For those of you not familiar with Southern Arizona (ok, more like southern-to-mid Arizona), we have a river here called the Salt River. Why it's called that, I don't know. It doesn't taste salty. Anyway. One of the things to do is to go tubing on the Salt River, and a company has taken it upon themselves to help in that endeavor. You drive there, pay $14 and you get a giant inner tube (black with a yellow stripe around it) and a bus ride up to the top of the river. If you are smart, you also pay for an extra tube into which you shove your laden-with-goodies cooler. At the top (aka Point 1), you slather yourself with sunscreen, tie sheets around the tubes (trust me. that black rubber gets REALLY hot and you can take off an inch of skin if you don't have the sheet), tie your tubes together - or at the very least, tie your cooler to someone in your group, and away you go. 3-4 hours later, after beautiful scenery,
snacks and stimulating conversation, you reach point 4, clamber over rocks and other tubers, untie your tubes, untie the sheets, pack everything back up, get back on the bus and head back to your car. At least, that's how you do it in an ideal world....On Saturday, Aimee, Cheryl, Phillip and I decided to go tubing on the Salt River. Actually, the decision was made before Saturday, but the execution of said decision was on Saturday. Anyway. We got up REALLY early, packed the cooler and our bags, and headed up to the river. An hour and a half later, we were there and began the process of getting ready to go: using the restrooms, cramming as much stuff as possible into the cooler and 2 bags, getting tubes, etc.
As per my earlier description, we got to point 1, put on sunscreen, tied down the sheets and cooler, and wearing beautiful floppy hats and no shoes, we shoved off. At first it was pretty calm. Soothing really. And, like I said, beautiful scenery.
After a half hour or so, we broke out the Gatorade (aka Margaritas disguised as Gatorade. No glass containers allowed.) Merrily we floated along. For some reason we were predisposed to floating as close to the shore line as possible. A low hanging and not at all flexible branch nearly decapitated me and then Aimee, but we survived. We came to an island and saw that we were going to be too close to the shore. We began paddling, in a somewhat energetic manner, because the speed of the water had picked up a lot. Just then my behind smacked into a rock, and we realized that there were more pitfalls to this section than just fast water and an island. Before I knew it, I slammed into a rock, my tube flipped over my head and I was being dragged along by the raging water. The water was only about 3 feet deep, so naturally, my knees came in contact with every single rock in the river bed. I struggled along, threw my floppy hat at Phillip and managed to grab hold of my tube. I was trying to pull myself back onto my tube, when it flipped over again, landing me smack in the water with knees and feet hitting yet more rocks. Somehow during all this Phillip let my hat escape. "Help!" I cried and Cheryl reached for me. I pulled myself half on to her inner tube, which threatened to overturn her tube. "Aimee!" she yelled and latched on to Aimee's arm, thereby balancing the tube and the four of us floated into the calm waters of Point 2. Somehow during all that, I was able to hook my hat with my foot and pull it along with me. It was really quite amazing. The rest of the trip was not nearly so adventurous. My side, knees, feet and but began to hurt, but otherwise I was in good spirits.And then...I really had to pee. I mean, REALLY. I hadn't had any Gatorade, but Cream Soda and Water go through you just as much. The pressure began to hurt. I asked "Are there bathrooms at Point 3?"
"Just go in the water" they said.
"Gross," said I.
"The river is your bathroom," said they. "Everybody does it."
"Eww," I thought and tried not to sit quite so low in the water.
Now, I won't say whether or not any members of my group actually did go in the water...you'll have to ask them, but at some point, it got so bad that I gave in to pressure (pun intended) and slipped out of my tube. And I tried. Believe me, I tried. But I couldn't go. I just couldn't! I tried all the old tricks: thinking of waterfalls, rivers (I mean, good grief! We were ON a river!), the song from Bambi that goes "Drip, Drip, Drop little April Showers". Nothing worked. So, I determined that we would stop at point 3 so that I could go to the bathroom. So I waited. And I waited. And we went past the morons who climbed the cliffs, mooned us and then jumped off. And I waited. The pressure kept building and building. Suddenly we saw a sign. -Point 4 ahead, move to the left of the river. -Apparently Point 3 does not exist.
We put on our flipflops and prepared to brave the rocks. Suddenly, one of my lovely yellow flips slipped off my foot and floated down the river. I think I heard it singing "born free, as free as the wind blows". sigh. The other flip yelled "WAIT FOR ME!!!" and raced down the river to join it's mate. double sigh.
We climbed out, unpacked and I thought ok, this isn't bad. The rocks are smooth. I'll be fine. And then I stepped out of the water. See, I had forgotten this phenomenon that happens in Arizona when the sun shines. Things get hot. REALLY hot.
Long story short, I ended up standing on our bag of wet sheets, as Aimee, Cheryl and Phil climbed the hill to the buses and and then Aimee took Cheryl's flips and brought them to me so that I could trudge up the hill. yay.
All in all, though, it was a very memorable day. We all got a little bit of a sunburn and I got....well, let me show you. I apologize for the whiteness.
Nice, huh? It really hurts, too.
