ROMEO's White Water Rafting adventures (March 6th)

ROMEO's white water fun on the Murrumbidgee (March 6, 2007)

Hello my dear family & friends,

I have enjoyed a restful couple of days off & it was great to catch up with a few of you over the telephone today ... I went to the "tip shop" yesterday with Benny & Jean-Michel... to the store called Revolve, the place at the Canberra landfill where they sell reusable household items that people drop off instead of sending them to the landfill ... Revolve is run by a non-profit organization. I found a couple of small tables/shelves to use in my room for nightstands for $13, plus a couple of small lamps for $5 ... and it turns out that both of the lamps actually work :)

Also, I have great news on the Bronze Medallion front ... Benny & I did our timed tows back on the 21st of March after our second day of Search & Rescue training. We were both successful in doing our timed tows within the acceptable 3 minutes & 15 seconds :) YIPPEE!! Another competency success and a great affirmation of the improvements in our swimming abilities. Krisette, our Bronze Medallion assessor was quite pleased with the improvements in our swimming strokes and our ability to lower our swim times for the timed tow & the 400m swim.

There's been a few other assessments that I have been signed off on ... for setting up a Rock Climbing anchor system and belay set-up and almost all of the same for the Abseil set-up ... I'll be working on a few small details for the Abseil set-up during the upcoming Year 8 Course Experience that I am on Back-Up for the next 11 days ... it also looks like a few of us that are stationed here at the National Base during this Course Experience will be able to work on getting our Driving Qualifications (Provisional) signed off with the 4 wheel drive (4WD) "Troopies", also known as Land Rovers, by the 6th of April as well :)

We have a total of 3 Course Experience sessions that will provide us with opportunities to do our Back-Up, Observe, & Assist internship activities. This first session takes us from March 26 to April 6 (I am on Back-Up with Chris, Elle, Amy, and we have Owain/"Frodo" and Krisette as our mentors, along with Belinda, our Course Coordinator (CC)). Our second Course Experience happens April 17-27 (I'm scheduled to do my Observe at this time) and the third runs from May 1-12 (I'm scheduled to do my Assist at this time). For both the 2nd & 3rd sessions, I am scheduled to be down in "The Snowies" and will have my RDO's April 28-30 down in the state of Victoria as well. I'll be connecting with my Melbourne Seed Mates to see what kind of plans we can make to meet up & reconnect over those last 3 days of April ... looking forward to meeting up with as many of the Melbourne mob as I can. So Ruth, Glenda, Dot, Hans, and perhaps Basil who I have heard is out that way for the year ...? if you are reading this posting anytime soon, please send me a note & let me know if you are around and able to meet up during my days of April 28-30.

~~~

FINALLY ... a chance to share my update on the whitewater rafting adventures we had a couple of weeks ago ...

As you already saw a couple of postings ago, we enjoyed a great day on the water with the canoes & our instructors Eva & Owain/"Frodo" on March 5th & then on March 6th, we headed back out with them on the Murrumbidgee River & the rafts ... Here's some pic's of the fun we had with the white water & the big rocks that added to the challenge of navigating/negotiating our way along the water ... we often had to bounce around, push off of the boulders in the river, and even hop out to get our rafts unstruck and out of the jams they got into with the big river rocks and the moving water pushing us against these rocks & other hard places ;)

simple raft inflating technology at work ... this technique actually works rather well & everyone can get in on the fun!

Ned, Teresa, Kate, & Zohara paddling along in the Blue Dolphin


... here we go, trying to avoid the big river rock in the middle of the river ...

oh no! ... we're jammed up against/on the rock ... time for Teresa to hop out & pull/push the raft away from the rock ...


... the raft is free to float again ... time for Teresa to get back in ...

no more rocks in this stretch ... now we can paddle all together again!


Owain ... "Frodo" ... one of our moving water instructors

Ned using his hand to push us away from another rock

lean back & keep paddling everyone! ... thanks for your help Frodo :)


in the clear & paddling along the deeper waters again :)

the rowdy rafters (Jean-Michel, Emily, Chris, Margot, & Pecky) having fun IN the rapids after their floatila of backpacks was carried away with the current ... our Blue Dolphin crew got the packs out of the current & onto the nearby shore for them :)

this group really put the new self-bailing rafts to the test ... there goes Emily in the white water rescue position ... feet first down the river ... Pecky must have already headed downstream ...

Mikie & Eva (our instructor in the yellow life vest) leaning back while "Clare Bear" (aka Saunders) & Tanya have fun trying to keep paddling as the water splashes up on them in the front

paddling together to get past the rocks

here they are again ... paddling hard & staying focused ... nice close-up Benny!


portaging with the rafts to get past the big sink hole boulder (to portage = to carry the rafts & our gear on land to get around the big obstacle)

last pack sails down to the water to be loaded up after portaging ... all our packs were thrown down to the water where Owain/Frodo loaded them onto one of the rafts, we loaded ourselves into the rafts a little further down the slope where we could access the shore directly ...

That's about it for my white water rafting picture update ... thanks heaps to Benny & Chris for all the pictures they took during our flat water & white water adventures ... their pic's have helped me share our ROMEO white water stories so much more clearly than words could ever have done. I figured it would be too difficult to get pic's with my camera since it is not waterproofed & because our days on the white water especially have been quite full, with not a lot of time to muck about with taking pictures from shore. I did manage to get some pic's when we were on the flat water but it's sooooo great that I have these other pic's to share with you from our excitement on the moving water FUN!

I'll be in & around the national base during our first Course Experience session that runs March 26 to April 6 and then we have a 3 day break over Easter, YIPPEE!!

Coming up on the evening of April 6th, I am looking forward to going with some of the OBA gang to the Cirque de Soleil's "Veraki" show that has just come to Canberra ... then it looks promising for me to meet up with a couple of Seed Mates over the long week-end during the National Folk Music Festival that happens in Canberra, YIPPEE!! ...

kt & Marie, please give me a call or send me a note so that we can firm up these plans :)

(02) 6235 5764 (phone room in our apartment) or
6235 5743 (apartment kitchen phone) or
6235 5700 (main reception, Sandra can try to search me out during office hours)

I'll be in touch again a little later on in the week. Until then enjoy the coming of Spring back up in the northern hemisphere & please add a comment to my BLOG or send me a note to let me know how you are doing ;)

Be well my dear friends & family,

Teresa

p.s. I'll try to get my Expedition update onto my BLOG sometime this week ...

p.p.s. Belated Birthday greetings to you Shelley ... so sorry I missed you in my earlier b-day wishes ... I had also hoped to call you yesterday but alas time got away from me & the time difference had me able to call you when it was already too late to catch you up ... I'll see if I can squeeze in a call at an appropriate time sometime this week as well ...