I Survived the Nile. Oh yeah…and did I mention a Waterfall!
(Whitewater rafting the Nile River in Jinja, Uganda)
"Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me. By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me- a prayer to the God of my life"- Psalm 42: 7-8
God's not finished with me yet.
Today was an amazing opportunity and adventure. I got to extreme raft the Nile river , with 6 other lucky, and lovely ladies on my squad. However, It was not quite the adventure I was expecting! Our tour guide was hillarious and his name was Olow. Praise Jesus for Olow….He saved my life. No…seriously, he saved my life! : )
As we started approaching the first two rapids our team was told quickly to "Paddle hard, paddle hard, paddle hard" and then after that , "Paddle back, paddle back, paddle back"….then I saw it ….A huge rock and big waves….I was like Woah if this is white water rafting then I am in trouble….As the wave then rushed rapidly gushed over our raft and we were then covered in water…Next thing I heard was get down, get down…and our girls did that pretty fast….then Olow said, "move left, move left, left" as we all held on for our lives dearly. I made my way as fast as I could to the other side of the raft and held on..lost my paddle but held on. Emergency whistles were being blown and ropes thrown out at us. It all was so quick but then we hit another huge wave, which happened to be the bottom of the waterfalls. Then we all screamed!! As we kept drifting towards another team at the bottom… they all looked at us with their mouth's dropped open..and then said "Oh my gosh are you all ok?!" We somehow landed the drop. If we hadn't landed it, I would not have liked to see what kind of condition all of us would be in.
Then we were explained by our guide that it wasn't supposed to happen….we had went the wrong way because we hadn't paddled fast enough! We went down a class VI , unraftable section of the rapids. Then I had processed the whole thing….Oh my gosh…I am alive…We just rafted down a small waterfall-like rapid on the Nile!! That was insane….Apparantly there was a shelf underneath and it would have not been good had we flipped… Thank you Lord for your protection over me today! Oh and that wasn't the end of it….as if I was ready to raft some more, we got towards the end of our last rapid and before we go to it, we have to paddle over the current so we don't go into an unraftable level 6 rapid which to me, resembled the part of Niagra Falls that appears before the falls come. So I was in a slight panic after having went down the wrong rapid previously. According to Olow, Level 6 Rapids are not survivable….So as we were paddling to go over to the land to walk around this insane rushing water to walk to the safer rapid, Olow starts yelling, "Paddle harder, harder, harder". I paddled my heart out and then half way fell off the raft as I screeched for Olow to save me. So glad he did , because I would have been in big trouble if not. So today was the closest near death experience I have ever had…. that I would not like to repeat. I love rafting, but not down waterfalls!! : ) Great story though, huh? I can't believe this is true; but it is!! I am pretty sure my heart is beating a little faster now for the rest of my life…will never forget this experience.
Sometimes you might feel like the waves are crashing over you, and you might even fall off of your raft, but if you belong to the Lord, he will bring you back in the boat of life.
Gotta love Jesus <3
pictures coming soon…Africa has the slowest Internet in the world so be patient….!
