipping our canoe to empty out the water, and getting it back up again.

When we were done, we got to watch as every other canoe flipped going over that hole.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part twelve of day six, click here.

Once everyone made it to where we were waiting, it was time for the rapids swim assessment. Patrick started wading through the water and told us to follow him.

We started walking along the slippery rocks. I almost slipped several times, but managed to stop by grabbing at Kayce, who was walking next to me.

We passed this spot where the water was running between two rocks, so fast that it started to sweep me away. I grabbed one of the rocks and Kayce, and managed to stay on my feet. Kayce had to pretty much push me through that spot, because I couldn’t do it. I wasn’t physically capable of getting through that spot.

And it annoyed me. I hated not being able to do things, and having to depend on others to help me. My whole life, I’ve always been the oldest. I’ve always been the capable one. And to not be able to do things, having to rely on my crew to help me, was a big challenge for me. Especially in things that I wasn’t scared to death of.

Like when we were hiking, and I just couldn’t carry the weight in my pack without stopping every two minutes (literally). I hated that I was slowing my crew down. I hated that they were all having to help me. I hated the fact that I was the weakest, the smallest, the _______.

But I think that’s one of the things God did for a reason. I think he made me the smallest and weakest because I needed to be there. Like I said, my whole life I had been at the top of the ladder, at least in my family. It was hard being at the bottom. Really hard. And it gave me lots to think about.

After a couple of minutes of walking through knee high water, being pushed along from behind when I couldn’t make it myself, and nearly slipping 8439+ times, Patrick stopped. He waited until everyone was standing on this big rock with him, right next to the big hole.

“Ok kids, listen up.”

My crewmates started grumbling – they hated when he called us kids. I never minded it, but it was kinda funny listening to them.

“Here’s what you are going to do. You’re going to swim, two at a time, into that big white spot next to the hole. Then you’re going to get into our rapids swim position, and float down for five to ten seconds. As soon as you are past that point,” He pointed at a big rock that was sticking out of the river. “turn and start swimming to shore. Katie is there with the rope to throw if you don’t make it, but I’m sure all of you are going to make it.

I immediately started freaking out, again. (Looking back, it’s really embarrassing. LOL) I couldn’t even make it past some of those little streams that joined the river. How was I supposed to turn and swim against the river??

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part thirteen of day six, click here.

The first two guys headed into the water. I watched Bobby and Luke do it with no problem, but I was still freaking out. They were two of the strong guys, not me.

Luke during his Rapids Swim Assessment

I watched as Tullia and Rebecca headed into the water. They made it out ok, but I was still freaking out.

Swimming into the white water for the Rapids Swim Assessment

And then, it was my turn.

Me and Kayce being told what to do for our Rapids Swim Assessment

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part fourteen of day six, click here.

Kayce and I headed into the water. I think Patrick could tell how scared I was, because he took some extra time to reassure me. I appreciated the gesture, but it didn’t help. Nothing could help with that fear I had. I don’t even know how that fear started. But I had this horrible fear of the water, and nothing anyone did could help.

Which, looking back, is kind of funny. Because I’m not scared of swimming pools, I’m not scared of the ocean, I’m not scared of creeks.

Now, I am scared of the things in those bodies of water. In swimming pools, I’m scared of my brothers who like to sneak up behind me and poke/pinch me. In the ocean, I get freaked out whenever anything brushes my leg, or the fish start jumping out of the water right in front of me. And in creeks, I’m scared of the crayfish.

But with the river, I didn’t even know what I was scared of. Since I’ve had time to think about it, I think it might have been the rocks/rapids. For example, canoeing on the lake hadn’t been a problem. I had been just fine. I had been a little worried about it, but not the irrational fear that I felt about the river!

Patrick told me that I didn’t have to swim so close to the white spot as the others did. He told me to just swim until the current was too strong for me.

I nodded my head, not trusting my voice. Patrick told me to go and I pushed off from the bottom. I thought “This is it. You can do this, Brett. Everyone told you that you would be ok. You can do this. Keep swimming.“

Swimming against the current was hard. We were told not to let our feet hit the bottom, because that was how you could get stuck and hurt your ankle. And with a bad ankle already, I didn’t want to chance that.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part fifteen of day six, click here.

I made it about half of the way to the white spot before I gave up. It was getting too difficult.

Trying to get into the white water swim position wasn’t too hard – you had to tuck your feet in and float onto your back. That wasn’t the hard part.

The hard part was trying to swim against the current to get back to the shore. I swam as hard as I could, but I wasn’t making any headway. I was pretty much just staying in the same spot.

I prayed – Lord, please help me to get back to shore. Please. I really don’t want to be the only one who has to get thrown the rope. Please, God.

Slowly but surely, I started gaining ground. I was getting closer to shore. I tentatively put my knee down -we had been told that if you could do a pushup in the water, you could put your feet down. It wasn’t shallow enough yet.

I was still swimming, and still making a little bit of headway. Not a lot, but enough that I was probably going to make it back to shore. I put my knee down to see if it was shallow enough, and my knee touched the bottom.

My other knee touched the rock. I started crawling, glad for something that I could make contact with.

All of a sudden, the rock disappeared. My head went under the water, and the river started pulling me downstream again. I fought to get my head above water again, and took a big gulp of air. I also swallowed half of the river with it.

I coughed and spluttered, but managed to keep my head above water after that. I swam some more, praying that I would make contact again. It was so hard, swimming against the current, and if I didn’t have something to grab soon, I was going to get pulled downstream. I wasn’t strong enough to swim against the current for that long.

Giving up wasn’t an option, but sooner or later I wasn’t going to be making headway, and I was going to be taken downstream.

I yelped as my knee ran into a sharp rock. It took me a couple of seconds to realize what that meant. Rock! Something to grab at! I put my hands down to grab the rock, but it wasn’t there. My knees were on it, but apparently it wasn’t a very big rock. I reached down by my knees and sighed in relief as my hands found something to grab.

While I was taking a mini break there, I looked up and realized that rocks were sticking out of the river a couple of feet ahead of me. A little bit behind them, was solid ground.

A minute or two later, I was pulling myself up onto solid ground.

Pulling myself out of the water after the Rapids Swim Assessment

I looked down at my knee that had hit the rock and wiped the blood off of it. Apparently the rock had been sharp enough to cut me. It wasn’t bleeding any more though, so I forgot it and walked over to where the canoes were.

Katie greeted me. “Great job, Brett! You did it. I knew you could!”

“Thanks, Katie. What are we doing now? Packing up?”

“Nope, now it’s time for the flip and swim.”

I think she said something along the lines of “Don’t worry, you’ll be ok.”, but I didn’t hear her. I just heard “flip and swim” over and over in my head. We had to flip? On purpose??

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part sixteen of day six, click here.

I don’t remember how we got the canoes over to where we had started our swim assessment. I just remember getting into my canoe and being so close to crying that I was blinking rapidly, hoping that no one would look at my face. I had made it the whole day without flipping, and I was going to have to flip now.

On purpose.

I was really freaking out. I had spent the whole day worried that I was going to flip, and now I knew that I was going to have to. I don’t know why flipping scared me so much.

It could have been the fear of the water that was helping with that, but I really don’t know. I just know that I was so scared to flip, that I was about to start bawling in front of my entire crew. And I don’t cry in front of my friends. I cry in front of my family all the time, (I’m blaming hormones), but never in front of my friends.

As I was staring out at the river, I saw one of the instructors taking one of my crewmates across the river.

Some of my crewmates had noticed too.

“Why is _____ going across the river? Does anyone know?”

No one knew. We asked Patrick.

“______ is going across the river because he/she is not participating in our flip and swim. Because of that, he/she will not be canoeing with us tomorrow.”

We were all horrified. One of our crewmates wasn’t going to be with us the next day? We hadn’t really been separated before, except for when we were getting Ben down the mountain. The fact that our crewmate was going to be gone for a whole day really bothered me.

“Patrick, why isn’t ______ doing the flip and swim?”

“He/she said that he/she had already flipped enough today, and he/she wasn’t going to do it again. Unfortunately, we can not let anyone go on to the second day of canoeing unless they participate.”

“Oh.”

I hadn’t known that was an option. I briefly thought about asking to join my crewmate, but was interrupted by Bruce.

“You’re going to be fine out there, Brett. Don’t worry about it.”

“But Bruce, I don’t even know what to do? How am I supposed to get the canoe to flip on purpose? How am I supposed to do this?”

“Listen – you just get us out where we need to be. I’ll take care of flipping us. Don’t worry about that part. You just paddle and get us to the current. “

I didn’t even try to hide the relief in my voice.

“Thanks, Bruce.”

He patted me on the shoulder.

“Don’t worry. You’ll be fine.”

I didn’t think so, but I wasn’t going to say that. Not after he had tried to cheer me up. And I wasn’t worrying about the forcing the canoe to flip part – I knew that Bruce would take care of that. He had said he would, and I knew that he would do it.

I don’t remember whether we were the first canoe to go, or if we were the second or third. I just remember that we were one of the first canoes.

What I do remember was how I felt when Bruce told me to start paddling. I was scared out of my wits, and there was nothing I could do about it.

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part seventeen of day six, click here.

Bruce told me to start paddling, and for some reason I did. I must have been out of my mind.

I started paddling, headed straight for the big white spot. Bruce started turning us to head downstream, towards the spot where our crewmate was standing on the opposite side of the river. We were supposed to end up by him/her.

Patrick yelled out “Go save _____ from that creepy old guy! Ok, when I get to three flip. One, Two,”

I never heard the three. I don’t know if he did it on purpose, but Bruce flipped us before the three. I was under water, water up my nose and not enough air in my lungs. My feet found the bottom of the river and I pushed off, trying to get to the air that I knew was only a couple of feet above me.

Within five seconds, I was at the top. But something wasn’t right. Instead of breathing in air, I was feeling pain on the top of my head. It took me a few precious seconds to realize what was happening – I was stuck under the canoe. And there wasn’t any air under there.

I was running out of oxygen. I’m not good at holding my breath, and I was reaching my limit. I used my hands to push myself out from under the canoe, grabbing the side and hauling myself up it.

Have I ever told y’all that I love oxygen? 😀

Breathing right again took a little bit. But we were running out of time – the river was sweeping us past the spot where our crewmate was standing.

What happened under water didn’t even take a minute, but it seemed like a lifetime to me. And when I was above the water, all I could think about was breathing and getting to the shore and out of the river.

Bruce was swimming at his end of the canoe, yelling something at me. I took a second to get the water out of my ears, and then I could hear him.

“Brett, you have to grab the canoe and start swimming. Brett?”

I grabbed the side of the canoe and started swimming to the shore. At least, I tried. We weren’t really making any progress.

“Brett? Grab the painter. It will be a lot easier to swim!”

Well, that made sense. I grabbed the painter (the rope hanging from the edge) and started swimming with that.

We made a lot more progress. It wasn’t long before we were nearing the beach (at least, it resembled a beach) where our crewmates were waiting.

Once everyone was done flipping, we had to move the canoes. We had landed them on a small island, so we had to move them all the way across the island, over the (long!) bridge, to the trailer.

It took forever. When we were done, we were all tired and hungry. But we had to wait for the car to get there.

We pulled out some trail mix and sat one some logs to eat it. I was walking over to get some trail mix when Patrick came up to us and told us to not go over to Glenn.

Of course, we asked why.

“Because there is a rattlesnake over there.”

Click here to read the next part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part eighteen of day six, click here.

The boys got excited immediately.

“There is a rattlesnake over there?”

“Yep, and you guys are not allowed to go over to it.”

“What? That is so unfair!”

Patrick told us that if we went past Glenn, we were in trouble. I was fine with that – I wanted to stay away from rattlesnakes. Yeah, it would be kinda cool to see it. But it wasn’t worth getting in trouble for!

The truck and van arrived, and most of us went and started putting our stuff in it. Once I had put my water bottles in my spot, I told Kayce and Maggie we should go ask Patrick for our reward for winning the race the day before.

We ran over, and apparently we were walking too close to the snake. I didn’t even know where the snake was! But Glenn thought we were walking too close to the snake.

I just remember asking if I could see the snake, since I was already there. I was given permission, so I asked where it was. You couldn’t see any snake!

“It’s right underneath that log. It’s a baby one, but it’s still dangerous. Especially because it hasn’t learned to hold back some of the venom.”

It was probably about a foot long, and it wasn’t moving. Glenn said there was a reason for that, but I don’t remember it.

I told Glenn thanks for letting me see it, and headed over to Patrick’s truck.

“Hey Patrick? Can we have our prize? We won the race on the lake, remember?”

“Oh yeah, that’s right. Sure, I’ll get you your prize.”

He lifted a small blue and white cooler out of the back of his truck. Kayce, Maggie and I looked at each other in anticipation – we couldn’t wait to see what we got!

Click here to read the last part of Day Six.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*