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| Not sure what is more wild, West Virginia, or Lauren. |
The whole adventure started off with a travel voucher. After working at a desk job all summer, I was feeling a tad dissatisfied with the lack of adventure I had provided for myself that summer. So when I saw a discount for a New & Gauley River Adventures two-night camping and white water rafting, it seemed to be just the thing to spice things up a little.
So I did what any adrenaline seeking, confident adventurer would do, I asked my friends to please buy this voucher with me because I wouldn't do it alone.
After hearing yes's from a few, I decided to jump right in, shirk my newly found boring desk job personality and seek out some rapids to raft.
Fast forward a few weeks. I find out none of my friends bought the voucher and I can't return it. So after being ditched by those jerks, I decided that I was going to be committed to going, after all there was no reason I couldn't be the adventurous heroine of my life.
Fast forward a week or two. I realized the fear of dying in bear attack alone was greater than my zeal for adventure. So I asked my former roommate and friend, Jen Yoo, to accompany me.
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| Reassuring. |
After making a call to New & Gauley River Adventures to make a reservation I discovered that the camping people were lenient on who pitches a tent on their property. And I also found out that the voucher I bought was for West Virginia. Not Virginia. Surprise.
So Lauren was invited because all of our roommates had weekend plans except for her.
So my camping team was assembled.
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| What could go wrong with these two by my side? |
The departure date was set for Friday after everyone got off work.
After work that Friday, I rush back to my apartment to quickly pack. It was at that moment that I realized how cold it was going to be that weekend, how ill-prepared I was, how I didn't have appropriate clothing for white water rafting, and, finally, how I wasn't sure what food to cook that weekend.
Along with the fear of starvation and hypothermia came the realization that I didn't know how to get to New & Gauley River Adventures. That last thing could easily be solved. I quickly rushed to my computer and printed out mapquest directions.
Upon printing these directions I received a new surprise to the already surprise filled trip - this place was five hours away. Originally I had thought that it would take no more than three hours to get there.
So instead of calling the trip off Jen and I decided to move on forward, without telling Lauren how long it would take to arrive to our destination.
Two hours into our trip we stopped at Cookout in Harrisonburg, VA to have dinner with some friends. That is when we broke the news to Lauren that we still had three hours to drive instead of one! Surprise! Best camping trip ever! She handled it really well, even though she has still not forgiven us.
We arrive to the place around 1 a.m. after driving through a ghost town from a horror movie.
We quickly make note of the welcome sign advertising fine burritos, the many many cars, and many many tents and realize that we are not going to be alone on this trip like we had originally thought. Bear attacks would not be a relevant fear that weekend.
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| Thank goodness we found a place that sold fine burritos. |
We park the car and get out to gather our bearings. We are looking around, trying to soak it all in. Within the first minute out of the car we hear a gun shot and a person yelling, "Shoot, I've been shot!" That is when we knew that that was going to be the general theme of our whole weekend. Gunshots and crazy characters.
With a little bit of uncertainty, we walked around to find the prime place to pitch a tent. We found a spot between three trees and right next to the bar and restaurant, which was another part of camping we did not expect.
Little did we know we were breaking the rules.
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| What are they going to do? Tow us? |
That night the bar, seen in the background of the picture, yes it's an outdoor bar, played music well into the morning, like 4:00 a.m. Then, at approximately 3:30 a.m. there were more gunshots and fireworks and a voice yelling, "wake up campers!" In that moment I was so certain I was going to die.
Luckily, we survived through the night and Jen made us breakfast.
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| The headlamp is a fashion accessory. |
Once we had eaten breakfast, Jen and Lauren escorted me to my solo white water rafting trip, because all my friends ditched me.
I was feeling pretty nervous about the whole experience until I found out I rent a wet suit. With the rental wet suit, I began to regain some of my confidence.
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| Jen made fun of me while I put the wet suit on. |
That newly gained confidence soon eroded after I had put on my wet suit and Jen and Lauren left me alone. All the rafters gathered at the bottom of the stairs and attendance was taken. Attendance went a little like this:
"McDonald, party of 8?" "Smith, party of 2?" "Martinez, party of one? One really? No one else is with you? And your helmet is on backwards."
So after being shamed for being alone and for putting my helment on backwards, I was starting to slightly question this adventure I had chosen to embark on.
Then came the safety talk. One of the instructors outlined all of the ways we would die. Getting stuck under the raft, being sucked under rocks that were undercut, falling out of the boat and into more rapids. I forgot to listen to the how to survive those situations part because I was overwhelmed by the fact that I was going to die.
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| The moment I realized I maybe wouldn't survive white water rafting. |
A forty-five minute bus ride up the side of mountain later, we were at our location. I was in a raft with two married couples. Being a fifth wheel quickly became one of my stronger qualities.
Some other people that went on this trip: a bachelor party (this party also shot guns until 4:00 a.m.), three french guys, two couples (whom I was with), and male members of a family.
After going over the first rapid, and crying inwardly a little, I realized that I probably wouldn't die and decided to relax and enjoy the trip.
Our raft guide was named Skip. He has been guiding rafts for 35 years, essentially since the commencement of the the industry. He was a true West Virginia character, with a long ponytail, an earring and wool socks. On our trip he told us stories about moonshine and the best practices for soaking fruit in moonshine. He pointed out different areas and told us the history behind them, even though most times he made it up. He let us do things that other raft guides don't do because they are younger and care more about the lives of their rafters.
Overall, the white water rafting experiences was one of the best of my life. It was a huge accomplishment and I still can't believe I went through some of the rapids I went through.
The reward for the rafters making it out alive was a beer for all. No worries, I did not partake in this tradition. However, I did enjoy the game they played on the way back - taking a drink every time they saw a trailer.
I returned to the Fine Burrito camping place extremely cold and accomplished.
While I was out adventuring, Jen and Lauren took a walk, played some cards, took some naps, and ate multiple meals.
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| 100th meal of the day. |
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| The walk. |
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| Some Karate Kid exercises. |
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| A camping site Jen and Lauren found. Dresser and all. |
After their walk and my white water rafting, we decided to head over to the bar and restaurant to finally try some of the fine burritos. We ate the burritos so fast we didn't get pictures. My burrito had sweet potatoes in it, definitely a new experience. A fine one.
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| Luckily, there is a picture of this. |
After finishing our dinner and bonding with some fellow diners over a fumble in a football game, we went back to the tent and tried to get warm.
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| Fire in a tent is always a good idea, right? |
We found out Lauren was going to have a new baby nephew, we talked about the movie Pitch Perfect and Jen told us bedtime scary stories.
We tried to sleep. There many gunshots, fireworks, and drunken shouts. Then the bar decided to play some comedy show tracks. Quality bedtime serenity.
The next morning we woke up, said good bye to our neighbors, and put away our little tent.
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| Our show-off neighbors, who needs tents that big? |
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| Our two person tent, where three people slept. |
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| Where our tent used to be. |
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| An awesome campfire someone had made. |
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| Good times were had in the tent. |
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| In all our glory. |
Then to finish is it up, we had a breathtaking drive home with the beautiful West Virginia scenery. Jen took a picture of literally everything, the Pizza Hut, the gas stations, trees, trees, and more trees.
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| Most times the pictures Jen took weren't all that focused. |
And, as if things couldn't get better, we encountered and photographed a motorcycle gang on our way home.
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| As a group. |
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| And individually. |
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| They can use the HOV lane. |
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| He was cold. |
It was a phenomenal weekend. We learned very little about camping, but we enjoyed the gunshots, fireworks, and stories. Thanks for the experience West Virginia.
