When River Rafting goes wrong

I know, I know, it may not seem like much to you all, but for those 5 minutes it felt like the end of the world.

It was a rainy morning, the jungle full of puddles and rocks. Our rafting group consisted of 6 guys, 7 girls, and 3 guides. We barely paid attention to the boring safety procedures since we were shaking in our wet suits and just wanted to get going already.

Okay, I thought, remember the paddles. For the love of God don't let go of those paddles. They cost $30.00 (a fact the guides reiterated).

He ordered half of us to go to on one raft and the other half, to well, you know, the other raft. Our guide was barely educated in the English language (our rafting trip was on the Rio Pastaza in Ecuador) and my fellow American rafters made fun of him. As did I. We were being very unruly.

And off we went. No major scare. It was my first time and I was very excited. The guide yelled "forward hard" and we put all our upper body strength into it. He'd scream "left, right", and we did as told.

Up ahead I saw deep pits of water. I didn't get nervous. Our guide yelled, "INSIDE!" and we sat our American butts right on the floor of the raft. Whew! That was exciting. And that's all it was until minutes later our guide warned us there was a possibility we might flip.

Flip?! What a minute. This wasn't on the brochure. I can't swim. "No flipping," the girls and I chanted. "Take us away from that area." But the boys egged us on. It'd be okay. It'll be fun.

So when I saw the pit, I didn't get scared. We probably won't flip, the guide was just scaring us.

"INSIDE!" yelled the guide, and we obeyed.

At that moment, the right side of the raft tilted so high that it flipped throwing all of us into the water.

I heard the gurgling and bubbling sounds of the river loud in my ears. I could feel my arms instinctively manuvering about trying to balance myself on my feet. But I fell into the water head first and did not honestly know where the ground was or if there was ground at all. Those seconds of misery made me recall every drowning movie I had ever seen. I'm drowning, I'm drowning. I'm going to die.

I'm not a swimmer and I never go into the dip end of the pool or the ocean beach. This was not something I was prepared for.

But finally I felt I had straightened out, and now, I had to pull myself up to the surface. My helmut hit something. When I looked up, I was right under the raft and still under water. Now I know its supposed to have air holes, but in my panic, I didn't breathe. In fact, I was swallowing water. The raft was too heavy to push up, and all I could see was the blue color of the raft all around me. I've got to get outta this thing, I told myself. I began feeling around hoping to find the edge. Seconds turned into minutes.

I finally saw the light of the sky and headed toward it. The waves hit my eyes and my nose. But I could breathe now. The guide was on top of the overturned raft. I held on for dear life. He yelled, "let go, I need to turn it over!" I shook my head. "No way, I'm not letting this thing go. I might go with the current."

I let loose a little while he turned it over, and he pulled me up first. I felt as heavy as an anchor. I breathed deeply. Thank goodness. One of the guys helped retrieve the rest of the people onto the raft. Everyone had a laugh about it except me. Was I the only one who thought she was going to die?

No, the rest of us had similiar stories. In fact, one of the boys pushed one of the male rafters head in just to get onto the boat. There was fear in his eyes. We all pointed to him and laughed.

When my life wasn't in danger anymore, I thought, hey, it wasn't so bad. But I was the only one who didn't save her paddle. Who cares about the freaking paddles?

Does anyone else have a similar story?