Who says you can't float the river twice in one month?

Justin was able to take his Teachers (and our nephew Gage got to come along too) up for a week to Utah, Idaho and Wyoming. Since there was a river run involved I of course went too! I opted not to camp with them though and spent the week instead as my brothers slave repainting his kitchen cabinets. Juli has always wanted to go river rafting and was able to come with me, it was so much fun to be able to watch her and Gage get to experience the river. I'm pretty sure she's hooked now too!

Since we didn't have any extra people watching I took pictures the first run and rode the second (so no pictures from that one). I was so nervous watching them come through because although Justin has been down the river so many times and has learned from the best it was his first time guiding the raft completely on his own. He did great though...for the most part. Coming into Kahuna it slipped his mind to tell those in front to "duck and tuck" so they hit the wall of water straight on, went flying back and took out the rest of the raft! I was worried about some of the boys because I knew they were a little nervous but they all agreed after that falling out was the funnest part!

I went on the second run and although it started to rain on us it was still so much fun. All the rapids were PERFECT, probably the best I've been on. It's a tradition that at the flat part of the river (Gauging straights) someone does a backflip off the raft as a sacrifice to Kahuna, otherwise you will flip your raft there. None of the boys would step up (something about the water being ice cold?) so I made the sacrifice. Probably not the best form but it did the job. When we went into Kahuna it seemed like we were in there forever and our raft got a little crooked, for a second I thought we were going to flip but I think the backflip did the trick and we came out the other side only losing one boy in the process. It was such a great day! Thanks Randy for taking us again and Heidi for letting me borrow your camera so I could get some good shots. The boys watched all the pictures at mutual last night and loved them!

Me and Juli

Justin's raft hitting Kahuna. You can't really tell from this picture since I was far away but it was HUGE (8 feet-ish?)!

When their raft came up I thought they had lost everyone since it was completely flat (there is actually one guy laying in the raft). Justin dumped everyone but one (including himself) and Randy lost two.

Randy's raft going through Kahuna.

Lunchcounter (below)

A close up of Gage's face...priceless!

Justin's raft in Lunchcounter.

Everyone survived and had a blast!!